Big and Clever (9 page)

“Already?”

I shrug.

“You know what the bush telegraph is like round here. Everyone knew that David Riley had shagged Louise Wilson before she did.” I'm exaggerating, but not much. “People know who we are now. We're going to start getting some respect.”

Raks smiles. All sorts of possibilities are starting to occur to him.

“Susie and Carly eh? Which one is going to be the lucky lady? Or maybe I'll have them both on the go.”

I pull a face.

“You couldn't handle one of them, let alone two.”

“Well, I'll have to,” Raks says. “I'm not going to be getting any help from you, am I?”

I laugh. I look towards Susie and Carly again. Susie sees me. She flicks her eyes down towards the ground then back in my direction. A little twinge of guilt goes through me. Flirting behind Zoe's back. Bad boy. Still there's no law against it. It's harmless. Window shopping. And it's just nice to be noticed again. I'd almost forgotten what it felt like. I lean back in my chair and smile. All of a sudden life is good.

There's a bit of a commotion over to the left. Looking across I can see Mr Green coming through the door. Grey hair with a side parting, moustache, glasses perched on the end of his nose, England One Day International cricket shirt, keys on a chain on his belt.

“OK then guys,” he's saying. “If we could just have people sitting down, we'll make a start.”

A couple of kids giggle. The music gets turned down, but nobody makes much of an effort to find a chair.

Mr Green tries again.

“OK. Come on guys. Chop chop.”

Once more, no real response. Mr Green's looking slightly edgy now. The shaving rash on his neck is starting to glow bright red. I feel a bit sorry for him really. He's not a bad bloke. He's fiftyish, a Geography teacher of the old school, a throwback to the seventies and eighties. You'd get fairly short odds on him owning a corduroy jacket with elbow patches. Anything goes with Mr Green. On the first day of the autumn term he let it be known that he wanted us to call him Alan, and it's turning out to be a bit of a rod for his back.

“Guys…” He's trying to disguise the desperation in his voice now.

Joe Humphrey pats him on the shoulder.

“Chill out, Alan,” he says.

Another minute passes. People are still milling around, so Mr Green decides to press ahead anyway.

“Right,” he says. “We won't bother with the formalities. Just a quick head count. Hands up if you're not here.” It's the same joke he cracks every few days. Nobody laughs.

Ten minutes later and Mr Green's finally winding things up. He's gone through his usual motivational monologue, and he's given out a list of messages as long as my arm. Don't drop chewing gum on the carpets. Don't wear jewellery in the science labs. Please stop smoking cannabis in the toilets. Students are expected to attend
all
their classes, not just those that fit in with their social diary. Mr Barnard the Principal would like to remind people not to bring mobile phones to school, or if they must, keep them switched off. The bell rings and people stand up, stretching and yawning, slowly heading for the door.

I look at Raks. His eyes are glazed, staring into space. I click my fingers in front of his face.

“Come on. Get in gear.”

Raks blinks.

“I was miles away. What have we got first thing?”

“Business Studies.”

Raks pulls a face.

“Gillespie.”

We both laugh.

Room 37b is already filling up by the time we arrive. Mr Gillespie's nowhere to be seen, but he's definitely been in the vicinity. There's a Newcastle United mug full of milky tea steaming on a table near the front, and he's written
ASSETS AND LIQUIDITY
in big black letters on the whiteboard.

“Shit,” Raks says. “
Liquidity
. How's that going to sound when Gillespie says it?”

“Dunno,” I reply. “But I'm sure we're going to find out.”

I'm just looking around for somewhere to sit when I see a familiar face grinning at me from a table in the far corner. Ryan. Cutting through the crowd, we pull out a couple of chairs and sit down.

“How's it going, lads?” Ryan asks.

“Not bad,” I tell him. I reach into my bag and get out
Super Goals
. “Have a butcher's at this. Page 27.”

Ryan takes it from me, leafing through towards the back. Finding the right page, he squints his eyes, whizzing through the text and nodding. He smiles.

“Nice one. It got mentioned on
Lincolnshire Today
last night too, when they were showing the goals.
Police are concerned about the recent escalation of violence in and around the Southlands Stadium
. That was what they were saying.”

