“Excuse me, please.”The horde of teenagers blocking her path, turned to look at her but didn’t move. Most had a look of mischief about them. Some giggled.
“Excuse me, please,” she repeated. It wasn’t what she wanted to say – not by a long chalk – especially when she saw that the ringleader was Ryan Halliday. He was wearing that smirk again. As if her day wasn’t already bad enough. “Miss, what’s a…” Ryan turned to face the noticeboard on the wall beside him, laughing in anticipation at what he was about to say. She followed his gaze and was horrified to see photocopied extracts of her work-in-progress novel pinned to the board. Somebody – probably Ryan or his trollop of a girlfriend – had gone to the trouble of highlighting various words and sentences. She didn’t have to read it to guess which ones. The “naughty” ones. The ones the Headmaster and his prim and proper deputy had deemed “lewd” and “inappropriate”. In fact her whole manuscript had been termed “inappropriate”. What was inappropriate in her mind was the fact that Ryan had stolen her manuscript from her desk one lunchtime whilst no doubt looking for cigarettes to steal. He’d read bits of it – a challenge for him no doubt – and then left pages all over the school. It had soon been brought to the Head’s attention. The Headmaster had just finished making it abundantly clear to her that her “smutty musings” were never to enter the school premises again or the same would be true of her. Smutty musings! The words made her bristle. Steamy romance is how she envisioned marketing it one day when publishers were falling over themselves to buy it. Besides, were they both so out of touch with the kids in their school that they didn’t realise sex was all over the television and the internet nowadays? She suddenly realised that Ryan was reading an extract from her novel-to-be and it was one of the more erotic passages. That was no coincidence. “Is this based on your own experience, Miss?” he asked, smirking. Those gathered around him burst into laughter as she started to colour. They thought she was blushing with embarrassment, but they failed to notice the set of her jaw and the murderous look in her eyes. It was the perfect slap she would later reflect and the glorious noise it made when her open palm struck his cheek would live in her memory for a long time to come. The kids’ expressions were priceless as they glanced from her to a prostrate Ryan. “I said excuse me,” and like the parting of the Red Sea they stepped back, the corridor opening up before her. It was time to go and clear her desk. A lengthy period of enforced “gardening leave” was beckoning. No, not gardening leave – writing leave. She smiled at the happy thought. Maybe today wouldn’t be a bad day after all. She stepped over the boy and headed for the classroom. © Author to be revealed at the end of the challenge Full details of how Start to Finish works...HERE
5 Comments
Secret Attic
8/5/2022 05:21:43 pm
Oh, the joy of writing! Loved this story - From the horror of having your ms exposed to the giving up the day job to pursue a writing life!
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Cindy Pereira
8/5/2022 05:22:09 pm
Loved it! I think I heard that slap!
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Lou
8/5/2022 05:22:25 pm
I enjoyed the story but I have to say that, speaking as someone who has been an English teacher and a writer for decades, I don't think it was an authentic description of a modern school. The ms of an erotic novel would be deemed, quite rightly, as being entirely inappropriate for a teacher to bring into school, and hitting a child, particularly so hard that he fell down, would be grounds for dismissal, I would have thought, not just 'gardening leave'! However, as a bit of wish-fulfilment, it worked well, and it was well-written. The characters and dialogue sounded plausible and lively.
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Vivienne
19/5/2022 08:52:37 am
Again, come-uppance always goes down well. Yes, there was a bit of suspending belief re this scenario would likely end up in the courts, but hey... A salutory lesson: don't leave your half-written erotic novel hanging around in your workplace! Good bit of comedic writing.
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Ronald T Hardwick
19/5/2022 01:46:41 pm
I laughed at the teacher's view that her novel was a 'steamy romance' and the headmaster took the view that these were 'smutty musings.' My old headmaster, 'Judge' Jeffries would have certainly adopted a similar position. There was a cheery and irreverent feel to the piece, and the idea that the teacher whacked the pupil (not the p.c. 'student', please) in order to achieve her own sacking was a delightfully giddy touch and in these desperate times for teachers, maybe a few will adopt that as a modus operandi!
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