School Monitor

  Seeing Spencer like he was in the sickbay bathroom fills me with liquid terror, and my legs nearly buckle.

  “One, two, three…”

  “Why don’t you hear him out?” Jones stammers, coming between us as Spencer continues to count. “What—”

  Spencer whirls round, his deranged black eyes silencing Jones. “Whose side are you on?”

  Jones shuffles and looks at his feet. “Yours.”

  “Doesn’t sound like it!”

  “Spencer…”

  Spencer’s having none of it. “Prove it!” he snarls, holding out his polo stick. “Prove you’re on my side, or you and I are through!”

  Jones shakes his head. “I’m not beating him up.”

  “Who said anything about giving him a kicking?” Spencer asks, his calculating cold voice making me tense up even more. “Smash his camera!”

  I meet Jones’s unsure gaze. If he doesn’t follow Spencer’s orders, he’ll be like Hermit, me, and the rest of the school outcasts who have to endure public humiliation and fear on a daily basis. But Jones is no Captain Howard. He’s the silent majority who always looks the other way, and as I make a grab for my camera in one last attempt to get Spencer to see the truth, Jones grabs the polo stick and with a roar brings it smashing down.

  My world ends. Egged on by a laughing Spencer, he continues to smash the life out of my camera until it’s a broken-up twisted corpse of spilt wires and shattered plastic.

  Spencer grins because he knows I’d have rather taken the hits myself than let anything happen to my camera.

  “Now bugger off!” he whispers in my ear, stabbing me in the chest with his finger. “And if you ever try to talk to me again, I’ll make sure you end up like your camera — and that’s a promise.”

  Chapter 57

  I was never going to take it this far. I don’t know if doing so makes me a bad person, but I don’t care. It wasn’t just because Jones smashed up my camera. I know he didn’t have a choice — not really, but when I get back to my room and find Baxter and Finny kicking the crap out of Hermit, I realise I have to stop this any way I can.

  I may not be coming back to the front line next term, but the others will, and the one thing I’ve learnt from all my hours with Captain Howard is that you never leave one of your own behind.

  Hermit refused to take part in Friday’s ambush. For once, he stood up to that lot, and I owe it to him and all the other wimps, geeks, and outsiders to stop this forever.

  If I’m honest, I wouldn’t have cared unless I’d joined their ranks, but I’m one of them now, and I’m going to lead us all to victory. I’m going to destroy St. Bart’s, its precious Code, and everything else it stands for, and as for Mum and Dad, well, they had their chance. They knew Chrissie was nuts. They knew she’d hurt my friends before, and they did nothing, and firing up the security cameras, I start my new project — a film that’s going to change the world!

  Chapter 58

  I’m with the Head and Laura when Chrissie steals the mobile. The Head wants to personally vet my documentary before he’ll allow it to be shown at the Christmas concert, and so we watch it on his laptop.

  He loves it. I knew he would. I know all the tricks. No one taught me how to make people cry, laugh, or jump with fear. It was something I was born knowing how to do, and I knew as the Head watched my film that I’d sucked him right into the horrors of the mud-infested trenches, made his chest swell with pride showing the achievements of the St. Bart’s class of 1912, before playing a guitar solo of epic proportions on his emotional heart strings as the credits roll to the school hymn sung by the boys who all gave their lives in the French trenches. It’s brilliant. Not my best — that’s still a work in progress.

  “It’s very good, Jarvis,” he says, taking off his glasses under the pretence he’s cleaning them, when he’s really wiping away a tear. “What’s the running time?”

  “Just under ten minutes,” says Laura, giving me a smile.

  The Head nods. “I think we’ll show it after the play. Well done, Jarvis. I’m glad there’s one class at least where you’ll make your parents proud.”

  I can’t believe it. Even when I do something good, he has to bring me down.

  “With talent like this, Headmaster,” says Laura, rising to her feet, “Richard only needs to be good at one subject.”

  When I leave, I go straight to tea, where I let Baxter trip me up in front of all the year nines so I’ve another thirty witnesses. Then I trail Bollinger to study hall, hugging my backpack while he hurls insults in my direction.

