Page 5 of Short Stack 3

“We don’t want to be TeamDeath,” the twin girls in my group exclaim. They’re wearing more shades of pink than Barbara Cartland, and their bottom lips are trembling. “It’snasty.”

“How about Team Shark?” I say. The Grady sisters look doubtful. “They’re very fast, and they have big smiles,” I say quickly and relax when they all cheer. I straighten my shoulders and offer Dylan a superior look. “I appear to have nipped that insurrection in the bud very ably.” I see Billy’s class teacher, Greg Hampson, approaching and raise my voice so he can hearme. “I can’t imagine why teachers are paid so much. This isn’t difficult at all.”

“We get paid extra because the food is so bad,” he says happily as he comes up next to us.

I roll my eyes. “What really chafes is that Billy isn’t even here.”

“He can’t help having a cold.”

“I wish I’d thought of it,” I mutter. I check my list. The word “toilet” seems to be mentioned more than in aBlackadderskit. I turn back to my group. “Anyone need the toilet, Team Shark?”

“No, thank you,” they all chorus.

“Are yousure?” Dylan says, staring at them.

I nudge him. “Whose team is this? Don’t you have your own perennially sunny group to manage?”

“I can multitask.”

A thought flits through my brain of how good he is at multitasking in bed, but I dismiss it very quickly.Extremelysuper quickly.

“Go away,” I say, and he snorts and turns back to his group.

I look back at mine. “Okay, no loo breaks mean we get first dibs on seats on the bus. Let’s show the others how to get thebestseats.”

They all cheer, and I look up to find Dylan shaking his head.

“What?” I ask.

“You’re introducing a rather competitive element to the day.”

I shrug. “I can’t help that. Children possess it naturally.”

“And some never lose it,” he mutters.

I ignore him in favour of ushering my group, or the winners as they are in my head, onto the bus. Fifteen minutes later, as we pull off the school car park, I revise my assessment when three of them look at me. “Mr Foster, we need the toilet,” they chorus.

I gape at them. “What?”

“I’m desperate,” one boy whispers. Reggie is his name.

“You’ve gone from not needing the toilet to being desperate in ten minutes. That is a surprisingly temperamental bladder.” I sigh. “Okay. Mr Finch,” I call to the driver. “We need to stop.”

The driver gives a weary sigh, strongly suggesting he’s done this before, and opens the door with a pneumatic wheeze.

Ten minutes later, I board the bus and fall into the seat next to Dylan. “If ever we think of doing this again, let’s just go to the zoo and sit in the penguin enclosure and let them eat us.”

He snorts. “You took a while.”

“You were timing me?” I narrow my eyes, my competitive instinct stirring. “Can it be done quicker?”

“There’s no hurrying children.”

“You say that like they’re a separate life form.”

“I think they might be. Of course, my experience is mainly narrowed down to Billy and my nephews.”

I shudder. “Don’t speak their names.”

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