Rumbled

The penny finally dropped for my mum when, for the third time in little over a week, I alleged that my early arrival home from school was attributable to a cancelled football training session.

“I thought you only had football training on Fridays,” she said. This was a Wednesday.

“Oh, this was a special extra session,” I explained.

“But it was cancelled?”

“Yes.”

“Just like last Friday?”

“Yes.”

“And last Wednesday as well?”

“Er, yes.”

“I see. So what else did you do at school today?”

“Oh, the usual stuff.”

“Like?”

“Sums. Reading. A spelling test.”

“And did you get any homework?”

“No – I mean yes.”

“You don’t seem sure.”

“I nearly forgot.”

“What homework have you got then?”

“Writing and sums.”

“Good thing I reminded you, isn’t it? You’d better do it then.”

“OK.”

A little unnerved, I retired to my bedroom to do my imaginary homework. A couple of minutes later my mum came in and closed the door behind her. Uh oh. Perching herself on the edge of my bed she said, “Why don’t you tell me what’s really been going on?”

Carefully manufacturing a look of innocent bemusement, I blinked up at her. “Huh?”

“I know you haven’t been going to school,” she told me. “I found out from Mrs Bouwmeester.”

A surge of panic rose, which I struggled to keep from inflicting itself on my features. Best say nothing, I thought, and did.

“Well?”

Keep calm, don’t say anything, avoid her eyes – perhaps she’ll give up and go away……..

“Well?” she said again, much too soon, and I was forced to acknowledge that my chances of escape did not look promising. So, somewhat hesitantly, with what I hoped was just the right air of indignation, I told her about my victimisation at the hands of Sister Vincent, and my persistent, almost daily, demotions to the babies’ class. When I had finished, Mum looked, and was, furious – but not, I was surprised and extremely relieved to discover, at me. “How long has this been going on?” she asked me.

“Coupla months.” I saw no harm in exaggerating matters.

“A couple of months! Why didn’t you say something?”

I just looked at her. Tell your mother your most shameful secrets? Who was she kidding?

“We pay a lot of money for you to attend that school,” she informed me, with obvious bitterness. “In return, we expect you to receive a proper education, not waste your time doing grade one work!”

It was, I had to admit, a pretty valid point, albeit one that had not occurred to me. I wondered briefly how much money my parents had effectively thrown away subsidising my dozen or so days in Sister Damien’s class, not to mention the days I had refrained from attending school at all.

“Right,” said my mum, using the business-like tone of voice that was frequently the precursor to a thrashing, but on this occasion her ire was directed elsewhere, “if you promise me never to play hooky again, you won’t be punished.”

It seemed a wholly reasonable deal to me, so I nodded.

“In the meantime,” she went on, “your dad and I are going to have a quiet word or two with Sister Mary Paul.”

With that, she got to her feet and headed for the door, only to pause just before she reached it, as though she had suddenly remembered something. Turning to me with a wry smile on her face, she said, “How’s your homework coming on?”

Somewhat reluctantly, I uncovered the exercise book that I had been covering with my elbows throughout our discussion, exposing to my mum’s inquisitorial gaze my somewhat extravagant, half-finished drawing of a triceratops engaged in a frantic and bloody life or death tussle with a tyrannosaurus rex.

“Mmm. Delightful,” said Mum, although she clearly meant the precise opposite.

Not that I cared. Energised and inspired by my unexpected acquittal, I set to work embellishing, and subtly amending, my drawing. Against all the apparent odds, the beleaguered triceratops was destined to survive, in the process consigning its seemingly invincible adversary to an abrupt, appropriately turbulent demise.

I never again played truant, and although I remained one of Sister Mary Vincent’s favourite penological targets, my regular exposure to the deranged wrath of her colleague, Sister Damien, was over. Whether the pair of them are still alive, or enduring perpetual torment in the deepest recesses of the non-existent hell in which I still irrationally believe, I cannot find it in me to wish them well.