It appears that, although the bell for the end of the school day rang a good five minutes ago, class in the Geography Room is still in full swing. Crouching slightly, Howard peers through the narrow window set in the door. The boys inside show no sign of impatience; in fact, by their expressions, they are quite oblivious to the passage of time.
The reason for this stands at the head of the class. Her name is Miss McIntyre; she is a substitute. Howard has caught glimpses of her in the staffroom and on the corridor, but he hasn’t yet managed to speak to her. In the cavernous depths of the Geography Room, she draws the eye like a flame. Her blonde hair has that cascading quality you normally see only in TV ads for shampoo, complemented by a sophisticated magnolia two-piece more suited to a boardroom than a transition-year class; her voice, while soft and melodious, has at the same time an ungainsayable quality, an undertone of command. In the crook of her arm she cradles a globe, which while she speaks she caresses absently as if it were a fat, spoiled housecat; it almost seems to purr as it revolves langorously under her fingertips.
‘… just beneath the surface of the Earth,’ she is saying, ‘temperatures so high that the rock itself is molten – can anyone tell me what it’s called, this molten rock?’
‘Magma,’ croak several boys at once.
‘And what do you call it, when it bursts up onto the Earth’s surface from a volcano?’
‘Lava,’ they respond tremulously.
‘Excellent! And millions of years ago, there was an enormous amount of volcanic activity, with magma boiling up over the entire surface of the Earth non-stop. The landscape around us today’ – she runs a lacquered fingernail down a swelling ridge of mountain – ‘is mostly the legacy of this era, when the whole planet was experiencing dramatic physical changes. I suppose you could call it Earth’s teenage years!’
The class blushes to its collective roots and stares down at its textbook. She laughs again, and spins the globe, snapping it under her fingertips like a musician plucking the strings of a double bass, then catches sight of her watch. ‘Oh my gosh! Oh, you poor things, I should have let you out ten minutes ago! Why didn’t someone say something?’
The class mumbles inaudibly, still looking at the book.
‘Well, all right…’ She turns to write their homework on the blackboard, reaching up so that her skirt rises to expose the back of her knees; moments later the door opens, and the boys troop reluctantly out. Howard, affecting to study the photographs on the noticeboard of the Hillwalking Club’s recent outing to Djouce Mountain, watches from the corner of his eye until the flow of grey jumpers has ceased. When she fails to appear, he goes back to investi–
‘Oh!’
‘Oh my God, I’m so sorry.’ He hunkers down beside her and helps her re-amass the pages that have fluttered all over the gritty corridor floor. ‘I’m so sorry, I didn’t see you. I was just rushing back to a… a meeting…’
‘That’s all right,’ she says, ‘thanks,’ as he places a sheaf of Ordnance Survey maps on top of the stack she’s gathered back in her arms. ‘Thank you,’ she repeats, looking directly into his eyes, and continuing to look into them as they rise in unison to their feet, so that Howard, finding himself unable to look away, feels a brief moment of panic, as if they have somehow become locked together, like those apocryphal stories you hear about the kids who get their braces stuck together while kissing and have to get the fire brigade to cut them out.
‘Sorry,’ he says again, reflexively.
‘Stop apologizing,’ she laughs.
He introduces himself. ‘I’m Howard Fallon. I teach History. You’re standing in for Finian Ó Dálaigh?’
‘That’s right,’ she says. ‘Apparently he’s going to be out till Christmas, whatever happened to him.’
‘Gallstones,’ Howard says.
‘Oh,’ she says.
Howard wishes he could unsay gallstones. ‘So,’ he rebegins effortfully, ‘I’m actually on my way home. Can I give you a lift?’
She cocks her head. ‘Didn’t you have a meeting?’
‘Yes,’ he remembers. ‘But it isn’t really that important.’
‘I have my own car, thanks all the same,’ she says. ‘But I suppose you could carry my books, if you like.’
‘Okay,’ Howard says. Possibly the offer is ironic, but before she can retract it he removes the stack of binders and textbooks from her hands and, ignoring the homicidal looks from a small clump of her pupils still mooning about the corridor, walks alongside her towards the exit.
‘So, how are you finding it?’ he asks, attempting to haul the conversation to a more equilibrious state. ‘Have you taught much before, or is this your first time?’
‘Oh’ – she blows upwards at a wayward strand of golden hair – ‘I’m not a teacher by profession. I’m just doing this as a favour for Greg, really. Mr Costigan, I mean. God, I’d forgotten about this Mister, Miss stuff. It’s so funny. Miss McIntyre.’
‘Staff are allowed to use first names, you know.’
‘Mmm… Actually I’m quite enjoying being Miss McIntyre. Anyhow, Greg and I were talking one day and he was saying they were having problems finding a good substitute, and it so happens that once upon a time I had fantasies of being a teacher, and I was between contracts, so I thought why not?’
‘What’s your field normally?’ He holds open the main door for her and they step out into the autumn air, which has grown cold and crisp.
‘Investment banking?’
Howard receives this information with a studied neutrality, then says casually, ‘I used to work in that area myself, actually. Spent about two years in the City. Futures, primarily.’
‘What happened?’
He cracks a grin. ‘Don’t you read the papers? Not enough future to go around.’
She doesn’t react, waiting for the correct answer.
‘Well, I’ll probably get back into it someday,’ he blusters. ‘This is just a temporary thing, really. I sort of fell into it. Although at the same time, it’s nice, I think, to give something back? To feel like you’re making a difference?’ They make their way around the sixth-years’ car park, a series of Lexuses and TTs – and Howard’s heart sinks as his own car comes into view.
‘What’s with the feathers?’
‘Oh, it’s nothing.’ He sweeps his hand along the car’s roof, ploughing a mighty drift of white feathers over the side. They pluff to the ground, from where some float back up to adhere to his trousers. Miss McIntyre takes a step backwards. ‘It’s just a… ah, sort of a gag the boys play.’
‘They call you Howard the Coward,’ she remarks, like a tourist inquiring the meaning of a puzzling local idiom.
‘Yes.’ Howard laughs mirthlessly, shovelling more feathers from his windscreen and bonnet and not offering an explanation. ‘You know, they’re good kids, generally, in this place, but there’s a few that can be a bit, ah, high-spirited.’
‘I’ll be on my guard,’ she says.
‘Well, like I say, it’s just a small percentage. Most of them… I mean, generally speaking it’s a wonderful place to work.’
‘You’re covered in feathers,’ she says judiciously.
‘Yes,’ he harrumphs, swiping his trousers summarily, straightening his tie. Her eyes, which are a brilliant and dazzling shade of blue custom-made for sparkling mockingly, sparkle mockingly at him. Howard has had enough humiliation for one day; he is just about to bow out with the last shreds of his dignity, when she says, ‘So what’s it like, teaching History?’
‘What’s it like?’ he repeats.
‘I’m really liking doing Geography again.’ She gazes dreamily around at the ice-blue sky, the yellowing trees. ‘You know, these titanic battles between different forces that actually created the shape of the world we’re walking around in today… it’s so dramatic…’ She squeezes her hands sensually, a goddess forging worlds out of raw matter, then fixes The Eyes on Howard again. ‘And History – that must be so much fun!’