The School Gate Survival Guide (5 page)

‘Excuse me, do you know where 4H or 5R children need to go?’

‘Excuse?’ she said, untangling herself from the spaniel’s lead. ‘My English very bad.’

‘Doesn’t matter,’ I said, waving her away. Of course. No nice Morlands grannies with a fag in their mouths and a toffee in their handbags here. Stirling Hall’s nannies came with a paid-for car and a foreign accent. Bronte was beginning to cry. Just as I was thinking up my most horrible threat for her, a blonde woman, no Penelope Pitstop hairdo, no red lipstick, no handbag with big gold clasp, came over to me. She was wearing jodhpurs. And if they were really only boobs under her sweatshirt, she had an exceptionally large pair of knockers.

‘Hi, are you okay? I heard you asking about 4H and 5R? Is this your first day? It’s always mayhem on the first day of term. I’m Clover, by the way.’ She sounded so like Joanna Lumley in
Absolutely Fabulous
that I thought she might be taking the piss. She thrust out a hand with nails that looked like they spent time in an allotment. My scabby old mitts looked quite refined by comparison.

She turned to Bronte. ‘Listen, my twins are in 4H.’ She called over two identical girls with curly white blonde hair trapped into scruffy ponytails. ‘This is Saffy and this is Sorrel. Just remember that Sorrel has the mole above her left eye. Even I can’t tell the difference sometimes.’

Bronte made no attempt to say her name, so I filled in the blank. Clover bent right down to Bronte’s level, hauling a bra strap against gravity as she went. ‘Do you know what, Bronte? Your teacher is really lovely. Do you like art? Mrs Harper does the best pictures of horses. She’s taught Sorrel to draw a really amazing pony. Will you let the twins take you to class? Look, hold Sorrel’s hand, she’ll show you where to go.’

Miraculously, Bronte’s snivelling puttered to a halt. She glanced down at Sorrel’s hand, which looked as though it was fresh from digging about in a guinea pig cage. I thought I might have a rebellion to deal with, but Bronte put out a stiff little paw for Sorrel to hang on to while Clover kept up her running commentary. ‘Bye bye, darlings, be good, Saffy, remember not to imitate Mme Blanchard’s accent. And do try and eat your apple at break. Sorrel, did you put your fountain pen in your bag? And tell Mrs Baines that you’re not doing drama next term.’

‘Fucking hell, Mum,’ Saffy said. ‘Shu’ up.’

Bronte looked the most animated I’d seen her all morning. I had to remind myself to close my mouth.

‘Saffy, I’ve told you before about dropping your t’s. Don’t let me hear any more glottal stops or you’ll be mucking out the horses on your own all week.’

That ‘t’ thing was becoming a bigger part of my life than I’d expected. At this rate we’d all be in the van chanting the prof’s favourite tongue twister: ‘Betty Botter had some butter …’ Although I couldn’t help feeling that Clover had overlooked something beginning with ‘F’.

She waved the girls off. I felt my shoulders come down from around my ears as Bronte scuffed away with the twins without looking back. Clover turned to me. ‘Sorry about that. I can’t stand glottal stops, can you? Now, let’s get your boy sorted out. What’s his name? Harley? Orion can drop him at 5R. Orion, Orion, come here.’

Orion raced over, lanky limbs flailing, tie pulled to one side and mud down the front of his blazer. His curly brown hair was cropped too close to his head so it stuck out at right angles which made him look a bit odd, but he had a friendly, open face. ‘Yes?’

Clover dished out instructions to Orion, who turned to shake Harley’s hand. Bloody hell, it was like the Freemasons round here. Harley managed to get his hand out of his pocket before it got embarrassing.

‘Cor, are you named after a car? That’s wicked. Me dad called me after his favourite motorbike.’

Orion looked puzzled. ‘I’m not named after a car. I’m named after the Hunter, the star constellation. My dad does astronomy. It’s his hobby.’

It was Harley’s turn to look puzzled. ‘Not a Ford Orion then?’ But he sounded indignant, as though Orion had somehow messed up the origin of his name. Not humiliated because, among my many other failings as a mother, I hadn’t been teaching him flaming star constellations since he was six months old. Watching all that confidence, all that optimism stuffed into one baby-faced ten-year-old made me ache to hug him. Luckily, the bell rang and Harley gave me a quick wave, a slightly impatient ‘I’ll be fine, Mum’ and walked off with Orion.

I heard Harley ask, ‘So what car’s your dad got then?’

I turned away. I didn’t want to hear the question – or answer – in reverse. ‘Thanks for sorting out Bronte. She was really worried about coming here this morning,’ I said.

