The Teacher's Secret

by Suzanne Leal

  ‘What—again?’ Adam says this with a smile that fades when Mel gives him a warning look. His next question is less flippant. ‘How bad?’

  ‘To put it bluntly,’ she tells them, ‘I was horrified. Horrified to see him picking on a student who’s not only new to the school, but new to the country. I was absolutely appalled to hear the racist tirade that came out of your son’s mouth.’

  Mel arches forward. ‘That’s a pretty serious accusation. What did he say?’

  Ms Mathews shakes her head. ‘I don’t really want to repeat it.’

  But Mel is insistent. ‘Well, we need to know what he said. I mean, if it’s so bad he could be suspended, we need to know exactly what he said.’

  Ms Mathews clears her throat. ‘Mr and Mrs Thompson,’ she says, ‘on Sebastian Chuma’s first day at this school, your son called him a fucking black cunt.’

  Mel is shocked into silence—Adam too.

  ‘So,’ Ms Mathews tells them, ‘I’m sure you can understand why I feel it necessary to suspend your son.’

  As soon as she’s out of the office, Mel turns to Adam. ‘I’m going to kill him,’ she says. ‘I’m going to rip his filthy head off. Then I’m going to ask him what the fuck he was thinking.’

  Adam gives her his lazy smile. ‘Don’t you think it might be a bit tricky to ask him anything, babe, once you’ve ripped his filthy head off?’

  She looks away because she doesn’t want him to make her laugh. She wants to stay angry long enough to be able to really give it to Ethan. Fucking black cunt. She can’t believe it. Can’t fucking believe it.

  ‘Give me the keys and I’ll wait for you in the ute,’ she says. ‘I’m too angry to even look at him.’

  Adam checks his watch. ‘Five minutes until the bell rings,’ he says. ‘I’ll grab them and bring them back to the car.’

  Mel nods. ‘You’d better warn Ethan he’s in for it.’

  Adam leans over to kiss her on the lips. ‘You look so hot when you’re angry, babe.’

  She pushes him away from her but not before she gives him the ghost of a smile. ‘Make sure you tell him he’s in for it, big time.’

  Adam nods. ‘Sure thing.’

  The ute’s parked right outside the school office. It’s the only good thing about getting hauled into the principal’s office half an hour before home time: there’s no fight for a parking space. The bad thing is having to deal with all of Adam’s shit when she opens the car door and tries to climb up into the front seat: building plans, paint sample sheets, hammers and screwdrivers and the rest of it. She pushes it all onto the floor and kicks it out in front of her so she can stretch her legs out.

  Fucking black cunt. Even thinking the words makes her flinch. Where would he have even heard them? Not that it much matters now. Because he’s topped it with this one. Little shit. What the hell was he thinking?

  There’s a small mirror on the back of the sun visor in front of her. Looking in it, she tries to apply a coat of lip gloss without smearing it all over herself. She’s still trying to get it right when Josh comes running hard at the ute. He jumps in the back seat but doesn’t sit down. Instead he stands up so he can wrap his arms around the back of Mel’s head. ‘Ethan’s in trouble, isn’t he?’

  In the mirror, Mel gives him the look. ‘Oh yeah, Joshy boy,’ she says drily. ‘Ethan’s in big trouble.’

  And Adam must have given Ethan the heads-up on that one because he’s looking super scared as he makes his way towards the ute. Well, he’ll be looking a hell of a lot worse by the time she’s done with him.

  As soon as they get home, Mel orders him to sit at the kitchen table.

  Ethan opens his mouth to say something, then stops.

  ‘Well?’ she asks impatiently.

  ‘Can I go to the toilet first, Mum?’

  Standing behind him, Adam mouths, Just say no.

  Mel gives him a hard frown. The last thing she needs is for bloody Adam to turn the whole thing into some comedy routine.

  Ignoring him, she fixes her eyes on Ethan. ‘Make it quick.’

  Josh dumps his bag by the door and escapes up into his bedroom. Adam goes into the kitchen to turn on the kettle and Mel follows him. ‘You want to handle this or will I do it?’ she asks.

  ‘You’re scarier,’ he says. ‘You do it.’

  That just pisses her off. ‘Well, that’s a bloody copout,’ she says. ‘A complete bloody copout. Tell you what, I’ll do the yelling and you sort out the punishment.’

