Wisps of Cloud

by Ross Richdale

  "It was nothing," Karla replied. "We are a team, Chrissy and always support each other."

  "Val and the boss don't," Chrissy whispered. "Even Gillian doesn't always bother. "

  "I never heard that," Karla said. "See you tomorrow."

  "Yeah! Duty day. I hope the rain stops." Chrissy picked up Stephanie's exercise book, that lay forgotten on the desk and left, far happier than less than an hour before.

  *

  Karla never saw much of the Junior and Middle School production that was held in the early evening a week later in the school hall. She was out the back assembling classes, helping little ones into costumes and, at one point hastily repairing a backdrop that had come adrift. Several parents were there to help but needed her to co-ordinate all the activities. At the same time Val and later Murray paraded around with the parents they deemed important for the school while the teachers looked after their own classes.

  The supper afterwards would have been a complete shambles with screaming children and the few show-offs beginning to tear around, knocking over glasses of orange and grabbing the more desirable food to eat. Karla walked in from the back stage and stared in horror at the scene. One or two teachers were attempting to keep their own children under control but much of the trouble appeared to be pre-schoolers who were ignored by parents more interested in socialising than controlling them. Val and Murray were nowhere in sight.

  Karla stood on the stage in front of the closed curtain and rang a tiny bell. Immediately half the children, mainly those from her syndicate, glanced up, saw her and stopped still. The roar subsided and even the adults paused, talking stopped and slowly the preschoolers stopped running and also looked up at her.

  "I am not pleased," Karla said in a normal voice but it carried across the room. "All school children will sit on the floor with crossed arms and legs."

  Again her own syndicate led but the juniors followed with many preschoolers copying their elder brothers or sisters. When all was quiet, Karla stepped down off the stage and stood at the bottom of the three steps descending from it.

  "You all gave us a wonderful performance of which I and I'm sure your parents, grandparents and friends loved." She stopped and waited until the assembly hall was completely silent. "However, you are not going to spoil it now. Firstly, will those who have their little brothers and sisters with them please take them back to your parents."

  Again she waited as twenty or more children took little ones by the hand and led them to where embarrassed parents rushed out to claim them. Afterwards she made all the classes go and sit in the positions they sat earlier in the evening.

  "The best class at sitting up will be the first to be allowed to go and get one more item of food to eat or to get another orange drink. When allowed to go, nobody will run, shout or skid around," She pointed to a nearby trestle. "Already several drinks have been dropped and I can see three squashed cakes on the floor. There will be no more dropped. Understand?"

  "Yes, Miss Spicer," over two hundred children replied in unison as they sat up and waited.

  "Room Four can go first," Karla purposely picked a junior class and watched with satisfaction as the five-year olds stood and moved over to the food trestles. Almost without exception, every child picked one item of food and carried it with their drink, back to their original sitting position. They sat down and ate quietly as Karla picked another junior class, one from her own syndicate and continued on. Finally, all ten classes were sitting in rows eating and talking quietly.

  "Thank you," Karla said. "That is the way we behave at Tui Park. When you have finished you may get a second item to eat if you wish and find your Mum or Dad. There will be no running or shouting at all. Is that clear?"

  "Yes, Miss Spicer," the voices replied.

  Peace was restored and the evening finished on a high note as supper was finished and the crowd dispersed. Several parents came up to say favourable things about the evening and Val appeared at the main exit door to gush away at those walking out. Murray was conspicuous by his absence and Karla assumed that he had already left,

  "Karla!"

  She turned to see Chrissy standing there.

  "Hi Chrissy. We did well. I loved the item your class put on and your art work was fantastic. Congratulations."

  "But it could have ended as a shambles. I tried to help but…" Chrissy shrugged. "I don't know how you do it. You had the kids eating out of your hand."

  "Not literally, I hope," Karla laughed.

  "I mean it," Chrissy said. "You've taught me more about teaching in the last few months than all those academics at the College of Education did in three years."

