Robin; Kids at 19

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The first day of a new year of school. It’s been a while since I’ve been but I still loath it as much as I used to. Its been about…err …two years or so since I’ve attended and I’m only returning after mum gave me the ultimate ultimatum, stay at home, live for free and go to school or move out. Where? I didn’t know where I could have gone where I wouldn’t be turfed out after a week so I opted for education instead. I didn’t really care about having to go because I’d spent the last two years lost in my mind and wasting my time and after a few conversations with mum she had convinced me it was a good thing to go back and who was I to contradict her?

Anyway, the first day. It’s never a pleasant experience in our house because everything is lost and we always end up late. This year Mina, my sister four years younger but weirdly she is to be in the same year as me because of my truanting, has lost her phone, mum has misplaced her car keys and dad refuses to eat his breakfast faster that glacial pace.

“I’m just going to walk” I call and roll my eyes as the typical scenes play out in their separate rooms. It takes me 20 minutes to make the walk to the front gates. I could have drove but it wasn’t really that far and I didn’t really fancy sitting in the rush our traffic for half an hour when it was quicker to walk.

 I didn’t know how I was suppose to feel about having to return to this glum and drab arrangement of buildings but the slight feeling of apprehension I felt as I dithered in the school yard not recognizing anyone grew and then faded as I spotted my long term best friend, Noel Harding, emerge from among the fresh chattering faces of the new kids, hung over and looking pretty unsteady. He’s dressed in his dark purple new romantics velvet jacket, which he sports everywhere he goes and keeps it in impeccable condition despite being a borderline slob. To keep in style with his coat he has on a pair of black suede Chelsea boots and had a smidgen of black and white eyeliner drawn with razor sharp precision under his left eye. He isn’t the new romantic he thinks he is. He is a womanizer.  He nods his head in acknowledgement at me and I understand that he will probably recover enough to talk at about lunchtime. Then about five minutes after his arrival three more friends showed up: Clarke, Benjamin and Ben. They are not new romantic wannerbees, which kind of makes Noel stand out just a little bit. Who am I kidding? Everyone who isn’t his friend knows exactly who Noel is because he is famed for his generosity with his dope.

 I had met Clarke and the Bens through Noel and we’d often hang out in Noels room and create a hotbox together. But quite often it would just be Noel and I in the hot-boxed room for hours on end during the week. We even made a few attempts at growing our own weed and actually on several occasions we were successful and I had a little cutting of out most successful plant on my windowsill. It wasn’t dead yet but I was no gardener. Noel was better at it than I was and had a small forest of it in his closet.

It wasn’t long before Ben was in full flow with some anecdote about when he went driving the other day.

“So anyway, I go round the corner at like 60 and I smack straight into a fucking pheasant. I nearly shit myself!’ the guys all let out noises as if they had been kicked in the balls. Noel stands up and runs his hand jerkily through his messy hair.

“Dude, Robin, look over there,” he gestures across the sea of students around us “See the girl with curly hair and dark skin?” he asks. I search and dither.

“Err…there’s two of them with that description” I say. “Is she the one in red or the one in the jumper?” The girl in red was talking to the girl in the jumper avidly and through the crowd I caught a sight glimpse of some curves.

“Jumper. Well guess what” he smirks a little.

“She’s called Callie and last night she sucked your dick” I say instantly and laugh, as he looks crestfallen.

“Who told you?” behind him Ben, Benjamin and Clarke all raise their hands with mock shame, their heads bowed.

‘You dicks” scowls Noel “Anyway did they tell you she swallows?”

“Yep” I fold my arms and wait to see if he adds more. He decides against embellishments but adds that she was gagging for it. The bell sounds and I trail after Clarke towards our form room. The others go their separate ways and various intervals until it’s only Clark and I left of the trail to one of the science labs. We refuse the ice breaking activities Mrs. Clément tries to include us in and instead Clarke tells me about how his dad is forcing him to decide whether he wants to go to either Oxford or Cambridge to study medicine and anything less is not an option. I didn’t know whether it was the fact that Clarke is Chinese or not that he was being forced to do such a hard subject without being able to decide upon it himself.

When the bell goes again we part ways and I go to my first lesson, which is English literature. I immediately regret picking it as the teacher Mr. Kent enters eagerly with an armful of Shakespeare. Everyone including me groans with disgust as he starts to hand the books out. After several brief encounters with Shakespeare previously I had definite issues with him that I wasn’t willing to resolve soon. I was on the verge of walking out but I only had to imagine being forced to reside at Noels for a month and that kept me in my seat. There was nothing wrong with Noel’s living quarters but lets just say housework wasn’t his forte.

With barely enough enthusiasm to turn the page we make it to the end of scene one act three of ‘Pericles’ before the bell interrupts a dull monolog and the whole class literally jumps to its feet and legs it away from the insomnia curing book.

Second lesson is Music Tech, which out of all my lessons, I was looking forward to the most because there is barely and writing and I can play the guitar pretty good. Also Benjamin happens to be in there too.  The girl who I saw earlier talking to Noel’s Callie happened to be in the same class too and several times I caught her watching me. She would shy away instantly and her abashed attitude made me smile. She was by far more beautiful than Callie so I don’t know why Noel the womanizer didn’t go for her. Maybe Callie was easy. I’d put that to Noel later.

Mr. Greenwood was telling us about a recording project he wanted us to do so we could get to grips with using the recording studio. He was halfway through a sentence when he interrupted himself with a reminder to do the register. I discover Callie’s friend is called Alayna. She catches my eye again and immediately her darks eyes dart away. I breathe a silent laugh. I’m not surprised Noel didn’t have his hands on her; she would probably not let him near her with a ten foot barge pole.

Sir sets us a simple keyboard task to get us back into the swing of class and I finish it after half an hour so Benjamin and I started messing about. Although we were having a relatively private conversation most of the people around us chipped in and laughed at the jokes and stuff which was rather annoying but what the hell.

The rest of the day passed with out much else worth speaking off. Noel wouldn’t shut up about Callie and Benjamin wanted me to start the recording project with him immediately to avoid the rush of unorganized people as half term drew closer. It was no skin off my back to comply.