literature

The Supply Teacher

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That morning it didn’t take long for the children of class 3B to work out something wasn’t quite right. As they poured through the blue painted doors of the Victorian built school house, the ritualistic routine of shouting, giggling, chairs scraping, desk lids opening and closing, and pushing and shoving diminished to a whispering murmur far sooner than usual. Instead of the warm smile, auburn hair and comforting floral prints worn by Miss Garfield, the children were greeted by a dark haired bespectacled man wearing a black suit, a starched white shirt, and shiny patent shoes. The children looked at the nervously smiling diminutive man with a wide-eyed innocence in keeping with the full eight years of their age, and waited for him introduce himself, but after he had done so no-one could remember his name because the tiny man possessed an miniscule voice - one that rasped, grated and, occasionally, squeaked, with every syllable he uttered. The pint-sized school master offered no explanation as to why it was he and not Miss Garfield who stood there that morning.  

By now the children were sitting in absolute silence, waiting for something to happen but not quite knowing what. The supply teacher had too settled into silence and he peered around the classroom, occasionally trotting up and down between the blackboard and Miss Garfield’s desk. One little girl who sat at the back of the class with her chair positioned slightly apart from the others watched as his two green eyes and two twitching eyelids surveyed the class of children from behind his black rimmed glasses. She wondered why he was taking so long to begin the class and she sensed he was contemplating some kind of plan. The little girl didn’t like the look of her new teacher at all.

A burst of sunlight that pierced through one of the arched white painted schoolroom windows jolted the newcomer from his reverie, and, very quickly, with light-footed ease, he positioned himself in front of the now illuminated blackboard. Then, raising his scratchy voice to its fullest volume, he gurgled, “Who wants to listen to a story?”

On hearing what almost had the effect of magic words, most of the children immediately forgot their initial apprehension and some began to giggle with excitement. Smiles started to form on faces and some of the children began to shout out with predictable cries of, “Yesssssss, we want a story,” and this chorus echoed around the classroom. With a gushing and childlike enthusiasm that more than equalled that of the children, the supply teacher sprung up onto his toes, and shouted, “Well, there’s no need for everyone to sit at their desks. Sit in a circle at the front here.” He gestured to the children to sit in the empty space in front of the blackboard, and the sound of scraping chairs was heard once more whilst the soon to be captive audience gathered to sit, cross-legged, in a semi-circle around the supply teacher. The pretty face of Miss Garfield had disappeared completely from the children’s thoughts.

In their new found exhilaration the children took a while to settle again, but as soon as they had, the little man said, “So what kind of story do you want to hear?” The children shouted out in reply, “A robot story…a princess story…soldiers.” And squeals and shouting filled the air once more.

“Shush, shush,” the supply teacher said, “No, none of those stories will do. I know what you want to hear. Do you want to hear a GHOST story?” And, without waiting for even just one child to respond, the green-eyed man turned around quickly to face the blackboard, picked up a piece of pristine white chalk, and began to draw. The little girl who sat apart from the rest of the children looked on in silence listening to the gradually building, and almost deafening, noise of chalk scraping on the surface of the blackboard and her eyes became fixated on a dried yellow mark that was gradually becoming visible under the armpit of the teacher’s shirt whenever he gesticulated to draw. She thought she could smell him sweating from where she sat at the back of the classroom.

Soon, a picture began to form on the blackboard, and the teacher began to narrate his story, but the words of the tale may just as well have melted in to air because no-one could hear the man’s tiny voice properly. However, one thing the children did not fail to notice was the apparent speed at which the picture on the blackboard grew larger and larger. The small man carried on drawing, without stopping to turn around, until an elaborate chalk image of The Grim Reaper loomed from the vastness of the old blackboard. Although the supply teacher must have taken some time to draw the picture, the space on the board seemed to have filled up almost instantaneously.

At first, the children sat in awestruck silence, but, after what was probably no more than ten seconds, one child began to snigger, and then another, and another, until the noise of laughter and whelps of amusement filled the classroom. Some children started to jump up and down, clapping and shouting, “More, show us more.” A wide yellow toothed smile spread from cheek to cheek on the supply teacher’s face and he began to shake with laughter too. The children were animated into a state of almost manic excitement and the supply teacher looked around with a satisfied smile. Indeed, all the children seemed to be laughing, smiling and shouting out, except for one. The little girl at the back of the class sat in stony faced silence scrutinising the scene. She looked calmly towards the group of giggling children, then towards the supply teacher, and then back towards the drawing on the blackboard. In his state of wild animation, it took a little while for the supply teacher to notice that the girl wasn’t laughing, but, in the split second he did, the little girl discerned the teacher’s toothy grimace shrivel somewhat, and his lips quivered nervously. The little girl couldn’t help but reveal an almost imperceptible smile of her own. She stared straight at the bespectacled teacher and her stare chilled him to the bone.