  "Let's say there is more to teaching than what the academics preach." Karla whispered, "I was never that good at university. Sure I gained my degree with modest marks but half the theory…" She shrugged. "Mutual respect is important, if you respect the children and vice versa you can't go far wrong."

  Chrissy nodded. "Oh by the way there's a certain School Property Manager waiting outside in that beat-up old pickup. He asked me to tell you he'd give you a ride home if you wish."

  "Ryan!" Karla gasped. "Why is he here?"

  "Oh Karla, you may be an excellent teacher but you are naïve when it comes to guys, aren't you?"

  Karla felt her face heat up but grinned at her friend's wide smile. "Nobody's perfect," she whispered and stepped away to find her jacket and mobile phone from where she had left them behind the stage.

  "Don't do anything I wouldn't do," Chrissy called out to her.

  "Yeah! Gives me plenty of choice," Karla replied. For some unknown reason her heart was racing.

  *

  Karla jumped into the Toyota Hilux but couldn't look at Ryan. "I've got my own car here, you know," she muttered as she watched the last few families leave the grounds.

  "So leave it here. It'll be safe in the school grounds for one night."

  Karla turned and saw Ryan's face. He looked as nervous as she felt.

  "But my place is over five kilometres from yours. Isn't it a bit out of your way."

  "Not really. I've packed a change of clothes and brought my shaving gear."

  "Why?" gasped Karla.

  "Well as you said it a long way between our two houses. I thought I'd stay at your place tonight. Perhaps we could go to our favourite bar first. After all it's only a little after eleven and there are only two more days of school in the term."

  Karla gulped. She had slept with Ryan twice since that first time and every time was more exciting and fulfilling than before and now her heart was racing and she felt more happening to her body as he grinned at her. "I haven't got the spare bed made up," she whispered in a mock protest.

  "We don't need it, do we?" he almost stuttered,

  "All night," she gasped.

  "Why not?"

  She nodded but remained serious. "Let's forget about the pub and go straight home." She turned. "I'm not going to make a habit of this, Ryan."

  He grinned reached over, grabbed her face to turn and kissed her firmly on the lips. At the same time a hand gently squeezed a breast."

  "Ryan!" she gasped as she noticed several people walking to their vehicles. "What if one of the parents sees?"

  "Who cares?"

  Karla smiled. "Yeah but keep your hands to yourself until we get home,"

  "And then!"

  "Oh shut up," Karla responded and hit him none too gently across the shoulders.

  They arrived home and within moments were both dressed in pyjamas and facing each other. He gathered her in his arms and they ended up on the carpet.

  "Not here!" Karla almost shouted as he lifted her shortie pyjama top.

  Twenty minutes later after a bout of love making that left them both gasping and covered in perspiration she broke free and ran into the bedroom. He followed, grabbed her, tossed her on the crisp sheets beneath the pulled-back blankets and everything was repeated with even more enthusiasm than the first time.

  Sometime in the
small hours of the morning, Karla awoke realised she was not alone in bed and they made love again. By the morning she was exhausted but he wanted more.

  "Ryan," she screamed as he reached for her. "I've got to get to school in an hour."

  But it was to no avail as he mounted her and everything else was forgotten.

  *

  Before the children arrived, Chrissy came into her classroom "I noticed that you arrived in that white Hilux and your car never moved all night," she said.

  "So?" Karla retorted.

  "I reckon he must have been a real stud. You look as if you been through a washing machine."

  "Oh hell," Karla gasped as she ran her hand through her hair. "I forgot to brush it."

  "You naughty girl," Chrissy giggled. "How many times? Two… three." She stared at Karla. "Oh my God he stayed all night and you did it every hour on the hour. No wonder you look washed out."

  "Oh don't be crude," Karla retorted. "Anyway it is none of your business."

  "Of course not, Miss Spicer," Chrissy whispered. "Once the dam bursts, you know."