  Adam grins. ‘Done.’

  He laughs when she scowls back at him.

  ‘It’s not funny, you know that, don’t you? In fact, it’s right up there. I mean, calling some black kid a fucking black cunt, it’s pretty bloody outrageous. You hear that in the street and you think, Who is that racist prick? Hang on, that’s our son. But then again, what would you expect from a loser kid like Ethan? Even his bloody principal thinks that.’

  ‘That’s not what she said.’

  He’s still pissing her off. ‘I didn’t say she said it, I said she thought it. And what would you know anyway, Mr Sorry-I’m-late-couldn’t-get-away?’

  Adam keeps his smile. ‘I wasn’t bullshitting, you know. It was true.’

  From the far end of the house, there’s the sound of a toilet flushing.

  ‘Get ready,’ he whispers. ‘Here he comes.’

  Back in the kitchen, Ethan gives Mel an uncertain smile.

  Mel doesn’t smile back.

  ‘Can I, like, have something to eat?’ he tries.

  Mel crosses her arms in front of her. ‘No,’ she says evenly, ‘you can’t. You can just stand there and hear what I’ve got to say to you.’ She keeps her tone pleasant, if a bit cool. It has the right effect. She can see it’s putting the fear of God in him. ‘So,’ she continues, ‘your dad and I, we got called up to the principal’s office today, didn’t we? Turns out you’ve been having a go at some new kid in the school.’

  Ethan doesn’t respond.

  ‘Well, is it true? Did you have a go at him?’

  When he doesn’t answer, she raises her voice. ‘Well, did you? Did you have a go at him or not?’

  He whispers something she doesn’t catch.

  ‘What did you say?’

  This time he looks up at her, his face set hard. ‘I said, he deserved it.’

  Now she really lets fly. ‘So he did, did he? On his first day at your school, he deserved to get picked on by you, did he?’

  He doesn’t answer her.

  ‘And I suppose he deserved to be called a fucking black cunt then, too, did he?’

  Ethan looks blank.

  ‘Well?’

  Still he looks blank. This just makes her more irate. ‘Is there something you aren’t understanding, Ethan?’

  Hesitantly, his lips part.

  ‘Well,’ she snaps, ‘what is it?’

  ‘What’s a cunt?’ he asks.

  She just stares at him. ‘Sorry?’

  ‘I don’t know what a cunt is.’ He says the word openly, so openly it suddenly occurs to her that maybe he really doesn’t know.

  ‘So why did you call him a cunt if you don’t even know what it means?’

  He shakes his head. ‘I didn’t,’ he says. ‘I didn’t call him a cunt.’

  ‘So what did you call him then?’

  He looks shamefaced. ‘Nothing.’

  ‘Tell me what you said to him.’

  ‘I can’t say it to you. You’ll get me in trouble if I say the words to you.’

  ‘I’ll get you in a whole lot more trouble if you don’t.’

  He mumbles something she can’t understand.

  ‘Loudly and clearly, Ethan, or I’ll get your dad to whack it out of you.’

  He takes a deep breath and closes his eyes. ‘Fucking fuck fuck!’ he shouts, his eyes still shut tight. ‘I called him a fucking fuck fuck.’

  Mel looks at him in astonishment. ‘You called him a what?’

  Ethan opens his eyes a bit
and gives her a wary look. ‘I’m sorry, Mum. I just said it. It just sort of all came out.’

  But that’s not what she wants to know. She lowers her voice so she doesn’t sound so cranky. ‘Just tell me again, Etho, just tell me what you said. Just exactly what you said.’

  ‘I said, You’re a fucking fuck, you’re a fucking fuck fuck. I’m sorry, Mum, I’m really sorry.’

  Mel looks over him to Adam and raises her shoulders in a confused shrug. Adam shrugs back.

  ‘I’m glad you’re sorry, Ethan, but your dad is going to have to sort out an appropriate punishment.’ She looks back at Adam. ‘Aren’t you, Adam?’

  Adam gives her a fake solemn look. ‘That’s right, babe.’

  It’s worth a week’s grounding. That’s what Adam decides. For picking on a new kid and for using such bad language.

  Later, when the kids are asleep and she and Adam are getting ready for bed, Adam comes up from behind and starts to nuzzle her ear. ‘You know what you are, babe?’

  She leans the side of her face against his. ‘What?’