  I sit in my normal seat and get on with my Latin homework as they pelt me with the usual array of rubber missiles, paperclips, and the occasional sharpener.

  If Chrissie’s done it, she’ll be here any minute. I risk a quick glance as the door opens, but it’s only Hermit. I go back to chewing my biro as I try to translate the passage that looks like an alien language with my one remaining brain cell that isn’t focused on waiting for Chrissie to get back. I hope she hasn’t been caught. Shit! What happens if she has and tells them I made her do it? The thought turns my stomach into a black hole of fear.

  I drop my pencil as something sharp smacks into the base of my skull. I bend down to pick it up, and as I straighten up, the door opens again, and in strolls Chrissie. I almost feel sorry for Spencer as she takes her seat next to him.

  Mouth dry, my insides turn into a nest of vipers as I continue my translation. She can’t have done it. It’s been too long. They would have noticed their mobile was missing by now, and feeling disappointed and relieved at the same time, I’m just about to leave when the silence is broken by the bell, three short rings and one long siren.

  Straight away, there’s a scraping of chairs as everyone whirls round to look at me.

  “All right!” says Bollinger, taking charge. “You all know the drill. Empty your pockets and bags; stand behind your desk facing forwards with your hands on your heads, and no talking — especially you, Jarvis!”

  There’s another rush of scraping chairs, zips, and thuds. I shake everything onto my desk and pull all the stuff out of my pockets. They all think it’s me. I know it isn’t, but now the guilt of setting Spencer up kicks in, when my fingers close around my Dictaphone that I forgot to remove from my inside blazer pocket — I’m dead.

  “What’s the matter, Jarvis?” Bollinger demands, his brown eyes sparkling with delight. “Guilty conscience?”

  “No,” I say, my heart pounding like thunder as I place it alongside my ruler and try to stand tall and confident with my hands on my head.

  He grunts and returns to his desk. A couple of other guys look nervous, probably because they’ve got some smokes or porn. Chrissie — she’s so cool it makes me shiver.

  Parker and Wilson enter the room, their faces set in the same angry grimace.

  “What’s happened?” Bollinger demands as if he’s one of them.

  “Empty your bag and pockets and stand behind your desk with your hands on your head!” Parker barks.

  Looking like he’s been punched in the face, Bollinger retreats behind his elevated desk and does as he’s told before standing facing all of us in the same degrading position — equally as guilty until proven innocent.

  “A member of the staff has had their mobile stolen,” Parker tells everyone, but only looking at me. “Whoever did it, you’ve got ten seconds to confess, and I’ll leave it to the headmaster to determine punishment. If you don’t, I can guarantee the punishment will be expulsion.”

  Focusing on my bit of wall as Parker continues his silent countdown, I continue to squirm as my guilt strums away at my intestines. What was I thinking? Last night this all seemed such a good idea, but now all I want to do is hit the rewind button and go with an alternate script.

  “No?” Parker says, looking up from his watch. “Very well. Mr Wilson, you start on this side. I’ll start by the window.”

  On his way over to my row, Parker stops by to inspect Bollinger
’s desk. “Still smoking, Bollinger.” It’s not a question as he points to the packet of cigarettes before frisking Bollinger like some airport security guard.

  “Only at weekends, sir,” Bollinger replies, still standing tall with his hands on his head.

  “Still loss of privileges, Bollinger,” Parker tells him in a flat voice. “You’re on report for a week.”

  “Yes, sir.” Bollinger somehow manages not to look pissed off, and cleared of stealing, he’s told to sit down and wait.

  Me, I’m three guys away from being exposed as an accomplice to theft.

  Parker reaches my desk just as the sweat begins to roll down my neck.

  “Is this everything, Jarvis?” he asks, pushing the point of his pen through my stuff.

  “Yes, sir,” I say, my eyes following the journey of his pen towards my Dictaphone.

  “You started smoking too?” he demands, holding it up.

  The vipers in my stomach start breakdancing.