  "No I don't," Karla snapped. "And by the way, I can't remember seeing your Long Term Plan for the end of the year on my computer. Wasn't it due in last Tuesday?"

  Chrissy nodded. "It'll be there. Had trouble loading it."

  "Of course you did," Karla replied. "Before the school holidays, Chrissy and not tomorrow at quarter to four. Understand?'

  "Yes, Miss Spicer," Chrissy replied mimicking a school child. She chuckled, affectionately brushed Karla's arm and retreated from the classroom.

  *

  CHAPTER 3

  New Zealand schools ran a four-term year divided by a two-week holiday break and six weeks over the summer months starting a week before Christmas. Term Three finished in late September so Karla and the other teachers at Tui Park Primary had two weeks holiday. Usually during her break she would have a week away from the school by visiting one of the tourist areas or tramping in the ranges. In the second week she would spend much of her time back at school preparing for the new term.

  This holiday, though, she decided to spend the first week catching up at school and have her break away during the last week. She didn't really admit it to herself but it fitted in with Ryan's hours for he was not on holiday and spent the time at school when no children were there, to wash the school windows, polish corridor floors and clean all those little extra places in the fifteen classrooms that the cleaners weren't contracted to do on a daily basis.

  At mid-morning on Monday Karla was sitting in her office immersed in her computer when she heard a faint cough and glanced up. "Oh, hi Ryan," she said. "I guess it is time for a break."

  Ryan grinned, walked out and returned a moment later with two steaming mugs of coffee and a paper plate of muffins and dainty sandwiches. "Whipped this up for you," he said.

  "Ryan, that's kind of you but what's this whipped up bit?"

  He laughed. "Okay, I got them from the coffee bar down the road. Thought you'd feel like a something at this time." He hesitated as he always did when he wanted to say more.

  "Go on." Karla swung her chair around, took one coffee and nodded at the armchair.

  "You usually have only a week away and the second back at school," he said. "Why are you here?"

  Karla flushed. "No reason," she muttered. "Just wanted to get everything done,"

  "For both weeks?"

  She shrugged. "Not really." She glanced up. "Why?"

  "I'm having some of my annual holidays all next week and was planning to visit the farm. Thought you might like to come."

  Karla grinned. "The farm! What farm?"

  "Mine actually, well a third of it is. When Dad died back in the nineties he bequeathed a third to my mother and a third each to my sister Trish and myself. I think Mum gave Trish quite a large loan to help her buy a new home with her farm profit share used for repayment." Ryan grimaced. "At least that's what should be happening."

  "But it isn't?"

  "Probably not. Mum is a little soft in that way. Anyway, Alan and Mum want to buy me out of my third." He frowned. "I'm not too happy about it so thought I'd go over and check it out. There's a manager on the property but the original house on my part of the farm is empty. That's where I stay when I visit."

  "And where is your farm?"

  "Over the hill and near the coast east of Masterton."

  The hill Ryan referred to was the highway that climbed two hundred metres over the Rimutaka Ranges north of Wellington. On the far side was a broad valley that led north to Masterton, a service town of twenty thousand inhabitants, a hundred kilometres away. From there it was a further fifty kilometres to several small beach settlements on the east coast of New Zealand's North Island.

  Karla glanced up and smiled. "So when will we leave," she said.

  Ryan caught her eyes, "So you'll come?"

  "Of course. I couldn't think of a better place to visit."

  "We could leave on Saturday and stay through to next Thursday. The weather report is good and there should be newly born spring lambs everywhere on the farm. Clive Windley the manager, has been in his position for twenty years or more. He is in his mid sixties and wants to retire next year. That has brought everything forward about what we're going to do with the farm." He shrugged. "Alan is being pushy, too."

  This was the second time Ryan had mentioned a possible conflict with his stepfather but again he said no more and Karla didn't pursue the issue.

  "Saturday will be great." She felt almost nervous as she looked at him. "Want to come around for a meal, tonight?"

