Spying With Sir

by Judy Jarvie

  I walk away, feeling like Khaleesi in Game of Thrones and pretending I look like her. Then I hear words uttered from behind a hand.

  “Told ya she don’t effin’ know. Told ya not ta bovver!”

  It’s Mickey Peters. The boy who dented my car bonnet with a cricket ball. I pounce like a cougar.

  “Peters!” I yell and his rigor mortis response gives me a delicious trickle of thrill. “Another word and it’ll be detention and Mr. Rogerson’s office. If I hear another curse, I’ll be mentioning Matt Riley’s mother. Then you’ll have Knuckles Riley at your door and he’s only weeks out of detention center.”

  They pout at me but I’m already high-fiving myself from atop my high horse.

  “If I knew about the school’s latest staff member, do you think I’d tell a car smasher? Disperse now.”

  I’m only through the door when Jack Carson, school janitor, corners me breathlessly. Creosote Carson, as he’s affectionately nicknamed, is out of puff.

  “Are you still seeing the doctor about your emphysema, Jack? If not, you need to go and get checked out.”

  Jack stops me with a hand. “Izzy, love, we’re getting a new teacher.”

  I’m more worried about his dicky ticker and the wheeze like my nana’s busted accordion than school staffing. “I know. Apparently he’s a premier league footballer. As if.” I roll eyes.

  Jack stares with squished-up eyebrows. “How in feck’s name did you know that, girl?”

  Jack has fingered more gossip pies than Betty Crocker—he’s a loveable Columbo with a wood preserver and chutney-stained coat. I hate to see him thus disappointed.

  “Heard it from the future prison inmate reserves in the car park.”

  “Then you’ll already know the worst.”

  “I know the bare minimum, Jack. It’s best with Viagra Rogerson in charge.”

  Jack’s jowls wobble at me. “The new sports head—he only used to play for feckin’ Spurs, Izzy. Sacrilege! And us Gunners lifers—a viper in our midst.”

  I take this as my cue—Mother of Dragons, Daenerys Targaryen, could play this no better. I throw down my bags and breathe deeply, closing my eyes. Then I stare at Jack with the iced fire of Boadicea.

  “Oh fuck. Bollocks. Crap. Piss. No!”

  In the religion that is Arsenal Football Club, at the cathedral that is the Emirates, I am bishop in training to Carson’s cardinal of fan worship.

  Being a loyal season ticket holder for two decades solid does not come without fortitude and sacrifice. Nor does it allow for a high-caliber Tottenham Hotspur ex-striker to come waltzing into our school staffroom without comment.

  We’re reeling—and I don’t mean doing Riverdance—as we head past phys ed toward the English corridor.

  “Who is it?”

  “You don’t wanna know, girl.”

  “I do. You can’t not tell me.” Much as I’m dreading the answer, there’s no avoiding it.

  “Brilliant finisher—two hundred and five goals in two hundred and fifty games. He joined Spurs juniors in 1994…”

  “Naff off, Carson! Don’t play Question of Sport with me at eight-forty-two on a Monday morning or I’m liable to kick you hard. My shoes are killing me, I set fire to the toaster this morning and my key broke in the back door again. Spit it out in the name of Arsene Wenger.”

  He pouts but his stare goes soul deep, so intense I see the name before he speaks.

  “Darby. Will bloody Darby!” we say in unison.

  I take a step backward to hold on to the wall for support and my ankles feel wobbly. Which reminds me, never buy wedge heels from Debenhams, even in a blue cross sale. Bunions on BOGOF.

  “That’s bad. He was good,” I whisper.

  “I know. Better than good.”

  “Head of PE?”

  “It’s a maverick move.” Carson offers me a stick of gum, but I decline. He pops one in his mouth and I’m hit by a minty waft of school days memories. And the recollections aren’t as welcome as I’d wish them to be. I shiver.

  “When does he start?”

  “Not sure—the copies of his contract are faint but I’ll check again. I ’av my magnifying glass soaking in Sparkle now.”

  “Matt Riley’s mother needs dealing with,” I mutter and kick the loose skirting board where I’m standing. The shoes now have a split seam.

  Carson pulls me close. “I won four balls on the National Lottery on Saturday and invested the spoils in multi-buy Oreos. Pop by my lair at break. I might ’av it cracked.”

  I bite back my professional itch to correct him—it’s a basement dumping ground next to the boiler room with a wasps’ nest in the corner. It isn’t a lair—or, for that matter, a place accustomed to hygiene. But if stinking of something stale and foreboding qualifies as a lair—then a lair it sadly must be.

