A Decent Education (Part One)
A Decent Education
The Cunninghams looked up at Derrymont School as they walked up the small hill towards its entrance. It was an old building that had been refurbished several times, so that sections of the original iron cladding were still visible underneath the modernised concrete.
“Doesn’t look very fun,” Elsa Cunningham said, raising an eyebrow.
“It’s not meant to be fun,” Davy, her father, shot back, “it’s got the best Ofsted reports in the whole county three times in a row.”
“But what if…”
“All right you two,” Claire, the mother, interjected, “let’s present a united front. Don’t want them thinking we’re common!”
Davy, running his fingers over a balding head that had once been blonde, nodded his compliance.
The entrance door half opened, a few flecks of newish red paint dropping off as it did so. In front of them dressed all in black was Ula Mules, the headteacher. She was a woman of average height, but somehow still imposing. Possessed of a bob haircut without a single hair out of place, she smiled thinly before extending her hand.
“Welcome,” Ula Mules said, pausing unnaturally. “To Derrymont School. My name is Ms. Mules. I’m the headteacher here. I will give you a brief tour of the school, before we repose to my office for a closer discussion.”
“Thank you so much! We are very happy to be here,” Claire said, shaking her hand. Davy was convincingly playing along with her words, Elsa less so.
“Thank you,” Davy mustered.
Elsa shook the extended hand without speaking, while realising Ms. Mules stared right at her throughout. She smelled paint, mixed with what she thought was bleach. Ms. Mules hand was cold, but not unpleasantly so. In fact, the handshake helped her feel more relaxed.
“Please, let me show you around our little world,” Ms. Mules said, opening her palm to escort the family inside. Claire went first, followed by Davy adjusting his dark blue tie from side to side and lastly Elsa. She looked out back down the hill as she entered. The sun was strangely low for this time of day she thought, with a grey sky with a few shards of light peeking through. She considered how unusual it looked, as the door closed behind her.
They were in a long corridor, with classrooms ahead on both the left and right. Ms. Mules began walking at a deliberate pace. “You will see here first the Year 2 students. They are learning Mathematics.”
Claire investigated the first classroom on the left. She was struck by how clean a modern the room was, with a full LCD screen on the rear wall, with the teacher—a woman who almost seemed too young to be a teacher—standing to the left of it. As she spoke, students repeated the answer to her question regarding multiplication in unison. “Wow, impressive!” Claire found herself saying.
“How old is that teacher?” Davy asked without thinking, adjusting his tie. Claire shot him a look.
“Like many of our staff, Ms. Moore is a former alumna of this very school,” Ms. Mules said, without answering the question.
“Wow, you must build a lovely home here for your students for them to come back!” Claire said, genuinely impressed.
“We like to think of our little world like the Hotel California.”
“Sung about by Eagles?” Davy asked, adjusting his tie. Claire shot him another look, this time more insistent.
“You can check out any time you like. But you will never leave.”
Elsa was too young to understand what the three adults had referenced, but she did notice something about the classroom that her parents had not. There was not one pen out of place. No one fiddling or chewing gum or chatting absentmindedly. It was like no classroom she had seen in her previous schools. Elsa ran her hand across her head and realized she was sweating.
“Okay if we move on? Great.” Ms. Mules moved her arm to usher them towards the next corridor. Claire followed first, with Davy once again adjusting his tie side to side. Elsa stayed a moment longer and stared into the glass front of the classroom. She assumed they could see her from inside, but no one so much as looked up.
“This is our Library,” Ms. Mules said as she opened one side of a large double-door, painted black. Elsa—who had caught up by now with her parents and their guide—stared wide-eyed at the contents within. There were three tiers to the library. The ground floor was two rows of desks with new looking laptops arranged on each, with well-organized charge cables connected to the left-hand side. The second tier was full of paperbacks, uncountable in quantity from the floor to what Elsa judged to be three meters in height. She could smell the dust of the old books from where she stood on the threshold, and it gave her a momentary feeling of great excitement. The third tier of the library, up a narrow stairway from the second which Elsa perceived as too narrow for most adults, were myriad hard back books—many without covers and she judged ancient in nature—at least as tall as the previous tier’s paperbacks. Elsa stared at it for a long moment, taking in the scale of what she saw.
“Wow,” Claire said almost involuntarily. Davy nodded.
“Can I…?” Elsa blurted, before stopping herself.
Ms. Mules whirled around. “Why of course my dear, go ahead.” She clasped her hands together as if in prayer. “We may continue our tour and send for you shortly.”
Elsa walked through the door. She bypassed the computers and headed straight to the second floor. There, she began to keenly thumb through various dusty paperbacks. They had a well-fingered, yellowing copy of Brave New World by Aldous Huxley, which she spent several minutes avidly perusing.
Eventually, Elsa happened upon a yellowing book, with many of the pages turned over entitled “Derrymont Through the Years”. It detailed the history of the town. As she idly skimmed through the pages she was startled by the fact the town had been burnt down during the Great Plague and then completely rebuilt.
As she continued indolently thumbing through the pages, Elsa encountered the founding of the school. It was old, dating back close to 150 years. There was an old black and white photograph on the page, captioned ‘Derrymont School, staff and pupils 1912.’ The students were all dressed in old fashioned shirts or blazers, shorts and culottes. There was a woman in the backrow, with a different haircut and the unmistakable piercing eyes, that looked just like Ms. Mules.
Elsa went to make her way to the next level but hesitated on the stairs. She briefly caught the sleeve of her jumper on the banister of the staircase and pulled it away. Thinking better of advancing further as her parents and the headteacher might be starting to miss her, she turned round and made her way down the stairs.
Once back at the edge of the library entrance, Elsa looked down at her wrist to check the time. She realised with both annoyance and concern that when snagging her clothes, it had pulled her watch loose and it must have dropped in the library. Cursing her luck, she made her way with trepidation back towards the staircase.
Making her way up the staircase, Elsa touched the banister. It was cold, though not an inviting cold like the headteacher’s hand. There was a heavy sound like the wind blowing through a bough of trees, then she understood it was her own breathing. Steadying herself, Elsa took the last step to the top of the steps. At last, she retrieved her watch from the ground.
Elsa began to ascend the last, narrow staircase to the third tier, almost unconsciously. She smirked involuntarily as she did so, reminded of Fliss the main character in Room 13, who was carried forward with terror by feet controlled by some unseen force. Elsa had loved that book when she read it. But she considered this and knew that an ambivalent mix of fear was counterweighed by an overwhelming dose of curiosity.
The upper tier was darker than the other two floors had appeared. There was a skylight that had long surrendered to the dust contained in and on the innumerable volumes of coverless books. The smell of the dust was what struck her first. She couldn’t fully place it, but it somehow reminded her of earth, something unmoving. Elsa pored over several volumes of the books. Many of them were written in languages she couldn’t decipher. The odd one she made out what it was, maybe Latin or a similar language? But she stood little chance of digesting more than beyond an odd word here or there.
After a considerable time and no longer worrying about the ire of the adults, Elsa struck upon several volumes that whilst they were no less covered in dust, she could discern the titles. ‘Derrymont 1925’ one read, ‘Derrymont 1947’ another. They were yearbooks of the school, though in no semblance of order.
She flipped through them fervour, almost obsessively. In every volume, with the unmistakable piercing eyes and a gradually changing haircut, was a woman with an uncanny resemblance to Ms. Mules.
And then at last, she was frozen. With surprise? With revulsion? With hopelessness? For there in two identical almost volumes, one from 1955 and another from 85, were two little girls, about her age who looked almost identical. And both looked nearly exactly, unmistakably like… her.
