by Green, Linda
Sam squeezed through the doorway and struggled to the front. ‘The kids are all fine,’ she said. ‘They’re watching the Jungle Book and Zach’s under instructions to keep an eye on Alice when Kaa comes on. Right. Are we ready to start?’ Anna and I nodded. I looked at the assembled group of parents before us: mostly mums, the usual mixture of middle-class professional types and the more alternative brigade, and a spattering of those very handy right-on dads which Hebden Bridge possessed. All of them ready for battle. I had a sense that we actually stood a chance.
‘Thank you so much for coming everyone,’ said Sam. ‘For anyone who doesn’t know me I’m Sam Farnell, one of the parent governors and mum to Zach and Oscar. Jackie here, who’s Alice’s mum, is chair of the PTFA and Anna, Esme’s mum, is secretary of the PTFA.’
We stood there tall (well, obviously not in Anna’s case) and proud, brandishing piles of petition forms. The three musketeers had nothing on us.
‘As you all know, we’ve started a petition against the council’s plan to get rid of Shirley, our school lollipop lady. The good news is, we’ve got over a thousand signatures so far. The reason we’ve got you all here today is to discuss what our next step in this campaign should be. We only have two weeks to go until the council’s budget meeting so we need to do something to make them sit up and take notice.’
Sam looked around, waiting for suggestions.
‘We could write to our local councillors,’ one of the reception mums suggested. ‘Maybe even to our MP.’
‘Great idea, so great we’ve already done it.’ Sam smiled. ‘The governors have written a letter and the PTFA has too. But if any of you could send individual letters that would be great. The more they get, the harder it will be for them to ignore us. I’ve got addresses and a draft letter if anyone wants them.’
The room went quiet again. I’d been planning to let other people go first, but if no one else was going to say anything I didn’t see any reason to hold back.
‘How about a stop-the-traffic protest outside school?’ I suggested. ‘The point being that if Shirley is made redundant, there will be no one to stop the traffic for our children.’
‘But we can’t actually stand in the road, can we?’ one of the dads said. ‘It’s illegal, isn’t it? Obstructing the highway.’
‘He’s got a point,’ said Anna. ‘It wouldn’t exactly help the cause if we got ourselves arrested.’
‘We won’t technically be obstructing anything,’ I said. ‘The protest will be on the other side of the road from school and we’ll just take an exceptionally long time getting all the children across the road one by one. With Shirley’s help, of course. It doesn’t take much to cause traffic chaos in Hebden Bridge. I think it’ll do the job for us.’
There were positive murmurings from around the hall. Anna still looked a bit uncomfortable about the idea.
‘We’ll invite the local media,’ I continued. ‘Have big SAVE OUR SHIRLEY placards. Get the kids to join in too. We need to do something that’ll get on the local news. It’s the only way to get them to take notice.’
A lot of heads nodded, including Sam’s. I looked at Anna.
‘Perhaps we should take a vote on it,’ she said. That was the only trouble with Liberal Democrats: they were always so bloody democratic.
‘OK,’ said Sam. ‘All those in favour …’
A mass of hands went up.
‘Against …’
Nothing.
‘I think we’ll take that as a yes then,’ she said. ‘Thank you all for coming and we’ll let you know the date of the protest next week.’
Sam turned to smile at Anna and me as the other parents began to file out of the hall.
‘Great. I guess we need to get a placard production line going then.’ She grinned.
‘Can Rob give us a hand?’ I asked. ‘I think these placards should be objects of beauty. This is Hebden Bridge, after all. People will be expecting something artyfarty.’
Sam laughed. ‘I’m sure he can be roped in. The kids can make their own though. It’ll make it more personal.’
‘Do you think we need to notify anyone?’ asked Anna. ‘The police or the council. I wouldn’t want Shirley getting into trouble.’
‘I don’t see why,’ I said. ‘We’re really not doing anything wrong and the last thing we want to do is get this stopped before it happens.’
Anna still looked concerned.