I nod. I pick a piece of loose skin from along the side of my thumbnail and look at Ryan.

“You knew there was going to be trouble on Saturday, yeah?” I'm pretty sure that I've read the situation right, but I just want to be certain.

Ryan laughs, handing back
Super Goals
.

“I had a reasonable suspicion,” he says. “Just recently it's been taking off again. Started the second half of last season, and then carried through into this one. We've been getting a bit of a firm together. It's lads from all over town, but there's quite a few from this place. Jimmy and Scotty in the Sixth Form. Then there's the Year Elevens — Gary Simmons and his mates on your bus. Rob Miller and Big Jerome Thompson.”

Raks shakes his head.

“But when we were in the café on Saturday, and I asked you about trouble at Letchford games, you said it had all died down these days.”

Ryan shakes his head.

“You said that. I just didn't contradict you.”

Raks frowns. He still needs a few things sorting out.

“So if you were fairly positive there was going to be a bit of a ruck, how did you know me and Tom would be able to handle ourselves?”

Ryan holds his hands out, palms upwards.

“I just felt confident. I could see you had it in you.”

“That right?” I say. Not for the first time today, I'm chuffed.
I
didn't know I had it in me.

Ryan nods.

“Yeah,” he says. “And I was spot-on wasn't I? You did good, lads.”

I'm beaming. I feel about two foot taller.

Ryan carries on.

“You're part of the crew now. We're away the next couple of Saturdays — Hereford in the league and then Kidderminster in the first round of the FA Cup — but then we've got Ashborough at home on the 18th. You're coming, yeah?”

Raks is nodding.

“Too right.”

I don't say anything, but I don't need to. I'll be there. It's nearly three weeks away, but already there's a churning in my stomach. A craving. Until Saturday I didn't realise how dull my life really was. And now I can't wait for Saturday to happen all over again. To experience all those sensations one more time. The adrenalin rush. The taste in my mouth. The breathlessness and the light-headedness. The feeling of being one step from the edge of disaster.

Up at the front of the room, something's happening. People are sliding their backsides off the tables and sitting themselves down. Mr Gillespie's here. Tall and thin with spiky black hair. He picks up his Newcastle United mug and takes a slurp of tea.

“Right then,” he says. “Today we're going to talk about assets and liquidity.”

A ripple of laughter goes round the room. The Geordie accent has done the trick again.

“Mr Gillespie,” Kelly Fox says. “What's Lick Widdity?”

The next fifty minutes or so seem to pass me by. Mr Gillespie has had one of his better mornings classroom-behaviour-wise and I'm sure he's given out plenty of good, useful information but I've not really been taking it in. I look at my notes and see lots of stuff about cash flow, liability and fixtures and fittings, but it doesn't make much sense to me.

As the bell goes to end the session and we start to pack our things away, a mobile phone goes off.

Everyone freezes. A few people start looking guilty. Others are glancing around, trying to work out where the sound is coming from. Slowly but surely it begins to occur to us all that there's only one person who would have Geordie anthem
The Blaydon Races
as his ringtone. Mr Gillespie.

The room is deathly quiet. Mr Gillespie looks mortified. He reaches into his pocket and mutes his phone.

“Mr Barnard will have you for that,” I say.

It's not the best joke I've ever cracked. In fact it's not much of a joke at all. But suddenly there's laughter. One second the room was in silence, and now people are pissing themselves. Looking at me and guffawing like I've just come up with the funniest gag since
My Dog's Got No Nose
. It's not everyone of course. The emo lot and the swotty ones and some of the indie mob are pretending not to have noticed, but plenty of kids are having a good old laugh. The popular ones, the chavs, the townies, the hip-hop crew. Even Snoop's joining in, and I've never even seen him smile before.

For a second or two I'm puzzled. This time last week nobody would have noticed me if I'd painted my arse blue and danced naked on the tables. But now I'm the centre of attention. And it's at that point that it all makes sense. I thought the bush telegraph worked fast around here. I just didn't realise how fast. It isn't only Carly Watts and Susie Black who know I've jumped up the Parkway hierarchy. It's everyone. The word is well and truly out. I
am
someone.

