Miss Bliss broke off, her eyes flicked over me, a look and then another one – ‘Harry, on my desk, a tiny gift to welcome you all back’ – then carried on.
You’d think she’d trip and hurt herself, walking round the room like that, reading aloud. But she stepped over people’s bags and stuff like she had a radar tracking system hid inside her creaky knees.
On her desk, a bowl with olives in it, oily and dimpled, the same shining deep purply-brown, almost black, of her eyes. I took one. It was my first Christmas present, unless you counted Brenda Beazley’s meditation balls, which I didn’t. I tucked myself into my desk. The lads nodded hello and got their heads down quick.
I slipped the olive into my mouth, sucked on its sweet, salty flesh, tore it, pushed out the stone, munched and swallowed, licked my fingers, wished I could eat ten more right now this minute I was so hungry.
Piggy hissed, ‘You OK, Picks?’
‘Triffic, thanks.’
He looked at me kind of nosy. Same look Mr Donald gave me when I ran into him at the gates and he said, ‘Pickles, just the man I want to …’ Only I didn’t hear the rest of it cos I was running for the building.
Maybe I looked worried on account of the big trouble I’d be in when Mo found out I wasn’t in the house. I tried to look normal, get a grip on the story Miss Bliss was reading about a little boy’s first day at school.
Piggy hissed, ‘Wodjoo get, Picks?’
I mustn’t blurt about the baby.
‘Harry. Wodjoo get?’
Across the room – God knows how she heard him, we reckoned she had every table bugged – Miss Bliss gave Piggy her ‘you’ve been warned’ face and had another funny look at me, like I had my jumper inside out or had forgot to zip my flies. I checked. It wasn’t that.
That boy’s sisters wrapped him up in scarves and stuffed a baked potato in his pocket. Dan liked baked potatoes. The room went dark and light again. My hands felt wet. My bum felt full, you know, like I might poo a noisy wet one. That little boy’s potato burned his thigh.
Peter and Terry, playing battleships, gave me a funny look when they thought I couldn’t see them. I checked my nose for bogies hanging out.
The ceiling cracked and twisted. Kids carried on like always, doodling, staring out the window, passing notes.
Someone stole that boy’s potato.
It wasn’t right.
Kids carried on like they had no idea the air was getting sucked out of the room.
It wasn’t right the way Mo called our baby Dan Dan. It wasn’t right the way we kept him as our secret. It wasn’t right, that sad-happy-sad-again flip she did. You know, one minute loving Little Boy and laughing. Next minute looking like he’d never come along. It wasn’t right – but it was better than before.
The room flashed bright and dark. The Hoberman sphere crashed down and bounced from desk to desk, and no-one saw.
A stumpy girl came up to that little boy. She had springy hair. He had a stick in his hand. He hit her on the head with his stick.
A spluttery cough came out of me.
Miss Bliss said, ‘Harry, are you unwell?’
I made out I had a frog in my throat, but it wasn’t that.
I was the Dutch boy with his finger in the dyke, not just the boy, the dyke as well, and any minute a sea of tears might burst out of me and flood the whole wide world.
That boy who hit the girl said the policeman’s hand on the shoulder always comes as a surprise. Miss Bliss looked my way. Like it was a sign or something. All the stories that she could have picked and she picked that one. I twisted in my seat. My mouth went dry. Was this how Granma felt when she went bonkers, all mixed up?
A sharp knock at the door. I had to squeeze my bum-hole shut.
‘A little word, Miss Balisciano?’
Our school secretary, Miss Fink, did her special whisper that might come in handy one day if the school was burning down and Mr Donald had lost his megaphone.
She hissed ‘Harry Pickles’ every other word, sent dagger looks in my direction. Everyone had a stare at me.
‘Harry, Mr Donald would like to see you. Please follow Mrs Finkelstein.’ Miss Bliss smiled.
‘Be cool,’ said Biffo.
I was cool.
I knew exactly what was happening. Like Miss Fink’s bristly whisper had scrubbed my head out. It was obvious.
I started gathering my things.
Miss Bliss said, ‘Don’t worry, Harry, you won’t be needing those.’
Of course. They’d be no use where I was going.
At the door I had one last look around the classroom. Who would visit me? Brian Smith shot me the panda look he’d had since the operation on his septum that got bent in footie. Pete and Terry, heads together, argued over whether tanks could take out submarines. Piggy smiled, gave me his thumbs up.
‘No dawdling, please.’
Miss Fink clacked down the corridor in her grey skirt and cardigan like she was getting me used to how things would be from now on.
The bell rang for break.
There’d be lots of bells where I was going.
Would there be breaking rocks for punishments? It might help, you know, help make me feel less bad about not checking that Dan was on the bus.
Chairs scraped.
Maybe there’d be football. With a change of air and venue I might regain my form.
Doors opened, noisy kids spilled out.
Would they take me straightaway? But it was chicken stroganoff for lunch.
The corridor walls moved in on me. Darkness gathered round my head. Somehow I knew I had to check on Mo and Little Boy before they took me off to prison.
‘I need the toilet something awful, Miss.’
‘The senior boys’ is just here, Harry.’
‘It’s blocked. I gotta go outside.’
I legged it past the bogs and through the gates and up the road. The cold pinched at my nipples – I’d left my parka in the cloakroom. The ground was hard and slippery. I didn’t care. I ran and ran and halfway home all I could hear was Miss Fink megaphoning after me.