Letting Go

Tom McLeish still got up at the same time every morning and sat down
to his sensible breakfast. 'The most important meal of the day,' he
always said. He was struggling through his muesli when his daughter
phoned.
"What are you doing today?" she began without preliminaries.
"I've got to pop into school," he said, vaguely.
"Again? What for this time?"
He didn't have a reason but he knew he'd think of one by the time he
got there. "Just a couple of things I've got to sort out."
In the months since he'd retired Tom had been 'popping in' to sort
things out on a fairly regular basis. Just to pick up some stray mail,
just to let them know where he'd put that coursework and to say that if
they needed him they'd only got to call. It was generally worth it.
Former colleagues greeted him warmly, if a little enviously.
"You look ten year's younger," they chorused. "No regrets?"
"None whatsoever," he replied, truthfully. But if it was true, why
couldn't he keep away from the place?
The office staff were always particularly pleased to see him, making
him coffee, giving him all the gossip and feeding his ego with dark
hints about how the place was going to the dogs since he'd left.
"I'm delivering my Christmas cards," rescued him from his daughter's
interrogation.
"Well, I suppose, that's all right ," she accepted reluctantly. "Just
don't make a habit of it!"
He tried to lighten the atmosphere between them. "Christmas comes but
once a year, that can't be a bad habit." She was right, of course, but
he wasn't ready to admit it to her. He needed to find something else to
do. He needed to let go.
In the months since he'd retired from teaching ('Thirty years with no
time off for bad behaviour,' he'd quipped in the final weeks.) Tom
hadn't really enjoyed himself in the way that he'd imagined he would.
He had money in the bank and an adequate, if not generous, pension. Why
couldn't he head off into the sunset and start a new life?
Instead, he found himself thinking about school more and more. He'd
glance at the clock at regular intervals and after a while he realised
it was usually when a lesson would be nearing its end in his old
classroom and some other teacher would be longing for the bell to ring.
Sunday evenings seemed empty without that familiar sinking feeling he'd
suffered all his working life. 'Get a grip,' he told himself. 'That's
what you retired to get away from.'
At about twenty past nine ('Well into the second lesson, so I don't
turn up at the changeover.') he set out on the familiar walk to school.
Perhaps I ought to move, he thought, get right out of the area. See
something of the world. And end up like one of those lost souls he seen
strolling the prom at seaside resorts, their dreams of retirement
reduced to meaningless daily rituals? But what was so different about
his life? He don't even have the sea air. The town wore the grey
dampness of winter today.
As he turned into the park he felt his spirits lift. Not far now.
However low Tom felt when he set out he knew that when he walked
through those school gates he'd be on the up, eager for news, gossip,
the smell of the corridors and the bustle of the kids fighting their
way through. It was an adrenalin rush.
Passing the bandstand his eye was caught by a boy sitting on the steps.
He seemed familiar somehow. One of his old pupils, perhaps? He never
forgot a face, even if he'd had found it increasingly difficult to
remember their names as the years rolled on. He was skinny kid with a
pinched face and untidy hair - how many of those had he taught? But not
this one. Without thinking, he stepped towards him before spotting the
Keep Off The Grass signs. Better set a good example, he thought taking
the path instead.
As Tom drew close a knot of anxiety formed in his stomach. Years ago it
would have seemed perfectly natural everything was suspect these days.
The last thing he needed was tabloid notoriety - 'Ex-schoolteacher
Accused!' Nudge, nudge, wink, wink - or worse. His schoolmasterly
instinct told him he should turn and walk away, there were no witnesses
here to protect him. But he didn't.
"Shouldn't you be in school?" he enquired using his most authoritative
teacher's voice.
"What's it to you?" the boy muttered, not giving him a glance.
"I'm an Educational Welfare Officer," Tom replied , delighted by his
ingenuity. "I'm employed to check on truants. So, shouldn't you be in
school?"
The boy spat, as if making a point. "I'm sick," he said.
Well, he certainly didn't look healthy - but sick? "Shouldn't you be at
home, then?"
"Suppose so."
This was going to be hard work. "What school do you go to?"
"King Edward's."