  “Oreos noted. We’ll meet later.” I tap on my nose. “At least Darby was a class player. If he has to come—better that he be top drawer. But why Netherfield? Why teach when you’ve scaled football’s heights?”

  “He said, and I quote from the application form, ‘for grass roots experience of an inner-city school and to apply opportunities for social inclusion for youth in sports, specifically football’.”

  I’m tempted to ask if Matt Riley’s mother is a code cracker spy in her free time. The woman needs a lesson on the purpose of dusters.

  “Why doesn’t he go for club manager or coach?”

  “Running a bookies would be better than this game, girl. But his mysteries will be revealed in time.” Jack’s phone blasts a vintage chorus of Happy Days Are Here Again. “Time is a wily mistress.” He walks off to attend to his summons.

  The bell sounds and I stride away with purpose for the English staffroom. And that’s when I glimpse him—halfway down the corridor, deep in conversation with Dodgy Rogerson. He’s wearing casual trousers, a waistcoat and an open-necked shirt. I’m grudgingly impressed at how ruddy good Will Darby looks in the flesh.

  His hair is dark and curling at his collar. He’s bronzed as a gypsy prince who’s spent time aboard a pirate ship. The hairs on the backs of my hands prick up and I stand gawping, not wanting to move yet. I’d blame the shoes but I’d be lying.

  I’m expecting him to notice me but he’s avidly attending to Rogerson’s spiel. Not that I think planets will collide or he’d recognize me from the stadium crowd at past matches or anything. I mean, at over five feet seven I’m no pocket Venus, but I think I’ve nice eyes, decent legs in heels and wavy brown hair that can behave when I remember to condition and drag a brush through it. I continue to stand, and still not a glance comes within a meter of me.

  He’s starting to make me feel like Lizzy Bennet at the Assembly when she’s not pleasing enough to tempt Mr. Fancy Buns Darcy. I can’t muster a demi-glance here.

  Will Darby—post young playboy footballer days—looks eerily like Sebastian Silver in The Guy with the Silver Tie. The book that started me reading erotica—my secret hobby. Shit, this is bad.

  “Oh, Izzy. The very person. Can you help me with these?”

  Our head of department Dibian Hicks barrels toward me with a tower of Krispy Kreme doughnut boxes. It’s been many a year since Dibian bent down to clip her toenails. I can’t see Krispy Kremes saving her on pedicures or assisting slimming aspirations. She’s way too generous with her snack donations.

  “Be a doll and open the door. My hands are like fly paper from a breakfast doughnut on the north circular.”

  “Course.” I nod toward the new PE teacher. “Have you spied the sex god in our midst? Sports head’s in the building.”

  Dibian flutters her eyelashes like a flapper girl. “Yes, darling. And I read that he loves a woman with curves! My ship might be in. Before I forget, Izzy—special teaching staff meeting in the staffroom tomorrow lunchtime. Food will be provided. All must attend.”

  I push the door then rush to decant my stuff and grab my room keys. The mental horror of envisaging Dibian and Will in flagrante delicto
derails me from quizzing her on the purpose of the meeting.

  Will Darby at Netherfield—it’s like finding out George Clooney tap dances. In a tutu and a fez.

  In such moments, I find myself asking how one of my favorite literary heroines would react. Lizzy Bennet would grab her bonnet, take a bracing walk then sew a voodoo curse into a sampler. I’ll have to be content with thirty hormonal second years and Muriel Spark in ten minutes.

  This morning’s revelations and seeing Will Darby in the flesh have unsettled me. And put me right off Dibian’s haul of sticky Krispy Kremes.

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  About the Author

  After winning a lovely boxed pen for writing a poem about the beach in a school competition aged eight, Judy Jarvie decided the writing game promised untold exciting treasures. It took her a while to turn that poem into any full length work that anybody would want to read so in the meantime she worked in Press and PR in London until she moved back to Scotland and realised she'd been spurning her one burning love of writing love stories. So she gave in to the call to do it and has kept going ever since. Now the writing keeps her sane and happy and dreaming up new heroes on a regular basis. She lives in a village in Scotland with her husband, two very special daughters and a crazy black cat who all keep her out of trouble and cause a fair bit in return.

  Email: jarviejudy@gmail.com

  Judy loves to hear from readers. You can find her contact information, website and author biography at http://www.totallybound.com.

  Also by Judy Jarvie

  Sassy with Sir: Scoring with Sir