‘My pleasure. It’s difficult starting halfway through the school year, and January’s such an atrocious month, but I’m sure they’ll absolutely love it here. It’s a marvellous school, they’ll settle down in no time. You must come to our class coffee morning next week. Monday. We have one at the beginning of every term so all the mums can catch up. It’s at Jennifer’s, Hugo’s mum, he’s in Harley’s class. I’ll pick you up, if you like.’

‘No, no, it’s okay, thanks anyway.’

‘You will come, won’t you? I’ll send home directions in Harley’s school bag. You’ll get to know all the mums so you can sort out playdates. Anyway must go, horses need exercising. Do you ride? No? Bet you do something far more fucking sensible like Pilates. You’re lovely and slim. Big tits always been my downfall.’

With that, Clover, the mother of a couple of herby girls and a star constellation strode off in her wellies to a muddy old Land Rover. Fucking Clover had saved the day.

I looked down again at the note that Clover had sent home. Though she’d obviously written it with a crayon or an eyeliner, it definitely said Little Sandhurst. Which meant Jennifer’s house was behind these wrought iron gates, a reddish blur down an avenue lined with horse chestnut trees. Jesus. Before I’d even pressed the button to get in, the gates whirred back and a security camera swivelled above my head. Thank God I’d had the good sense to leave the van in the pub car park at the end of the road, otherwise I’d have definitely been risking directions to the tradesman’s entrance.

At the door, I tugged down my T-shirt to make sure my belly button ring wasn’t showing. The long walk up the drive hadn’t agreed with my underwear and I was just in the middle of pulling my knickers out of my bottom when I suddenly remembered the security cameras. I looked round, praying I wasn’t being beamed around the kitchen or the front room, digging between my buttocks for my Asda sideslappers. Then something else caught my attention. A silver Mitsubishi Pajero. Jen Bloody 1. I’d bust a gut, mopping, spraying and hoovering like a chicken on ecstasy to finish early and get over here for coffee with none other than the flaming horn-honker. Stupid cow. For two pins I wouldn’t have come, but Harley and Bronte were having a tricky old time fitting in as it was. If I could help by nodding nicely at other mums and crooking my little finger over a Jammie Dodger, bring it on. Hopefully she wouldn’t recognise me without the van.

The door opened and Jen1 stood there, a skinny minny with super-straight long blonde hair almost down to her waist. I think it was her waist, anyway. The wide belt around it made it look like my wrist. ‘You must be Harley’s mummy. I’m Hugo’s mummy, Jennifer, how do you do?’ She held out a hand that had definitely benefited from the sort of creams I dusted on dressing tables – lotions and potions made from nightingale droppings, Chilean snail slime or snake venom at £100 a blob.

‘I’m Maia, pleased to meet you, Jenny.’ I wondered whether Jen1 phoned the hairdresser’s and announced herself as Hugo’s mummy.

‘I prefer Jennifer, if you don’t mind,’ she said, as she did what I always thought of as the elevator look. She started off looking at the top of my head like an exotic parakeet had settled there, then flicked down, taking in my T-shirt, my cardigan with the button missing, my Primark jeans. She got as far as my shoes, then zoomed all the way up again. As soon as she realised that I was so far down the food chain, there was nothing to compete with, her whole attitude shifted. She dug out a different face, like she was picking one out of the wardrobe. The mask she’d chosen for me was a limited amount of smiling and friendliness so I couldn’t go away and slag her off but I wouldn’t start thinking that I was going to become her bessie mate either.

‘Come in, come in, we’re all in the kitchen,’ she said. I stepped into the hall. Pale cream carpet without a single stain, no splodge of tea, no muddy marks. No place for the Crocs that I’d squelched around the football field in at the weekend. I took them off, wishing I’d worn something other than the Boozy Bird socks that Colin had bought me for my birthday.

I followed Jen1’s trail of perfume as she led me into the kitchen. About twelve women were standing in various little groups around a black marble-topped island with a built-in wine fridge. Jen1 obviously didn’t have to shuffle everything round and stand her milk outside the back door if she’d bought a chicken for Sunday dinner. I handed her the box of bakewell tarts that I’d bought at the Co-op on the way. With barely a thank you, she dumped it down next to a box of Waitrose’s mint truffles and a tin of biscuits from Harrods. She introduced me to a few women who had names like Francesca, Elizabeth and Charlotte, all with their own versions of the elevator look.