‘Shirley won’t get into trouble. She’ll simply be doing her job. And all we’ll be doing is helping our children safely across the road. No one can possibly complain about that.’
Anna nodded, her jaw appeared to soften a little too. Or maybe I was just imagining it. We stacked the remaining chairs and made our way down to class two. As we entered Oscar was twirling around in his powerchair singing ‘I wanna be like you hoo-hoo,’ at the top of his voice.
‘Sorry,’ said Sam to Mrs Cooper who had been trying to hold the fort. ‘Has he been like this all the way through?’
‘Yes, but we’ve all enjoyed the performance.’ She smiled.
‘Are we going to save Shirley’s job, Mummy?’ asked Zach, running up to Sam.
‘Do you know what, love?’ she said. ‘I think with all your help, we just might.’
3
ANNA
‘Look, Esme. The first snowdrops are almost out.’
Esme stopped leaping along the stepping stones between the roses in our front garden for a nano-second to glance down to where I was pointing.
‘Oh yeah,’ she said, with the casual indifference of one who has better things to do. I smiled to myself. It was one of the things you didn’t get told in parenting manuals. That one of your children may be so different to you that you sometimes wonder if she is really yours at all. Not just different to me, mind. Different to her entire family. I used to spend hours in the garden with Charlotte when she was this age. She wanted to know what every flower was called. The names of the roses, the variety of tulips. She would help with pruning and planting bulbs. Sit for hours on the front step writing notes and drawing leaf shapes in her exercise book. Even Will, although he’d been less studious in his interest, still used to join me out here and help with the weeding and planting. Although maybe the novelty factor had played a part there. We hadn’t had a front garden in Islington. Or a back one come to that.
Esme attempted to leap over two stepping stones. She landed in between them. Right on top of the snowdrops I’d just pointed out to her.
‘Oops,’ she said, looking up at me and pulling a face. ‘Will they boing back up again?’
‘Probably not, love,’ I said, surveying the flattened stems and trying to keep my voice calm and measured. ‘Tell you what. Why don’t we go and play indoors for a bit?’
‘OK,’ said Esme, turning on her heel and bounding up to the front door which I’d left ajar. ‘Are there any muffins left?’
They were savoury ones. I’d got the recipe from the woman who made them at Organic House. It was an ingenious way to get children to eat asparagus and broccoli without them realising it. And they had pesto in them. Esme would quite happily eat anything that involved pesto.
‘Yes, but wash your hands first please,’ I called after her. There was a seven-year-old girl equivalent of a screech of brakes and a handbrake turn as I heard her crash through into the downstairs bathroom.
I busied myself in the kitchen as Esme sat at the table and in between mouthfuls of muffin regaled me with stories of what she’d been up to at school.
‘And Mrs Johnson said I wasn’t to do handstands up the wall in the playground any more because of that thing with Amy yesterday.’
‘That thing’ was her way of glossing over the incident in which she had accidentally whacked a classmate in the face with her foot because she’d had the temerity to walk past as Esme had been coming down from her attempt at the world’s longest handstand. Fortunately the girl’s mother had been very good about it when I’d apologised profusely in the play
ground at home time. Said the tooth had been wobbly for weeks anyway.
‘I think that’s only fair, sweetheart. You wouldn’t want anyone else to get hurt. Save your handstands for gym club. That’s the safest place to do them.’
Esme shrugged and said ‘OK’ in a mock disgruntled teenager voice that I presumed she’d picked up from her brother, then reached across to grab a magazine, knocking over her glass of juice in the process. It was the one moment of insight David had had on the parenting front. That perhaps Grace would make a better middle name than first name for our third child.
Charlotte and Will arrived home together. It didn’t always happen, of course. On Mondays Charlotte went straight to her piano lesson and on Wednesdays she had choir practice. Tuesdays and Fridays Will went to a youth-theatre group, but on Thursdays, for some reason, Hebden Bridge was momentarily a cultural desert.
‘Hi, you two. Good day?’
