Page 2 of Still Falling for You

He extends his toned arm. ‘John Fitzwilliam. The PE teacher.’ His grip is firm and confident, and he’s giving me a wide-toothed smile that probably causes all women to swoon or melt into a puddle. ‘This way.’ He points down the long corridor. ‘I can see you’ve already met Mary, King George’s efficient receptionist. She brings constant joy to this place.’ I make a face, which makes him chuckle.

A little bit of warmth pours back into my body. Maybe it won’t be so bad here.

‘So where did you teach before?’ John makes small talk as he leads me down the narrow corridor and up the stairs to the upper level.

‘Nigel Longfleet Academy,’ I say and strategically arrange the scarf so it hides my chest.

‘I’ve heard of that place. Weren’t they markedrequires improvementby Ofsted?’ He scratches his chin and the muscles in his arm press against the fabric of his T-shirt.

‘That was the Ofsted inspection before last. They got agooda few months before I left.’ It’s a sore spot for me because Iworked hard during my teacher training year and was praised by the Ofsted inspectors only to be dismissed two months later. But I’m not going to divulge all that to a virtual stranger even though he seems nice. Aaron used to be nice to me before he was repeatedly nice to the acupuncturist on our John Lewis sofa.

‘My car’s broken down. What’s your excuse?’ he asks.

We steer left and start walking along another long corridor whose walls are covered in examples of pupils’ independent writing and art projects. A number of internal windows to my right show the classrooms on the other side.

All the classrooms are spacious and light, fitted with interactive boards the size of my studio flat’s wall. I could get used to that. Some of the doors have tinfoil-covered robots made out of cardboard boxes standing guard. The air smells of glue and paper, making me feel at home straight away.

John is still staring at me, and I remember he asked me a question. ‘Pardon?’

‘The reason why I’m late? My car broke down.’

He winks at me, and I feel a little aggravated. I don’t want him to think I’m one of those constant latecomers, no pun intended.

‘Road maintenance.’ I check my watch nervously; we’re fifteen minutes late.

We pass the inclusion team’s office, and I wish we had already reached our destination, but John is strolling down the corridor like he’s taking a walk in a park.

‘Just wait for Alex. He’ll flip his lid.’ John exclaims with mirth.

My heart kicks up as it always does whenever the name is uttered despite ten years passing by.

Then the weirdest thing happens. John grips the bridge of his nose with his thumb and index finger, plasters a pained expression onto his face and then huffs with exaggeration. It makes me think of somebody I used to know, minus the huffand dramatics.

‘Who’s Alex?’ I barely make myself say the name, mentally scanning my memory of the school’s limited website currently under construction. I don’t remember any Alexes there.

‘Don’t worry about the old fart. He always gets his knickers in a twist over something. He’s just got promoted to assistant head, and now he thinks he’s been elected prime minister and can boss everyone around.’

He pats my shoulder in camaraderie and somehow the gesture, despite his sexist pun, reassures me.

The tightly knotted bundle of nerves inside me eases. Alex is my age so it can’t be my Alex. Not mine, I correct myself inwardly. Painful memories of Alex Bennet, my first love, flash through my mind. Alex was the first person whoever said he loved me. There’s only one other person who said those words to me and I wish that person nothing but gangrene, rat torture or life entombment.

But despite the zero chance that this Alex is the same person, John’s action brings back memories that heat my cheeks. Alex used to pinch his nose whenever his mum forgot to pay the internet bill, spilt a glass of milk on the floor without wiping it properly or when she left her hair-curling iron on and it burnt a patch into the towel underneath it before Alex switched it off. Alex was a fixer. He made you think that everything would be OK, even if the world was literally going to rack and ruin around you. He definitely didn’t ‘boss people around’ and think he was important. Quite the opposite.

My mind wanders towards the happiest year of my life when I was seventeen and madly in love. But guilt and hurt chase away the warmth building in my chest and muddy the memories.

John stops in front of a classroom door, truncating my self-pitying thoughts. I pull myself together. Through the internal windows, I can see twenty-odd people sitting on child-sizechairs. The desks interrupting the small pockets of people are littered with empty chocolate wrappers, half-eaten packets of biscuits and unfinished mugs of tea and coffee. They’re all listening to somebody speaking in front of the whiteboard half obscured by the door.

John walks in without knocking, beaming, winking and waving like he’s a celebrity onTheOne Show. I’m a ghost in his wake, a sodden shadow. The room is crowded, but I don’t have any strength left to carve my way through. Thankfully, John does that for me with his big personality and wide shoulders.

He heads towards the only two empty chairs in the far-right corner of the classroom, right under the literacy working wall decorated with rainbow-coloured streamers.

I stop and start a few times as people’s crossed and stretched-out legs, bags and chair legs get in my way. It feels like hours before I’m even halfway to my seat. A couple of people smile at me encouragingly, but the majority ignore me and a few even scowl as if my late arrival spoils their day. I finally slump down next to John and school my features to neutral. The back of my jumper drips onto the lino floor in the silence that has reigned over our arrival.

I look apologetically at Jane, the school principal, who’s standing by the teacher’s desk with a PowerPoint presentation running in the background. It sayssafeguarding updatein shouty capitals and it’s still on the main page. Maybe they were just starting. Good.

‘Now we’re all here, we can start,’ Jane announces not unkindly, but there’s something wary about the way she says it that makes me stiffen. For some reason, Jane’s eyes flick to the opposite side of the classroom before they return to the front.

The realisation hits me like a punch in the gut. They’ve been waiting for us. I slouch in my chair and pull out a notebook, wishing the ground would swallow me whole and spit me out in a different dimension.

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