Growing Up Beside You [John Lennon/Beatles Fanfiction]

30. I wouldn't expect an apology (1)

Everyone was painting. Everyone except John, that is. Truth be told, he couldn't be bothered. They were supposed to be putting watercolour to whatever art they'd drawn in their sketchbooks two days ago and so far, John hadn't even lifted a paintbrush.

He sighed to himself and glimpsed at the work of the ginger kid sitting next to him. The page was filled with an abundant jungle, tangled with foliage of sumptuous green. He was carefully brushing brown paint to fill in what looked to be a famished antelope sinking its teeth into a lion. The gaunt-looking lass adjacent to John had painted a peacock with its feathers spread fervidly across the top of the page, and on closer squinting inspection, John noticed the feathers were actually human eyes complete with long, black lashes.

John inspected his own work. It wasn't nearly as sophisticated as theirs was. It was ridiculous. Fucking stupid in fact and John couldn't help but grin at it. It's not every day you see a two-legged horse riding a four-legged cowboy now, is it? Sure enough, it coincided with the distorted reality theme of their coursework so it was plausible enough. Tough tits if that fussy mare, Attwell, didn't like it.

John leaned back in his chair, giggling to himself. He deliberately drew out a loud, obnoxious yawn as he stretched his arms high above his head and received plentiful head shakes and eye rolls from his classmates. It was routine by now. He did something to wind them up every lesson, and the more it irked them, the more he'd do it.

Mrs Attwell was looking in John's direction and though John couldn't see her properly, he knew she was giving him one of her discontented stares from over the top of her specs. John simply smiled and waved at her from across the room. As always, she sighed and then put a finger to her lips whilst jabbing another finger down at his sketchbook.

It was John's turn to sigh now. He hated working in complete silence, especially in a room with these boring sods. He wasn't in the mood to paint today, anyway. What John really wanted to do was play a bit of skiffle with the lads. What with it being so bollock-cold, it'd been a while since they'd had a bang about on the playground bins. Hitting knife and forks on the canteen table just didn't have the same effect and those poxy dinner-ladies would always be around to put an end to their fun.

John looked out the window. There was no sky today, only a rough woollen blanket of mottled grey to cover them all. It's gonna fucking rain, he thought. John groaned and glimpsed at his watch. An hour and a half before break. Hopefully, the rain would come and go before then. Anyway, he'd ask the boys if they were up for it. If they all wore their coats it wouldn't be so bad, would it? And if it was, well that was just too bad because John was gonna drag them outside regardless.

John picked up the paintbrushes in front of him and started rhythmically tapping them on the edge of the table. These will come in handy for skiffle later, he thought to himself. He decided to keep those. The dirty looks and frustrated sighs didn't stop him from drumming on the wood. Instead, he started humming a tune and picked up the pace, tapping his foot as he kept to his own beat.

"Enough of the racket, Lennon," Attwell said while studying a page of a book. She, like most of his teachers, no longer needed visual proof of the culprit. Nine times out of ten, it was John.

"I'm just testin' the sturdiness of the paintbrushes, Miss."

"Well don't!" Attwell shouted over the top of John's table tapping.  "You're not the only one in the room."

"I'm not?" John asked, feigning surprise. He dropped the brushes and draped an arm over the back of his chair. "Who else is a one then, Miss?" John glanced around the room and caught eyes with Patrick who was glowering at him. "Patrick over there looks like a pongy number two. Pooooey!!"