I swing my bag onto my shoulder and head down towards the door with Ryan and Raks following. Even out in the corridor I can still hear people laughing. Laughing at my joke, even though it was crap. Because that's what you do when a kid with a bit of influence pipes up. Confidence surges through me. It's a great feeling. For the very first time, I'm completely at home at Parkway College. 100% settled. There's no doubt about it now. I've arrived.

It's just gone quarter past one. The bell for Wednesday afternoon registration is going to go in five minutes and me and Raks are heading into the toilets for a quick pit stop. The urinals are busy so we use the cubicles. Raks goes into trap one and I go into trap three. Whoever's in trap two isn't a well man. The walls between the cubicles are paper-thin and you can't avoid the sound effects. There's a squealing, like air being slowly released from a balloon, followed by rapid splashing and a final burst of what sounds like gunfire. To round things off, a low moan comes floating over the partition.

“Nobody smoke!” somebody shouts.

I zip up my fly, pull the chain and unlock the cubicle. The toilet is clearing out now, as people start making their way to their tutor rooms. I cross to the sinks, squirt a glob of pink handwash into my palm and push down the hot tap. I rinse my hands, then dry them on a paper towel. Back in trap two there's the sound of frantic bog-roll-dispenser use. Raks's cubicle door swings open and he steps out, clicking the cap on a big black permanent marker.

“Been busy?” I ask.

He grins.

I push past him and stick my head round the cubicle door. In four-inch letters on the left hand wall it says
LTFC – PRIDE OF ENGLAND
.

I tut.

“Naughty boy.”

He shrugs.

“Makes a change from the ejaculating cocks or offers of gay sex you usually get in bog stalls,” he says.

I laugh. He's got a point.

The door to trap two opens and a big emo kid emerges. He's got a fringe over his eyes and a huge black leather jacket that's only prevented from dragging on the ground by his stack-heel shoes. I recognise him from the canteen last week. One of the band members.
Nocturnal Emission
is stencilled onto his rucksack. Looks like the Prolapsed Colon boys got voted down.

“You want to eat more fibre,” I tell him.

Emo Boy grunts and shuffles off.

Raks goes across to the sinks. While he's washing his hands, I look at our reflections in the mirror. Not for the first time this week, a thought crosses my mind. A lot has changed over the last few days. Me and Raks are different people now. But on the outside everything still looks the same. We need to do something about it.

“Raks,” I say. “I've come to a decision.”

Raks grabs a paper towel.

“Shit.” He raises his eyebrows, smiling. “That sounds ominous.”

I laugh.

“No. I'm being serious.”

Raks chucks his paper towel into the bin.

“What's up then?”

I run my fingers through my hair and look into the mirror again.

“The hair's got to go,” I say. “We look like a pair of kids. We've got to sort it out.”

Raks has stopped smiling.

“What are you suggesting, man? A proper bonehead?”

I nod.

“It's got to be done. You think of the people we knock about with now. Ryan, Gary, Jerome, Rob – they've all got short hair. Neat and sharp. And then there's us two. First and second place in the Tim Henman look-alike competition. We just don't look the part.”

Raks glances at the mirror.

“You could be right,” he says.

“It's got to be done,” I tell him again. “I've got about a tenner on me. What about you?”

He checks his pockets, counting the coins into the palm of his hand.

“About eight fifty.”

“Right then. You and me are going to be stopping off at Talking Heads on the way home.”

Raks nods.

“Right you are,” he says. He swings his rucksack onto his shoulder and we set off for our tutor room.

Afternoon registration with Mr Green is the usual shambles. By the time he's cracked his ‘hands up if you're not here' joke and done his head count there's a full-scale argument raging in a corner of the room. Sophie Reed and Tanya Fielder are both convinced that the other one's been shit-stirring and saying things about them. As Raks and me pick up our bags and head off round the curve for ICT in Room 22, Mr Green's started trying to sort out Sophie and Tanya's problems. It sounds like it's going to be quite a long process.