I heard Clover swearing before I saw her, a helmet of wayward curls among several shiny bobs. She was wearing a pair of thick round glasses that made her look like Velma off
Scooby-Doo
. A kaftan top created a beaded shelf over her enormous boobs like an usherette’s ice cream tray. She made her way round to my side of the island.

‘Maia, how are you? How are the children settling in? Orrie said something about a problem with Harley’s hair? They’re such fucking fascists at that school sometimes. I mean, they’re great at telling the kids what they’re good at, all those star charts and best bloody handwriting awards, but they’ve got no bastard idea about individuality. Still, I suppose that’s what we’re paying for. They can instil discipline so we don’t have to bother.’

When she took a breath, I told her about the note his teacher had sent me, saying that Harley wouldn’t be allowed back until he’d had his hair chopped off. That same evening I’d given him a number five in the kitchen with Colin’s clippers and watched his curls gather on the floor like an old wig. When I’d finished, my raggle-taggle golden boy looked like he was about to join the army cadets. Harley had run his hand over it, shrugging. ‘S’all right. It feels like a tennis ball.’

When Colin saw it, he did a Sieg Heil salute and told Harley he looked like a BNP supporter. I picked up a curl from the floor, wrapped it in silver foil and put it in the old biscuit tin under my bed where I kept all my precious things. Right on the top of the pile was his school photo from last year. He looked so much younger, scruffy curls falling over his face, cheekily carefree. I had jammed the lid back on.

Jen1 appeared at my side, all buzzy-bottomed and efficient in her black polo-necked jumper and pencil skirt. She offered us a plate of mini chocolate brownies. Clover took one, then scooped up two more. ‘These are lovely, did you make them?’

‘Hugo and I bake every Sunday afternoon. I think it’s essential for children to learn to cook. It’s no wonder that there are so many of these fat chavvy children about when their mothers just feed them pre-packaged rubbish,’ Jen1 said.

I glanced over at my bakewell tarts, still in their box, shining with thick white icing and glacé cherries. I took comfort from the fact that she hadn’t even let the Harrods pure butter shortbread poison her kitchen.

‘We eat organic as far as possible. I’m even getting the gardener to plant some veggies this year. We should have our own rocket, leeks and red peppers by the summer,’ she said, turning to me. ‘Would you like coffee, Maia? I’ve got linizio, livanto or capriccio if you want an espresso or vivalto or finezzo if you want a longer one. Or I’ve got Mao Feng green tea and white Ginseng tea. Or Tung Ting Oolong.’

I didn’t have a clue what she was on about. I must’ve looked a bit dorky because she indicated the coffee machine on the side. ‘Coffee would be lovely. I don’t mind what sort. Thank you,’ I said.

Clover readjusted a bra strap, temporarily raising her left boob like a put about to be shot. ‘If you come round to mine, it’s just instant,’ she said, not quite managing to whisper.

A tall woman came trotting over, horsey teeth, bright orange lipstick and frilly Peter Pan collar. ‘Clover, how are you? And you must be the new boy’s mother. How do you do? I’m Venetia Dylan-Jones. Welcome to Stirling Hall, or SH as we like to call it. How is your son settling in?’

‘Fine, thank you. I think he’s finding some of the work quite hard but hopefully he’ll catch up.’

‘I think reading’s key at this age, isn’t it? Theo’s a great fan of Beverley Naidoo.’ Venetia had the sort of face on that meant she expected us to be impressed. I obviously didn’t get my eyes open wide enough.

‘I don’t think I know who she is.’

‘Of course you do. She’s written all those books about racism and prejudice in South Africa. You must know
Journey to Jo’burg
,
No Turning Back
,’ Venetia said. ‘It’s terribly important for our children to understand other cultures.’

‘I don’t think I’ve come across her.’

Venetia looked as though she thought I might be having her on. She battled on. ‘Of course, he likes fantasy stories as well. Anthony Horowitz, David Almond and Harry Potter.’

‘He’s read Harry Potter?’ Harley was reading
Diary of a Wimpy Kid
and that was a struggle.

Again, Venetia looked at me as though I was speaking a foreign language. ‘He’d read most of them by the time he was eight.’ She had that ‘hasn’t everybody?’ tone going on. ‘Not so keen on the last one, I think he was finding it a bit easy.’

That morning I’d got really stressed over Harley’s spellings because he still hadn’t cottoned on to the fact that some words had silent letters, still writing ‘nife’, ‘nome’ and ‘restling’ while Bronte sat there rolling her eyes. Nothing compared to how bloody stressed I was feeling now. Weren’t any of the other boys reading
Top Gear
and
Doctor Who
annuals?