  ‘You’re a fuck.’

  She laughs. ‘No, I’m not.’

  ‘Yes, you are, you’re a fuck. Actually, you’re not just a fuck, you’re a fucking fuck.’

  She twists herself around so she’s facing him, then wraps her arms around him. ‘I am not a fucking fuck.’

  ‘Oh yes you are, babe, you’re a fucking fuck fuck. You, my darling, are a real fucking fuck fuck.’

  He starts to moves his hand down her backside. ‘Oh yeah, baby, that’s what you are.’

  She smiles into his neck. ‘You think?’

  ‘Oh yeah,’ he whispers. ‘So, you feel like a fuck, then, you fucking fuck, fuck?’

  ‘Fuck yeah,’ she whispers back.

  Rebecca

  The appointment is at ten o’clock. The lawyer Emmanuel has found does not charge for the advice. Rebecca questions how such a lawyer—a lawyer who doesn’t charge—could possibly be a good one—but she doesn’t argue about it.

  When they approach the counter, the receptionist doesn’t lift her eyes from her computer. ‘Criminal or civil?’

  When neither of them answers, the woman raises her head, takes a good look at them, then slows her voice right down. ‘Do you have an appointment with a criminal lawyer or a civil lawyer?’

  The question irks Rebecca. Surely the woman can see that they are not the sort of people to be in need of a criminal lawyer.

  ‘We have an immigration question,’ Emmanuel tells her.

  ‘That’s a civil matter, then.’ She scrolls down a page on her computer. ‘Your name?’

  ‘Chuma,’ he says. ‘Emmanuel Chuma. And my wife, Rebecca Chuma.’

  The woman is looking doubtful. ‘So is Tumour your first name or your last name?’

  ‘It is our family name.’

  Now she is shaking her head. ‘Nothing under T. Have you got the right day?’

  ‘The name is Chuma,’ says Emmanuel, his voice clipped. ‘C-h-u-m-a. And I am certain that our appointment is for this morning.’

  The woman is still unwilling to take his word for it. She squints at the computer screen, her mouth tight. ‘Emmanuel Chuma,’ she says finally. ‘That right?’

  Emmanuel gives her a small nod.

  ‘Take a seat then and wait for your name to be called out.’

  There are plastic bucket seats lined up along the walls of the room and they take a seat beside a girl who seems only a few years older than Sebastian. It is a surprise, then, to see a baby stroller beside her, with a dirty-faced toddler sleeping in it. As Rebecca watches, the girl slides down in her chair and, letting her head fall back, is soon asleep too.

  From the front of the room, Emmanuel’s name is being called. It is a woman who calls him, and because her voice is thin, she has to speak loudly to be heard. Her hair, Rebecca sees, is unkempt and she wears no make-up. She is dressed casually, in trousers and a shirt under a sleeveless vest, and when Emmanuel lifts his hand to say that, yes, he is Emmanuel Chuma, the woman walks over to them.

  At her request, they follow her down a long hallway. This, Rebecca thinks, is where the lawyer’s office must be. Instead, they are led into a room that is empty apart from a round table and four chairs. There are no books or bookshelves in it, no files and no lawyer.

  ‘Right,’ says the woman, once they are all seated. ‘My name’s Amanda. How can I help you?’

  ‘We were hoping to see a lawyer,’ Rebecca tells her, ‘an immigration lawyer.’

  The woman nods. ‘I’m a lawyer,’ she says, ‘and a migration agent.’

  If this surprises Emmanuel as much as it does Rebecca, he doesn’t show it.

  ‘You’re on a temporary visa, is that right?’

  ‘I have been researching here,’ Emmanuel tells her.

  The woman has a notepad in front of her and now she has started to write in it. ‘So you’re on a student visa, is that right?’

  Emmanuel’s reply comes so quickly he sounds curt. ‘No,’ he says, ‘not a student visa—a research visa. I am an academic. I am a visiting academic.’

  The woman turns to Rebecca. ‘And, Rebecca, are you on the same visa as your husband?’

  To be addressed like this, by her first name, by a woman she doesn’t know—and a white woman, at that—is insulting. ‘My son and I were granted visas on the basis of our relationship to my husband,’ she says stiffly. ‘I can show you our passports.’

  The woman tilts her head to the side. ‘Sure.’

  Reaching into her bag, Rebecca pulls out their three passports.