The next morning, the headmaster’s secretary arrived in her office at 8.30am to find a man and woman waiting quietly in the reception area. Before even getting the chance to take off her coat in order to receive the visitors properly, the headmaster swooped out of his office to call the couple straight through, and, then, sharply, he shut the door firmly behind him. After hanging up her coat, the secretary edged closer to the headmaster’s door to try to hear what was being discussed and to discreetly spy through the connecting window. She saw a plain and quiet looking couple engaged in a spirited but civilised conversation with the headmaster, who was pacing with authority around his desk with his head bowed to the floor. As she saw the couple rise to leave, the secretary retreated to sit behind her desk, and when the door opened she caught two sentences of the tail end of a short exchange between the pair.  

“The Grim Reaper…it’s a disgrace,” said the woman.
“Yes, you know how she hates horror stories.” said the man.

After the couple had left, the headmaster opened his door and walked into the side office. The secretary looked at him with a questioning glance, hoping he would reveal what had just taken place, but he volunteered no information. Instead, he asked her to make his usual morning coffee and walked straight back in to his office.

Later that morning, the children of class 3B poured through the blue doors of the schoolhouse once again with hopeful expectations of another day of story telling thrills, but instead of the supply teacher, Miss Garfield greeted them with her warm smile and firm but gentle words. Almost straightaway she clapped her hands and in a crystal clear voice, announced, “Good morning children. Today, we’ll be doing reading out loud. Mrs Beakes, the Librarian, will be here in a few minutes to hand around our reading devices. Remember that you’ll be sharing one device between two. When we’ve finished, leave the tablet on the desk where Mrs Beakes can see it for collection. And let’s have some quiet please.”

Within a minute all the children were sitting at their desks in silence, until one little boy spoke out.

“Miss…where’s…”

But before he had chance to finish his sentence Miss Garfield interrupted.

“Jenny has chosen the story we’ll be reading out loud today, so when Mrs Beakes arrives we all need to stay sitting at our desks whilst she hands out our reading devices.”

Almost simultaneously, every child’s head swivelled to turn to look at Jenny, who was, as usual, sitting quietly at the back of the class, just apart from the others. Jenny looked back at the rest of the children sternly, piercing their gaze with her sharp blue eyes, but just at that moment the door handle of the schoolroom began to rattle and everyone’s attention re-diverted to the opposite end of the classroom, where Mrs Beakes was struggling to get in with her box of computer tablets, dropping the box on the floor in the process.

A few sniggers erupted around the room, but their attention didn’t linger upon Mrs Beakes for long, instead the children instinctively seized the opportunity to begin chatting with each other. Quickly, their initial whispers morphed into a babble of voices that served well to drown out the conversation that had started between Miss Garfield and Mrs Beakes.  

“Don’t worry - just put the box on my desk, that’ll be fine. I’ll be glad when this week is over. They called me back in from leave,” said Miss Garfield.
“Really?” said Mrs Beakes.
“Yes, I’ll tell you all about it later.”
“OK,” replied Mrs Beakes, “But before I go, is this the story you wanted for reading- the new story about the elves?”

Mrs Beakes handed a hard copy of a book to Miss Garfield, who looked down at the cover. It sported a drawing of a finely formed blue eyed elf dressed entirely in red on a green background. “Yes, that’s the one. Thanks so much. This cover really gives me the creeps. Look how that things stares out at you. After what I was told about the goings on yesterday, thank goodness the children will only be reading the text of this one on a computer.”

After Mrs Beakes had distributed the tablets, Miss Garfield clapped her hands once again, strained a smile, and shouted, “Right, silence please, let’s all touch our screens and get ready to read. Jenny, if you want to begin.”

The diminutive supply teacher with the magic chalk was never seen again.
© 2013 - 2024 AMThuree
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sevenofeleven's avatar
Instead of the warm smile, auburn hair, and comforting floral prints worn by Miss Garfield, the children were greeted by a be-speckled, dark-haired and bearded man who was dressed in a black suit, a starched white shirt, and shiny patent shoes.

be-spectacled?

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Well done.