  “It’s a voice recorder,” Wilson tells him, in the middle of frisking Hermit. “Jarvis uses it for making his films.”

  Parker grunts and presses the play button.

  My heart’s thumping so loud I’m gobsmacked he can’t hear it, and then everything turns into slow motion as I watch his thumb hit the button.

  “Let’s see what our very own Steven Spielberg’s been working on…”

  Chapter 59

  I swallow again and hope Parker can’t see the single bead of sweat running down my face, but it isn’t me and Chrissie talking — it’s the sound of marching and gunfire. Thank God, there’s hours of this crap I recorded from Laura’s sound effects album.

  “What’s this?” Parker demands.

  “World War I sniper fire,” I tell him, the realisation I’m off the hook sending the vipers into a mild wriggle. “It’s for my media project.”

  Parker turns it off and starts frisking me, slapping me much harder than he needs to before he eventually gives up and starts on Finny, and as I sit down, the next wave of panic pushes me under as I wait for him to reach Spencer. It doesn’t take long.

  “What’s this?” Parker demands.

  I know just by looking at Bollinger’s open mouth the mobile’s been found on Spencer, and because it will look too suspicious not to, I swivel round in my chair, and like everyone else, watch Spencer try to explain it away.

  “Well?” Parker asks for a second time.

  “I didn’t do it!” Spencer tells him, shaking his head. “I’ve never seen it before in my life!”

  I risk looking at Chrissie, and like everyone else, she looks both shocked and disturbed as she mutters in disbelief. There isn’t a micron of guilt in her — me, I’m overdosing on it.

  “So who took it?” Parker demands with full-on sarcasm. “The tooth fairy?”

  No one laughs.

  “Him!” Spencer cries, lunging towards me. “That bastard — he’s got it in for me!”

  I swallow, as once again I’m centre stage.

  “Where were you between three-thirty and four?” Parker asks me, holding Spencer back.

  “I was with the headmaster and Miss Bell,” I reply, reminding myself I’m innocent. “Then I went to tea and came here.”

  “And where were you before that?”

  “He was in my class,” says Wilson, replying for me again.

  “And where were you, Spencer?” Parker demands.

  “This is ridiculous!”

  “Spencer, where were you?”

  “I had a free period, ALL RIGHT!” he yells. “I was in the library!”

  “Can anyone vouch for you?”

  Spencer’s temper explodes. “I AM NOT A THIEF! Check the bloody security cameras!”

  Another aftershock of panic shakes me. I thought I was in the clear when he didn’t find anything on my Dictaphone, but if he goes into the security room and sees everything I’ve got rigged up—

  “Hold your tongue, Spencer!” Parker barks. “You can’t have it both ways. Or do I have to remind you that it was at your father’s insistence the security cameras were an invasion of privacy and not to be used in evidence for such infringements.”

  Chapter 60

  I can’t go through with this. I just can’t. I thought I could, but thinking and doing are a million miles apart. I don’t care if doing the right thing means committing suicide; feeling like this hurts far more than getting beaten up, and once again, I find the help I need in the diaries of Captain Howard.

  I made a brilliant film about the captain because I liked him. I respected him for always sticking to his principles — never leave a man behind. He crawled out into No Man’s Land to bring his own men back, and he dragged the enemy back into safety too.

  I remember one passage in his diary when he and his batman had a major falling out over some German sergeant who’d been shot in the stomach. The batman couldn’t understand why they wasted bandages on someone they’d earlier been trying to kill.

  “He’s the enemy!” the batman kept telling Captain Howard. “Why are you trying to save him when we spent all day trying to kill the bugger?”

  “Because he was holding up the white flag when we shot him!” Captain Howard explained. “He left his trench to get an injured man, and we broke the rules!”

  The batman still didn’t get it. Captain Howard went on to write a couple of pages about how he despaired trying to explain that their win was no victory, and it wasn’t. The next day they were forced to retreat when the Germans decided to break the rules by starting the fight before sunrise.

  Captain Howard was right. You play by the rules. I’ve broken the rules letting Spencer take the blame for something he didn’t do. I’m not saying he doesn’t deserve to be punished — he does. So do all the others, but they need to take the rap for the rules they’ve broken!

