About Hana
Page 3
Chapter 3
The first week of term passed in a blur. On Friday, the staff and students assembled outside in the courtyard for the first of the whole school assemblies. The principal welcomed new students and reminded those from last year what he expected.
The day loomed hot and humid. Tempers snapped amongst the staff, even before the exercise of aligning six hundred chairs outside in the baking sun. Alan Dobbs ran around booming orders and introducing his unique brand of confusion. One minute there weren’t enough chairs. Then too many appeared and needed to be carried back inside by a troop of giggling boys. The invited guests arrived, but nobody remembered to greet them. A beaming set of new parents were sent in the wrong direction and later discovered sitting in the stands by the swimming pool.
So began the lengthy pōwhiri, the colourful welcoming of new students and staff by the impressive Kapa Haka boys. Garbed in their traditional feathered cloaks and loin coverings, the group of older students performed their school haka, filling the airwaves with guttural noises and fearsome display of aggression.
The principal’s address to staff and students proved rousing as always. He conducted his whaikōrero, or formal speech, in flawless Māori and repeated in his gentle Scottish lilt. Angus Blair spoke with conviction about his vision. “It is our intention to make the young men in our care into valuable contributors of society...”
Hana’s mind wandered as the principal outlined his expectations for the year, having heard it for the last fifteen years. Angus had made Waikato Presbyterian School for Boys into one of the best schools in the North Island. Parents boarded their children in the St Bartholomew’s boarding house from as far afield as Australia and Germany, to enjoy the strong academic and sporting acumen of the school. Angus’ strong Christian principles permeated every fibre of the school ethos and he was a man with infinite patience. Hana once overheard him say to a troublesome student, “You may have bounced out of every school in the district, but you’re here to stay. You’ll leave when your time is up and this school has turned you into the useful young man I know you can be. I have all the time in the world and nowhere else I’d rather be!”
When Hana’s husband died in a car accident nine years before, Angus called round to her house. She opened the door to him with reluctance, accepting his visit as the rudimentary five-minute-duty-call. He stayed for five hours, consumed most of a large bottle of red and shared his own experience of losing his wife to cancer months before. “We have to press on, dear,” he told her in a slurred Scots accent, the wine working its magic on both of them. “Otherwise, what’s the point of living?”
The ceremony went without a visible hitch from the perspective of the enamoured new parents. Those members of staff unfortunate enough to be near Sheila Jennings and son-in-law, Rory Kingston were privy to the resounding slap she meted out to him somewhere between the whaikōrero and waiata. The latter drowned out the argument with its rowdy singing. Both possessed faces like thunder and from her distant viewpoint, Hana anticipated the day going downhill fast.
Bored, she studied the new staff members seated on the steps whilst fanning herself with a programme. Angus favoured male teachers in his elite school for boys and this year they looked fresh out of university. Apart from one. The new head of English was Māori and handsome. He looked in his late thirties with jet black hair and olive skin. Even from the other side of the courtyard, Hana noticed his striking eyes. She shifted in her chair to admire the shapely bottom Sheila described with such enthusiasm, but unfortunately, he was sitting on it.
Hana peered too long, deciding if the man’s eyes looked blue or green. The new head boy gushed his acceptance speech at the lectern and sweated ribbons of fluid which left wet patches under his armpits. The handsome male teacher moved and Hana should have averted her gaze out of decency. Slow on the uptake, she discovered his full attention turned on her, as though he sensed her gaze. She gulped. Perched on a small library chair behind the Year 12s, she bobbed her head, sensing the pink blush begin in her cheeks.
Curiosity got the better of her and she peered between boys’ shoulders for another look. Hana stared straight into a pair of piercing grey eyes whose influence crossed the entire distance between them and drilled straight into her soul. She took a sharp intake of breath, causing the boys to look round as an unsettling déjà vu washed over her. The man smiled, an awkward, lop-sided expression, more from his eyes than his mouth. He pulled his gaze away and focussed on the head boy. Hana missed her opportunity to return the smile, convincing herself it was directed at someone else. Much as she wanted to appraise the striking man more, she resisted the urge in case she got caught again. She distracted herself with the excitement of a mental grocery shopping list.