  "Sure," Ryan grinned, stepped forward and kissed her lightly on the cheek. They both knew that he'd stay the night and they would sleep together. In many ways he was as bashful as she felt about their affection towards each other. "Must away. They're laying new carpet in Rooms One and Two downstairs and the contractors want me to shift the kids' desks into the corridor."

  Karla smiled and returned to her computer. She glanced at the notes she had been typing and shrugged. "It'll wait," she muttered to herself, switched the monitor off and walked out to her car. Somehow, her enthusiasm for schoolwork had taken a lower priority lately. Nobody seemed to appreciate the long hours she put into her position anyway and with even her syndicate disappearing by the end of the year, why bother?

  *

  After stopping for an early morning coffee in Masterton, Karla let Ryan take over driving her late model Mazda, as he knew where to go. They headed east towards the coast. It was a sunny spring morning and lambs or calves were everywhere. On cultivated land, crops were sprouting in neatly ploughed paddocks. This was one of the prosperous faming areas of New Zealand with a rich history of European settlement. The land had originally been bought in 1853 by the government for a pittance from indigenous Maoris and resold in large blocks to landed gentry from England who had been sold a town section in hilly Wellington where the harbour was and a farm here. The original idea to transpose the English class society into this new country never eventuated with New Zealand becoming free of the rigid British class society.

  "Yes," Ryan replied when Karla asked about his family. "I am the fifth generation owner of the farm." He grinned. "The family did change though. Dad inherited the farm from his mother whose family owned it. I guess it was lucky for Grandma was the only child of Great Grandpa. In those days the girls usually inherited nothing if there was a brother to carry on the family name."

  "How awful," Karla whispered.

  "Yes, Dad was more liberal. That was why he divided the property up between Trish, Mum and myself, A generation earlier, I would have inherited everything and Mum given the right to run the farm until she remarried or died."

  "He could have left it all to your mother," Karla replied.

  Ryan grinned. "I said more liberal. Dad was still pretty conservative as are many farmers who live in this area today. Rural people are still often a generation behind city dwellers like yourself."

  "And y
ou," Karla whispered.

  "Yeah. That's the reason I didn't take over managing the farm way back when Dad got ill and couldn't manage it own his own. He was a bit of a bossy old sod and still treated me like a teenager when I was in my twenties. I worked in Wellington for several years before I decided to go onto varsity."

  "So why are you at Tui Park now?"

  "Money," Ryan replied. "Oh I could be rich by selling my part of the farm but I refused to come under Mum's control and didn't have the heart to sell to anybody else. Anyway, I've got almost all my electronics degree but decided to take two years off, hence the job at Tui Park. I only have two papers to go."

  "That's great. I struggled with mine but got there in the end"

  "I heard you got a BA as well as your BEd."

  Karla shrugged. "Got my BA first and had credits from it help me get my teacher's degree.." She changed the topic away from herself. "How much further?"

  "About twenty kilometres. We turn off the road to Riversdale Beach soon."

  The FM stations broadcasting from Masterton faded behind the hills and Karla turned off the radio. She was quite content to relax and gaze around. Traffic was light with the season being too early for the summer crowds that would visit holiday homes in Riversdale or Castlepoint further north. Every driver who drove past waved and Ryan returned a reciprocal reply.

  "They're locals," he said. "In summer it's different. That's when the teenagers invade."

  They turned off the road and up a narrow winding road to a level plateau where the road headed straight towards distant hills with cultivated and grass paddocks on each side. When they drove past a high hedge Karla gave a tiny gasp. There in almost parklike surroundings, sat a tiny school. The single classroom building would be a hundred years old if it was a day but was well maintained with an older style tennis court covered in colourful playground markings and two gigantic oak trees almost hugging the building on each side. The sign above the high front windows read Top Plateau School.

  "Stop!" Karla said. "Can I have a peep?"

  "Sure," Ryan replied. "My old school. Went here right through to Year Eight."