melanie.
I enter the maths classroom and I'm immediately approached by my teacher, Mr Bates.
"Melanie! Welcome back! Good to see you again!" He chimes happily. Half of the enthusiasm is because I'm top of the class at maths, the other half is because no one expected me to actually come back considering I did rubbish in most other subjects bar maths. A little bit of him was probably relieved that I wasn't gone, because everyone else in this class is quite rubbish.
"Thanks sir, you too." I say quietly as I sit down. He comes over to me again.
"Melanie." He says, pushing up his glasses.
"Sir?" I ask, a bit confused.
"Do you, um think you could do me a favour, I'll make sure to repay it."
I was utterly creeped out. What kind of favour? Like he didn't strike me as a pedophile but I guess you just don't know with some people.
He recognises the look of confusion on my face. "Oh! It's to do with maths!" He yells, slightly embarrassed. "I have a small group of students who are in desperate need of maths help, it'd be during your French lessons so you'd be exempt if that's okay with you."
"Uh, I don't know sir, I don't think I'd make a good teacher." I began, and then the reality sunk in. "Why would you want me to even teach a bunch of people maths anyway?"
"You see, these pack, they won't listen to me, and Mr Oldfield told me they'd be expelled for bad behaviour and for failing important subjects continuously, so they need to get their grade up. And I thought you'd know how that feels, since it almost happened to you."
It was true. I was almost expelled for the same thing. The only reason I was still in this school was because of my maths grade. I graded in the top five percent for the entire country. That's why they couldn't expel me.
"Look, you only have to teach them the very basics, because they literally know nothing. And in return I'll get you off loads of classes and help you get into the mathematics course for college in Cardiff."
He looks as if he's pleading with me, and I have to think about all that he's done for me over the past few years.
"Right, fine I guess I'll do it, only because it's you though sir." I say.
"Great!" He cheers and he goes off to talk to the other students in the class.
And then I am alone with my thoughts, what did I let myself in for? What if I'm just stuck in a room with a bunch of animals who won't listen to me and can't add one and one?
A feeling of dread filled the out of my stomach. I don't think I fully understood why I had just agreed to.
The class passed by slowly, we revised some things that we had done the year before so I took it as a chance to tune out. Who would I be teaching maths to? I bet it was a bunch of Year 9's who decided it'd be a good time to rebel and listen to screamo and call themselves 'misunderstood'.
I felt a strange pressure though, not to let Mr Bates down. He was the only teacher who actually believed in me, and told me I wasn't shit when every other teacher did. He stood up for me when I was going to be expelled, he made sure I didn't get in too much trouble. So I suppose I'd do it for him, no matter how anxious it was making me feel.
The class ended and Mr Bates called me back.
"Okay, so you're first lesson with the group is today during your French lesson." I'll brief you on the plan but then I have to go and teach another class so you'll be in this room just as a group. Ms Humphrey is next door if you need anything and I'll meet back with you afterward to see how it went."
"What if it goes shit?" I ask.
"Well then we'll scrap the idea, but I think this'll be good for the lot of you."
He pulls something from his desk.
"Here's the list of the students in the group, see you if know any of them." He says, handing me a sheet of paper.
Year 11
Larry Lau
Ryan McCann
Benjamin Blakeway
Year 10
Jake Gunn
Finn O'Day
"They're all lads?" I say, looking at the list.
"I'm sure you can handle them." Mr Bates winks.
So basically he's shoving me in a room with five lads and expected them to listen to me go on about fractional equations for an hour? Was he actually so stupid? Considering they wouldn't listen to him I really doubted they'd listen to me.
In simple terms - I was fucked. But the alternative was going to class and probably not getting to go to college if I didn't help Mr Bates out, so I guess beggars can't be choosers.
"See you at one o' clock Miss Edwards." He reassures me as I leave the room. I shove the list into my bag and try not the think about the unfortunate fate that lies ahead.
God, I was going to regret this.
