Page 16 of Sex Ed

It takes him a moment to work out that I’m not talking in innuendo.

‘Oh… yeah? You had questions about the photocopier?’ he asks.

‘Well, you know me, Ed. I’ve lost my photocopier card more times than any other member of staff. I’ve set records,’ I tell him. This makes Caitlin giggle. ‘Ed can enlarge things and photocopy on both sides of the paper. He’s an actual wizard.’

‘Ignore her, but yeah, I can talk you through it if you want? We could do it now?’

As Caitlin looks away, I give a thumbs up to Ed who frowns at me in return. I don’t get his problem. He likes the girl and wanted an introduction. This is perfect – plus he really loves that photocopier and understands it like no other person I know.

‘You can eat first if you want, I don’t want to interrupt your lunch,’ Caitlin interjects.

‘Oh, no, I’m good. I can eat later,’ he says, standing up, though he looks flummoxed at having to alter his lunch plans.

‘Perfect, I’ll leave you two to it,’ I say, a little too jovially, winking at Ed. He doesn’t look impressed. For that, I steal his sandwich which he has stupidly left unattended on the sofa. I love tuna.

ED

I’ve been at this school too long today. I left my house at 6.30 a.m. to go to the big supermarket to buy milk, and then arrived super early to lay out muffins and juice boxes and revision booklets that no one will look at. I even used graphics and stapled them together, but I can see those booklets now left in lockers, at the bottom of schoolbags, abandoned for trendier subjects like Photography and Psychology. As I leave, a certain conversation from earlier lingers in my head too.

‘So, this enlarges, and you just press this for a few seconds and then…’ I explained.

‘That’s pretty big. I don’t think I’ll ever need anything that big,’ she replied.

‘Size is good. You can never be too big.’ Silence followed. ‘I mean, for wall displays – I have a student who has an unfortunate squint, so I copy everything big for him.’

Did I squint to illustrate my point? Yes, I did.

‘Well, I think I get it now. Swipe the card, paper in here and keypad there.’

‘Pretty much.’

It was a tutorial that took all of three minutes in our little photocopy room that’s basically shelves and reams of paper and passive-aggressive signs from the office about saving the planet and only making as many copies as you need. All in Comic Sans with smiley faces, all designed to hurt my eyes. All the while, I noticed little things about her. Neatly polished nails, a small daisy bracelet, the fact she smelt like vanilla, not that I was totally weird and inhaled her. But I don’t think I made an impression, not even the smallest of dents. I will be lucky if she remembers my name.

‘BOO!’ a voice comes at me, as I leave the school building and head to my car. Bloody Mia. She likes to jump out at me a lot and thinks it’s funny. I spill a lot of tea as a result.

‘Fuck! Don’t do that!’ I moan at her, pushing her playfully.

She pouts and makes sad puppy eyes at me. ‘Sorry! You swore! You never swear!’

‘I’m very tired and on edge. You could have been a mugger or a wild… animal…’

‘Like a fox?’ she asks.

‘Yes, an urban rabid fox…’

Normally, she’d laugh hysterically at this but instead she is still, a great big grin on her face, trying to work out what to say to me. I’ve not really seen Mia all day and yes, I have been avoiding her. Is she going to ambush me again with the virgin thing? Here? Now? Outside our place of work?

‘Are you mad at me?’ she asks, still pouting.

‘Sort of. What was that photocopier thing? That was so embarrassing,’ I tell her.

‘It was a perfect moment for you two to have a conversation. I’m crap with the photocopier.’

‘I ballsed it up.’

‘How?’

‘By talking… Once I finished explaining the photocopier to her, I randomly told her I liked running. I sounded like Forrest Gump,’ I confess. ‘I like running, you like running?’ I demonstrate in a deep Southern drawl.

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