  No one’s going to have any respect for me if I do it this way, but more important than what other people think, I won’t have respect for me, and that’s what I keep telling myself when I finally knock on Parker’s door.

  “Come in!”

  I go in. Parker looks really pissed off, and I can’t help but notice a big glass of whisky on his desk.

  “What do you want, Jarvis?”

  “I don’t think Spencer took the mobile.”

  “No?” he says, taking a swig of whisky.

  “No, sir.” I tell him, wishing I were as brave as Captain Howard. “He was in the library.”

  “And how do you know all this?”

  “I saw him go in there when Miss Bell and I were walking to the headmaster’s office.”

  The silence feels like I’m being choked as his nasty eyes look right inside me. “So why didn’t you tell me this earlier?”

  I shrug. Best not to tell any more lies.

  He grunts and takes another big gulp. “So we still have a thief in the school?”

  “I guess,” I say, deciding it’s best to look at my feet; I don’t think I’m quite the actor Chrissie is.

  “Know who it is?”

  I know this is the perfect time to tell him it’s Chrissie, but I’m not going to. I don’t trust her not to talk her way out of it and leave me in even more trouble. “No, sir.”

  “I don’t believe you, Jarvis.”

  “It’s the truth, sir,” I say, knowing now I was right to keep quiet.

  He grunts again, the whisky making him drop his guard. “I don’t think you know what the truth is, Jarvis!” he snaps, towering above me as he rises to his feet. “Now get out of my sight. You’re dismissed!”

  Chapter 61

  It’s like an approaching storm: the atmosphere’s electric. Everyone knows a fight’s going to break out tonight. Hermit scarpered an hour ago. He had the decency to apologise, but if he hadn’t fled to sickbay, I’d have made him go.

  It’ll happen soon, while Parker’s out having a smoke. I lie on my bed, my heart bruising my chest as my fear interprets every creaking floorboard, every closing door as the ap
proaching attack.

  For a while, I debate barricading myself in my room. I need to hold up a few more days. In a few more days, it will all be over, and this school and its bloody Code can rot in hell for all I care, but all my hard work will be wasted if I don’t make it to the end of the term.

  A door at the end of the corridor crashes open, and a mob of angry voices grows in volume. My stomach tenses, and I clench my fists as the first hit of adrenaline ignites the warning signs of danger.

  As a guy, you’re supposed to be brave. Fights are a rite of passage; guys brag, relive, and provoke, and we shrug off a punch even if it hurts like hell, but we all get scared, even if we’re in the pack picking on the runt.

  I’ve never been one for fights; I can play the game, go along with the crowd just like everyone else. I never picked on the runt, but until I became the runt, I never helped them out either.

  The mob voices fall silent as they plan their attack. They’re coming. My terrified heart counts them down. They’re not coming to talk. They’re coming to hurt me.

  I can run, I can hide, or I can fight. I’ll lose a fight, and there’s nowhere to hide. The only choice is to run, but where? Where’s safe in a place where everyone hates me?

  If I’d been thinking straight, I wouldn’t have returned the security room keys, but it’s too late for that now. I have seconds to decide. Sickbay, chapel, an empty classroom… I dismiss them faster than I can think of new places to go. I have no choice. Parker’s a bastard, but he can’t stand by and leave me to a lynch mob. Decision made, I leap to my feet, but it’s already too late.

  Baxter kicks open the door, and he, Spencer, and Finny all pile in to surround me. I wonder if Chrissie knew this was going to happen or if she orchestrated it to punish me for going up against her. I should have been smarter. I should have played it her way a bit longer, but my conscience wouldn’t let me.

  “You bastard!” Spencer hisses, taking a step forward. “Chrissie said you’d do something like this to stop me from seeing her, but to pull the same trick a second time!”

  I get up to speak, have my say even though I know it’s hopeless, but Baxter pushes me back down.

  “If it wasn’t for your sister, you’d be dead!” he continues, spitting the words in my face. “Now how did you do it?”