  The woman flicks through the top one. Rebecca cannot see whose it is, whether it is hers, Emmanuel’s or Sebastian’s. To not know this makes her anxious, immediately and inexplicably anxious.

  ‘Right,’ the woman says finally. ‘So you’re wanting to extend your visa, is that right?’

  ‘Under ordinary circumstances,’ Emmanuel tells her, ‘that would not be our intention. I have good employment in our country. In addition, I hold an academic post. My wife, equally, has good work there. Unfortunately, since my arrival in Australia, the situation has changed somewhat.’ He moves in his chair, shifting his legs. ‘In my absence, my wife was detained. Threats were made against her, and against our son.’

  Rebecca marvels at her husband’s calm delivery of words that make her flinch.

  ‘Are you looking to make a claim for asylum then?’

  Emmanuel looks at Rebecca for an answer, but she has nothing for him, nothing to give him. And so, lowering his head a fraction, slowly he lets his eyelids close over his eyes before he opens them again. I will handle it, he is telling her. She is grateful for this. No, more than that—she loves him for it.

  ‘Yes,’ he says. ‘We would like to make a claim for asylum.’

  For this, there are forms to complete. Afterwards, there will be an interview with an officer from the immigration department. Amanda the lawyer is happy to help them with the forms but won’t be able to accompany them to the interview. Very few applicants bring a lawyer with them, she tells them. And in any case, she adds, most applicants don’t have the money for a lawyer. When, then, with a smile, she includes them in the pool of the poverty-stricken, Rebecca has to swallow before she can smile back.

  That afternoon, she waits in the schoolyard for the bell to ring and for Sebastian to come to her. Because she knows no one here, she waits by herself. This is why she doesn’t turn when a voice calls from behind her, ‘Excuse me? Excuse me?’

  When, finally, she does turn, there is a woman in front of her. ‘The new kid in Year 6,’ she says, ‘are you his mother?’

  Rebecca smiles as she takes in the pale-skinned women around them. ‘Yes,’ she says, ‘I am.’

  The woman pulls at her earlobe. ‘Listen,’ she says, lowering her voice. ‘I’ve got to apologise for my ratbag son. Apparently he had a go at your boy.’

  This is the first Rebecca has heard of it. ‘I’m sorry?’


  ‘Last week,’ the woman tells her, ‘we got hauled into the principal’s office about it.’

  This, too, is news to Rebecca. ‘Was it very bad, then, what he did?’

  The woman shakes her head. ‘What he said, not what he did.’

  ‘And what did he say?’

  ‘Look, the language is bad.’ This, it seems, is meant as a warning.

  Rebecca smiles. ‘I’ve probably heard it before.’

  The woman pauses. ‘So you want to hear it then, what he said?’

  Bemused, Rebecca nods. ‘Yes,’ she says, ‘I do.’

  The words come out in a rush. ‘Fucking fuck fuck,’ the woman says.

  Rebecca thinks she must have misheard her. ‘I’m sorry?’

  The woman grimaces. ‘Yep, a fucking fuck fuck. That’s what he called him.’

  Rebecca is still confused. ‘I’m sorry, what is a fuck-fuck?’

  The woman shrugs. ‘Fucked if I know.’ She gives a bit of a snort. ‘Sorry about that. Makes me sound as bad as my no-good son, doesn’t it?’

  Rebecca tries not to smile.

  ‘Listen to me rabbiting on like a lunatic,’ says the woman. ‘What I meant to do was give you this.’ From her handbag, she pulls out a blank, sealed envelope. ‘I don’t know your name so I couldn’t write it on the envelope. But it’s for you. I mean, it’s supposed to be for you.’

  Intrigued, Rebecca slides a finger under the back flap until it gives. Inside is a card. When Rebecca pulls it out, she can’t hold back a small cry of recognition.

  It is the rock pool card, the very same one. Slowly she opens it, then reads it.

  I wanted to apologise for the bad behaviour of my son, Ethan, towards your son. I’m very sorry it happened.

  Best wishes,

  Mel Thompson

  Mel, Rebecca thinks, Mel. And sure enough, when Rebecca turns the card over, there it is, written in the same looping, swirling sort of handwriting: Made by Mel.

  Rebecca smiles as she looks over at the woman. So this is Mel.

  ‘It’s a beautiful card,’ she tells her. ‘Thank you.’