A School Day

Introduction.

       A School Day.

I.

     The year was 2003. My hair was shorter then and my confidence was zilch. The place was Colchester, a town in north-east Essex, England; the town in which I had so far spent the vast majority of my life. To be more specific, the place was in fact the ‘Philip Morant School & College’, Ryder house area, lunchtime. I was almost fifteen years old and was doing my duty as school pupil in my penultimate year of what Mum & Dad used to call ‘big school’.

     I certainly did not feel big however. I wore my green blazer, black smart ironed trousers, and the blue Aylward tie; the cherry on top. My top button was always done up. I sometimes attempted to raise the front of my hair in a quiff purely as an effort to find this fabled character trait which everybody my age lusted over: Cool.

     I remember the year but not the month. I was sitting in a chair with my shoulders slumped, pretending to read whatever was on the wall in front of me. Every few seconds I blinked five times in rapid succession, making sure that everything I blinked at was in perfect symmetry.

     There was a circle of chairs in front of me, each occupied by a fifteen year-old lad. I sat outside the ring of chairs; I was not allowed in the circle you see. There were about twelve members or the ‘Ryder house area crew’. They were not generally jocks, but were deemed ‘cool’ enough to avoid bullying, wedgies, and having footballs kicked at them violently. The ‘crew’ had banished me from the circle because I never talked. I couldn't talk. I could never for the life of me think of what to say, and if I did, I would not have the self-esteem to engage my larynx.

     Ian Appleton turned around to me and I knew a mocking was coming again. The worst part was that I still tried to hang around with these people even though they had told me numerous times to go away, often in more harsh tones than that. Ian smiled at me and belched into my face. I remember his breath stinking of garlic. He then performed his hilarious parody of me by hunching down; crossing his right arm across so it clutched his left shoulder, and blinked rapidly several times. The ‘crew’ broke up at this and now I knew that all their attention would be fixed on me for at least the next five minutes.

     The main focus of their bullying was my muteness. I think now that they took the piss over it because it almost frightened them. If I was shy and awkward (which I always was), then they would feel shy and awkward around me, and these emotions probably freaked them out somewhat. The bullying from the Ryder crew was soft compared to the rest of the school. That’s one of the reasons I stayed there. Indoors I could have no footballs kicked at me and no puddles splashed in my face. The sheer humiliation of trying to sit with a group of people who didn't like me and openly told me so, was not nice. In fact it was f*****g demeaning.

      Secondary School had started bad and plunged around years 9 and 10. I had started off with a few friends, but all had left one-by-one over the years, seemingly searching for popularity like a damaged man seeks a spiritual path. Associating with me was not the way to go if you were going to be the kind of lad who starts drinking, partying and having sex at sixteen. As year 10 approached, it seemed that more and more people realized this, and my popularity �" what there was of it �" plummeted, along with my confidence.

     I don’t remember which young genius came up with my nickname ‘the shadow’, during year 10. I was called this because instead of walking home or to classes among a group of people like ordinary people did, I walked slightly behind like a blind man following a guide dog. When the dreaded year 10 came around and my GCSE’s began, I had taken a fair share of mental battering in the form of bullying, and self-esteem/confidence melting.

     One day after the lunch bell rang, I began making my way towards my tormentors at Ryder house area, and halfway there I stopped on impulse. I think I had finally decided that enough was enough. I was not going to let them humiliate me anymore, however I was far too shy and under-confident to confront them and so my mind turned to another option.

     I had been a natural, talented musician (not to toot my own horn ha-dee-ha), since picking up the clarinet at around the age of ten. Therefore I was familiar with the school’s music department and in my experience, jocks and bullies did not hang around in such places. They preferred the football fields, basketball courts of comfy sofas in the house areas. Strangely and interestingly, I did not actually envy any of them. This is something I have not considered much.

     I turned up at the music department with still 40 minutes to go until the end of lunch. I opened the door to the main room, hoping to find no-one inside. I didn't. To my right was a music cupboard, in which pupils stored their violins, clarinets, guitars, bags etc. It was a small cupboard and when I opened the door it was fully packed. I squeezed inside, sat down among the many instrument cases, and shut the door, making the cupboard almost pitch black. I just sat and waited for the bell hoping desperately that none of the students would come in and see me.

     It was about 20 minutes later when the door opened. I stood up instinctively and found myself looking at Mr. Robb, the head music teacher. Mr. Robb was a well liked, charismatic teacher who was extremely gifted at music, unlike his co-workers. He had always liked me and the feeling was mutual. When I looked into his fishy eyes, I saw there one of the saddest looks of pity I had ever seen.

‘What are you doing here Luke?’, he asked. I knew full well that he already knew the answer to that question; my skills of perception were already running strong at 15.

     I muttered something to the effect of ‘I don’t know sir’. I remember not being able to meet his eyes. I felt embarrassed and I know that he did too. I think that teachers often feel awkward around pupils who are at the bottom of the social ladder. He asked me where my friends were. I don’t know to this day why he asked me that because he knew I had none. Mr. Robb was about as away with the fairies as Peter Pan, but even he knew that I was the unpopular one. Musically gifted, but s**t at social interactions.

        It was the look of pity in Mr. Robb’s face that got me going that evening. I would have preferred he shout at me but instead he looked at me as though I had just received news of a terminal illness. That was what unleashed my major crying fit when I got home that afternoon. That pitying look, among other things. I arrived home from school to find nobody home. I walked upstairs to use the toilet and instead just lay down on the landing and sobbed like a baby. My cat Prudence would have only been a kitten then, but I clearly remember her nudging against me and purring like a pneumatic drill. It seemed at that moment that she was the only living thing on earth who understood my sorrow and she did what she could to help. She helped surprisingly well for a feline actually.

     That night I made possibly the most important decision of my life so far.

     And I came up with a plan.