Looking out from my classroom window, watching Gareth take the first football practice of term (and getting quite angry with his team by the looks of things), I wondered what my inbox would hold for me when I got home. I had had to forcibly restrain myself from switching my laptop on that morning, knowing that my concentration at work would be severely impaired if anything interesting was nestling in amongst the Viagra spam. No, I told myself, it’s too soon. You won’t hear anything yet. You probably won’t hear anything, ever.
But what if Sir Right was waiting for me even now, hanging on for my reply?
I giggled to myself and wandered over to my desk, sternly telling myself that I wasn’t to go home until I had marked these shoddy Year Eleven listening exercises. All awful, apart from Tunde’s, as usual.
Unexpectedly, the door opened after a brief knock and I looked up to be faced with …
‘Oh hullo.’
Patrick Superhead Marks, looking as suave and deadly as James Bond, stood with his hand on the knob, casting his eye around my neglected lair.
‘The music room,’ he declared in those knicker-wettening tones. ‘And you must be Cherry? Cherry Delaney?’
‘Yes,’ I said, thrown into confusion. For some reason, I had stood up when he entered the room, just as I used to as an inky-fingered convent schoolgirl.
He loped across, two swift swishes of his long legs, and extended a hand. Still wedding ringless, not that that meant anything. I took it, rather limply, but he shook it with great enthusiasm and I found myself wanting the gesture to go on and on. This was how handshakes were meant to be, my hand enclo
sed in reassuring warmth and strength, given no option but to follow his lead. He really was a lot better looking than I had at first thought, one of those men whose attractions creep up and leap on your unsuspecting libido. The voice was just the fanfare for the man. I hoped I wasn’t blushing, but knew I probably was.
‘I’d hoped to get round all the staff a little more quickly, but you know how it is – some of them have a list of grievances that would fill the pages of the Encyclopaedia Britannica. Still, better late than never. Please accept my apologies.’
‘Uh, of course.’ You have those crinkles at the side of your eyes.
‘Good. So this is your kingdom, is it?’
‘Haha, yes. It’s a little bit ramshackle. Needs a new king, haha.’ Jesus, what am I saying? I can’t think with him standing this close. He’s so distracting, with his piercing green-brown eyes. I wish he’d go away.
‘Well, I don’t know about a new king – you seem to be doing very well. One of the few curriculum areas that’s been getting halfway decent results. But I do agree that perhaps the physical fabric of your land could do with some … regeneration.’
The truth of this statement forced my attention away from him and on to my sorry domain. One piano, indifferently tuned, stood in the corner, while paint-scratched cupboards housed a variety of ancient and battered instruments. The music stands used to be blue but now they were a gunmetal grey. The shelves on the wall held music scores that were used by these children’s grandparents – dog-eared, ripped and graffitied to hell.
‘Music hasn’t been much of a priority in the budget, traditionally,’ I confided. ‘It’s a bit of a poor relation.’
‘That’s a shame. And I think it needs to change.’
I looked up at him again, catching a breath. Was he going to make me an offer?
‘You’ve worked hard, got good results and I think you should be rewarded. Music is a subject area that could be a real success for our school – most of the kids here love music. Many of them DJ or play in bands in their spare time. Why not capitalise on that enthusiasm? I want to build a decent music suite with a recording studio.’
‘That would be amazing!’ You are amazing. I think I love you.
‘Yes. I think it could be developed as a community resource too. It would be popular, newsworthy, give some of the disaffected youngsters a focus, perhaps.’
‘I agree!’ You’re giving me a focus right now. A highly sexual one.
‘Good. I’ll put it to the Governors. And another thing, Cherry …’
The way you say my name makes me want to come. Say it again.
‘There’s more?’ I laughed, trying to convey in that one sound the enormity of my gratitude for his interest in me and my music room.
‘I wonder if you’d be interested in putting on a production? A musical, something like Oliver!. Or, I don’t know, what has lots of young people in it?’
‘West Side Story?’
‘Perfect! The gang theme!’
He clapped my shoulder approvingly, his gorgeously cruel lips angled up in a broad smile. I nearly fainted.