Grace

Chapter 22

Master Clarke was not happy when I told him. He made a fuss about them skipping out on me at the weekend and apparently missing this was too much for him to handle. I really wanted to tell him to get a grip as it wasn't him who should be upset at them not coming but me since they were my parents and all, but I remained tight lipped as I stood at his door. I also wanted to tell him it wasn't like they didn't see what I got up to once a week even if it was with a two week delay. I didn't tell him that either though. He was bashing his keyboard enough as it was.

"Get to breakfast, Grace," he said without turning to look at me. "I'll call your parents later."

"Call Mum," I said. "She's not in surgery today but will be tomorrow."

"You mother's having surgery?" he asked and quickly turned to face me.

I shook my head with a smile. "She does them. Brains."

I went into breakfast. There were only a few minutes left before we had to change our collars and ties and go in for chapel. As such I only managed to eat a bowl of weetabix before sitting through a somewhat boring service about forgiveness. I wondered for a moment if Master Clarke had asked the father to talk about it, but quickly dismissed the idea. They didn't communicate outside of school. As far as I knew.

As I ignored the preaching I chanced a look over to Ben on the boys' side of the small church. He was just one pew up from me and sat next to the central passage way. He was looking straight ahead, hair half tied up as was normal on the days he got up early enough to do anything with it. Though his eyes were fixed upon the father, I could tell that he wasn't paying a blind bit of attention. His thoughts were directed inwards, but more than that I couldn't tell. Then we sung a hymn which, once again, I didn't join in with and then we were free to go.

"You don't believe in Christianity at all, do you?" Chi asked on the way to dance.

"No. Do you?"

"I'm not a die hard or anything, but I like to believe we're being watched over by someone who wants what's best for you."

"Oh."

"You prefer the jewish way of thinking?"

I scoffed. "All religion is a load of rubbish if you ask me. It's written well I'll give it that, but it's also responsible for a lot of deaths."

"No it's not."

"The Holocaust. Need I go on?"

She gave me a knowing half smile. "You have a whole list don't you? Go on, I might be able to be swayed on why we shouldn't use the bible as a moral guide."

I scoffed again. "Frankly that people think we need to rely on a book to tell us how to behave is terrifying. When you've done wrong you just know it. No one actually goes and thinks 'hey I'll just go consult a book on that'. And if God is all knowing then why do we have to pray? If he's all knowing he already know what's in our hearts and our minds so we don't need to get down on our knees for his showcase of self-gratification."

"Wow. That put a real bummer on my day."

"And what's all this about 'please give me the strength to do this' and 'please believe that I can do this' yada, yada, yada? I don't need to ask someone to believe in me to help me do something. I have quite enough faith in what I can do for myself thank you very much."

"Actually... Yeah, you do have a point there."

"I'm just glad we don't have to go on Sundays now that the big churches aren't big enough for us all. Though they could at least do a later breakfast. If Sunday is the day of rest, why aren't we allowed to sleep in?"