Will grunted and pulled a face as he yanked his tie off and tossed it on the floor. Charlotte said nothing. Just slipped her coat off, hung it up neatly and sat down opposite Esme at the table.
‘The thing is,’ said Will, ‘if we didn’t vote for that poxy new uniform I don’t see why we have to wear it.’
‘It’s called democracy,’ I replied. ‘Nobody voted for a coalition government, but we’ve still got one and we still have to live with what they do.’
‘Yeah, but you and Dad voted Lib Dem. The government thing is at least half your fault. I voted for the polo-shirt and sweatshirt. It was all the other stupid parents and staff who voted for the tie-and-blazer crap.’
‘Will,’ I said, sternly, nodding towards Esme.
‘Sorry,’ he said. ‘I bet she’ll kick off about wearing it too, though, when it’s her turn.’
I suspected he was right. I also knew this was not the time to tell him that his own father had voted for ‘the tie-and-blazer crap’. There again his own father had wanted him to go to grammar school. I was the one who’d argued that Will’s happiness was more important than his exam grades, and if all his mates were going to the local comprehensive and they had a good drama department which was what he really loved doing, then that was fine by me.
‘Well, all you can do is try to get them to change the system. Give more weight to the pupils’ votes next time.’
‘Yeah, but it won’t be in time for me, will it? It’s all right for you. You can change the government in a couple of months.’
‘Not if the majority disagrees with me I can’t.’
‘You know what I mean. At least you’ll get to have your say.’
I wasn’t about to admit to him that I was actually dreading the general election. We’d always made it a family thing, going down to the polling station together. David was very keen on showing the children democracy in action. I guess as a local councillor he had to be. Quite how I was going to hide the fact that I couldn’t bring myself to vote for his party this time, I hadn’t yet worked out. Nor had I worked out who I was going to vote for instead, come to that. It was all looking decidedly awkward.
‘Anyway. Would you like something to eat, love?’
‘Yeah, but nothing you’ve got.’
‘You don’t know what I’ve got.’
‘The muffins are yummy,’ said Esme.
‘If you like eating green vegetables dressed up as cake, which I don’t.’
‘Will!’
‘Well, come on. She’s going to work it out sometime.’
‘They’re aren’t any vegetables in my muffin are there, Mummy?’
Will and Charlotte both looked up at me, keen to see how I’d talk my way out of this one.
‘Only little bits, love.’
‘Where?’ asked Esme, picking up another muffin from the plate and starting to dissect it.
I gave Will a look.
‘What? I was simply broadening her education,’ he replied with a grin, before disappearing upstairs.
‘Charlotte, love. Would you like something?’ I asked.
‘No thanks.’
‘I can do you a cheese-and-tomato sandwich, if you like.’
‘No, really. I’m not hungry.’
Charlotte never usually turned down a cheese-and-tomato sandwich.
‘Is everything all right, love?’
‘Yeah. I’m fine. I’m just not hungry.’ Charlotte pushed her chair back, poured herself a glass of smoothie from the fridge and took it up to her room.
She wasn’t fine. I knew that. But clearly she didn’t feel inclined to tell me what was bothering her. The irony of the professional counsellor who specialised in adolescent behaviour not being able to talk to her teenagers was not lost on me. I consoled myself with the thought that it would be different with Esme. I couldn’t imagine Esme ever being quiet long enough to bottle something up.
David arrived home at 6.01 p.m. He did so every night, just like Mr Banks in Mary Poppins. To be fair, it wasn’t his fault. It was simply that if he walked at his usual pace up the hill from the station, that was the time he arrived. And at least he didn’t expect his slippers to be waiting for him or the heirs to his dominium to be scrubbed and tubbed by 6.03. It was simply that it put the thought of an Edwardian banker in my head, which was never a good start to the evening.
‘Hello, love,’ he said, placing his hands lightly on my shoulders from behind and giving me a peck on the cheek. ‘Smells good.’
‘Roasted red pepper, cannellini bean and sweet potato stew.’
‘Oh, great.’