"Like the spuds, eh?" The old joke fell on deaf ears. Tom wondered if
he'd ever seen a potato except sliced into chips. "Do you like it
there?"
"It's all right,".
"I used to teach at Belmont Road," he confessed, adding quickly,
"before I became an EWO."
"They're all idiots up there," the boy declared.
"Well, maybe not all," Tom retorted. "Although, I've known a few who
were." The image of a headmaster swam into his head. "All mouth and
trousers some of them!" Once again, the humour was wasted. "So, why
have you come here. A lot of kids hang around the precinct during the
day if they're off school," he said. It amazed him how many young
people he'd see during the day. Why weren't they in school? he'd
thought. But, there again, if they had been in school the place would
have been even more crowded and unbearable that it was with all those
who did attend.
"I like to be on my own," the boy said.
"Yes, I can see that. 'And he went back through the Wet Wild Woods
waving his tail and walking by his wild lone'."
"What?" A look of incomprehension passed across the boy's face.
"Kipling . . . The Cat that Walked by Himself . . . Oh, never mind," he
stumbled into incoherence. Kipling probably just meant exceedingly good
cakes to him.
As if he'd finally decided to trust this strange man, the boy suddenly
said, "We used to come here a lot."
"Did you?" Experience told Tom it was time to listen and say as little
as possible.
"We'd sometimes bring sandwiches and then give the crumbs to the birds.
Grandad could get them to feed from his hand. The sparrows and the
robins, not the pigeons - tree rats he called them. Then we'd have a
kickabout on the grass."
"What about the signs?"
"Grandad never took no notice of signs. They're for other people, he
said. Nobody was going to tell him what to do."
"Right on!" Tom exclaimed, getting another withering look from the boy.
"Yes, well, now you've come on your own?"
"He's dead."
"Oh, I see," Tom said, shocked by the boy's bluntness. "But you keep on
coming here?"
"It's where I remember him best."
"How often?"
"Most days."
"What about school?"
"What about it? They don't miss me."
"They will soon, they'll send the Welfare round - " He noticed a smile
drift across the boys face, he knew he'd been rumbled from the start.
"But it's not just that. Your education's important. For your
future."
"Sure."
"I bet your Granddad would have said so. Didn't he encourage
you?"
"Yeah, 'Knowledge is Power', he used to say and 'Don't let the buggers
grind you down.' He was always saying things like that."
"Well, I'd certainly endorse the first. He'd want you learn, get on,
get qualifications, get that power so you could stop the buggers
grinding you down."
"Yeah, but it's hard. I mean to go to school in the morning but I jus t
sort of end up here."
"If you mean to then you're halfway there. What you need to do is to
let go, move on. It's what your Granddad would have wanted ."
"Let go?"
"Of the past. Your Grandad's always going to be in the past from now
on. You've just got to accept that. It doesn't mean you have to forget
him. You can still keep coming here now and again. I can even see you
bringing your kids and your grandkids here in the future. But now your
life needs to take a different path."
After a long silence the boy looked at Tom for the first time and
slowly said, "Yeah, I suppose so."
"This is the place where Grandad used to come with a little boy, not
with someone who's nearly a man. He'd think you were soft in the head
for still coming here now."
"He would an' all. 'You're a sandwich short of a picnic,' he'd say.
"
"So, what are you going to do?"
"I'll go to school," the boy said briskly.
"You'll be there by breaktime, slip into the next lesson as if you've
been there all the time."
"I will. Thanks."
The boy got up and strode defiantly away across the grass. It seemed as
if he was a different person to that sullen boy Tom had started
speaking to just a few minutes ago. The old magic had not left him,
there was no doubt about it. All those years of experience could still
make a difference.
As he sat there in a warm glow of self-satisfaction he gradually
realised that it was mingled with other, less familiar, less
well-defined feelings. The sun broke through the shifting clouds, he
felt the years drop away and he saw the boy and his grandfather engaged
in a frenetic game of football. He'd never felt so happy, so
free.
He stood up decisively and followed the boy's footprints across the wet
grass. When he got to the path he hesitated for a second and then
turned to head for the town centre. Now, he thought, where is that
travel agent's?