It was said with only a modicum of enthusiasm. David was a meat, potatoes and two-veg man. When he cooked at weekends that is what we tended to have. On weekdays I got to do my thing.
David hovered in the kitchen for a moment. ‘Remember I’ll need to leave about quarter to seven for the meeting.’
I hadn’t forgotten. Hebden Royd town council meetings were one of the many things listed on the family-organiser calendar which hung on the kitchen door. Esme had called it a family-planning calendar once, causing David to mutter under his breath that it was a bit late for that. It was a joke, of course. The sort which appealed to his dry Scottish sense of humour.
‘That’s fine. It’ll be ready in a couple of minutes if you want to give the others a shout.’
Esme was the first to respond, managing to drag herself away from the lounge where she’d been watching CBBC. While I was cooking was the only time she was allowed to watch television. Fortunately it coincided with the one point during the day when her energy levels took a momentary dip. Half an hour of recharging her batteries on the sofa while watching Blue Peter and she’d got her second wind.
‘Daddy,’ she said, throwing her arms around his waist.
‘Hello, Esme,’ he said, bending to kiss her. ‘What have you been up to at school today? Not knocked anyone else’s teeth out I hope.’
‘No. I’m not allowed to do handstands any more. They didn’t say anything about cartwheels, though. Maybe I can still do them.’
‘Gym club, Esme,’ I called out over my shoulder. ‘I told you to save all that for gym club. Or the park when it’s nice weather.’
I put David’s dinner on the table and went to the bottom of the stairs to call out again to Charlotte and Will. A few moments later Charlotte descended the stairs and silently entered the kitchen.
‘Hello, Lotte,’ said David. He’d called her that since she was tiny. It was quite endearing really. Although I suspected she didn’t think of it that way. ‘How’s the homework going?’
‘Fine, thanks,’ she replied. I wondered whether to warn David that was the answer he’d get to anything he cared to ask this evening, but didn’t want to embarrass Charlotte by doing so.
I watched as she picked at her food, taking an eternity to chase one chunk of sweet potato around her bowl. Next to her, David appeared to be eating in indecent haste. I waited for him to notice. To catch my eye, mouth across the table asking what was wrong. He kept on eating, eyes fixed firmly to the front while
Esme chattered on about what stunts and daredevil challenges she would do if she were a Blue Peter presenter.
I heard Will’s footsteps galloping down the stairs and got up to take his bowl out of the simmer oven. It was only as I carried it over to the table that I caught sight of him in the hall putting his jacket on.
‘Where are you off to?’ I asked.
‘Out.’
‘I was hoping for something a bit more specific than that.’
‘With Jack and Troy.’
I tried really hard not to roll my eyes. And to resist the temptation to point out that he was still not answering the question about where.
‘What about your tea?’
‘We’re gonna get some chips.’
‘That’s not what I mean.’
‘Sorry, Mum. I just haven’t got time.’
‘Well, if that’s going to be the case can you at least tell me next time so we don’t waste the food?’
‘OK.’
David called out from the kitchen.
‘Have you done your homework, son?’
‘Yeah.’
‘OK then.’
That was it. Permission had been granted. There was nothing else I could say.
‘Home by ten then,’ I said, doing my best to raise a smile.
‘Yeah. Laters.’
Will grinned at me, knowing how much I hated the expression and pulled the door shut behind him. I walked back through to the kitchen. Esme was still describing how she would hang-glide off Mount Everest for Sport Relief. Charlotte remained silent and had barely eaten a thing. David stood up, rinsed his bowl before putting it in the dishwasher and turned to me.
‘Thanks, love,’ he said. ‘I’d better be off.’
I nodded and walked out into the hall with him, closing the kitchen door behind me.
‘He’s gone to the park,’ I said. ‘I know he has.’
David shrugged. ‘We can’t stop him going out. You know that.’
‘Yeah, but you’ve seen the kids who hang out there. It’s Special Brew corner.’
‘He could at least drink a Scottish brew.’
‘David, I’m being serious.’