The Confusion of Karen Carpenter Read online

  ‘But the Olympics isn’t for ages.’

  ‘July. June. One of those “J” months.’

  ‘And I need a solution quicker than that.’

  ‘Do you want to move?’

  ‘I dunno. Not really, but maybe it’d be good to get away from all my memories of Michael.’

  I don’t want to move at all. I am just trying to sound grown-up.

  ‘Hmm, but some might say don’t act rashly. You’ve had a big shock. Don’t do anything as a knee-jerk reaction.’

  ‘The only thing it’s a knee-jerk reaction to is the fear of being repossessed.’

  Just then I see Ethleen on the other side of the playground. I shouldn’t be on the phone when I’m on break duty, so I quickly make my apologies and hang up, adopting a stern ‘don’t mess with me – I am Toilet Tzar’ face. I even cross my arms and shoot daggers at all the girls heading in for a wee. My look is steely and says, ‘Don’t even think about having a fag in there. And if I catch you so much as attempting to shoot up heroin, you’ll be for the high jump. Mark my words, missy!’

  They can see I mean business. Although I have to say, in all my years of standing outside these toilets, I am yet to catch a recreational drug user or nicotine addict. I get the odd fight, a bit of name-calling – mostly aimed at me – but that’s it.

  Ethleen is heading over, smiling. She is head to toe in powder green. Short skirt and boxy jacket. A string of pearls hangs round her neck. She looks like she’s off to Ladies’ Day at Ascot, not running a comprehensive school. All she needs is a fascinator and she’d be hot to trot. I would tell her this, but it would appear frivolous, and frivolity has no place when you’re on break duty.

  ‘Miss Carpenter,’ she says, professional in front of the kids swarming round us.

  ‘Miss Butterly,’ I reply, stopping myself from adding an ‘Utterly’ in front of her surname like the kids do. I try to sound approachable but stoic. I want her to see I take the duty she has entrusted to me seriously. My tone says, ‘I cannot talk for too long, as I must at a second’s notice jump inside the toilets and swoop on someone jacking up.’

  I know. Ridiculous. Still.

  ‘How are you?’ she asks, and then looks round the playground. Hundreds of teenagers are running wild. The noise is deafening. It grants us some privacy at least.

  ‘Good, thanks.’

  ‘Oh good. Good. Work’s a tonic sometimes, isn’t it?’

  ‘Indeed,’ I say. My tone continues to be in the ‘look, do we really need to do this? Toilet duty’s reeeeeally important, you know’ vein.

  ‘Whenever things are going a bit tits up for me, I’m always grateful to get into the office and have my attention diverted.’

  ‘Of course.’

  ‘There’s no greater distraction than working in a school.’

  ‘Indeed.’

  I am giving one-word answers. Surely she will go soon.

  ‘Not that it’s particularly healthy to run away from our problems.’

  ‘Of course not, Miss Utterly. Butterly! Sorry. I don’t know why I said that.’

  I expect her to be crabby, but she has her head cocked on one side. I know what this means: sympathy, empathy, any ‘-athy’ you want, really. She rubs my arm as she speaks. Jeez, she’s going for the full whammy.

  ‘How are you financially? Are you OK or in a bit of a mess?’

  I freeze. How? How does she know? Am I walking around with ‘Bollocks. Up shit creek without a paddle, mortgage-wise’ tattooed on my forehead?

  Hmm?

  No. My forehead isn’t that wide.

  ‘Everything’s fine, thanks, Miss Butterly.’

  She nods, as if she didn’t expect anything less. And much as I’m grateful to her for taking an interest, and much as it makes me like her even more that she bothered to ask, and that it entered her head, I still don’t want to go there with her. She’s my boss, after all. Unless she’s about to offer me a promotion?

  ‘Only I was thinking . . .’

  She is! She’s going to ask me to be head of year or something! OK, so it’s not exactly winning the pools financially, but it’d be a help. And I’m good with pastoral care. I’d make a brilliant head of year!

  ‘There’s quite a lucrative market out there for private tuition.’

  I look at her. Private tuition?

  ‘A lot of rich people want their kids to do better, and sometimes it just takes someone like you a few hours a week to get them on the right track.’

  Blimey. She wants me to moonlight. It’s like an NHS doctor advising a colleague to go and do evenings at a private hospital.

  ‘It’s worth bearing in mind,’ she says, now sounding embarrassed to have brought it up, interpreting my silence as offence. I must learn to speak more.

  ‘I will. Yes, it’s a good idea.’

  Ethleen smiles. It’s a strained smile. She’s weighing me up, my mood. She prides herself on being able to read people, and I know today I am unreadable.

  ‘If you’re interested, I’m sure I can point you in the right direction.’

  We all know that Ethleen’s husband is Very Rich. He is a surveyor for an international building company and they live in Knightsbridge, or near Sloane Square or something. She drives a Porsche Boxster. She never dines out on this fact. She probably doesn’t need to work as her fella earns so much, but for some reason it makes me respect her commitment to Fountain Woods even more. And of course she must have contacts. She must know loads of rich people with thick kids who need a helping hand.

  I would never describe our kids here as thick, but rich kids? That feels OK. Is that bad? Yes, it is.

  ‘Thanks, Ethleen.’

  She takes my use of her first name as a cue to leave.

  As she heads off, I picture myself in a Knightsbridge drawing room with a fourteen-year-old called Rufus. He’s been kicked out of the school that Lily Allen went to for dealing marijuana. (Or maybe they encourage that there, I don’t know.) He is sullen and spaced out, but over a matter of weeks I have him wanting to learn, and within a year he has got eighty-three GSCEs and they’re all A triple stars.

  God, I’m good. It’s a nice image. I like their house, and Rufus is a treasure. He goes on to be an international rock star and takes me round the world as part of his entourage, claiming he never wants to stop learning.

  ‘Terrible about Rochelle, isn’t it?’

  Someone is talking to me. I abandon all thoughts of Rufus and the gorgeous house in Knightsbridge, our trips to Mauritius, Mustique, Miami, and turn to see a stranger standing next to me.

  Oh God, another new member of staff whom I don’t recognize. I really should pay more attention in Monday-morning briefings!

  She is in her mid-twenties; maybe she’s a student. I wouldn’t necessarily know all the student teachers. Maybe she started before Christmas when I was off.

  I nod. ‘Yeah, shocking, I know.’

  The other woman – she has the most amazing curly red hair cascading down her back, though I find it a bit Seventies and retro – has crease lines round her heavily lipsticked mouth that make me assume she’s a smoker.

  ‘Are you a student teacher? Sorry, I’ve been off for a while.’

  ‘Yes.’ She holds out her hand. Golly, official. ‘Kate. Kate Tobin.’

  I shake it. ‘Karen Carpenter.’

  Her eyebrows arch and I expect her to burst out laughing, but she doesn’t. She shakes my hand firmly.

  ‘Karen, I’ve heard a lot about you, yes. Lot of respect for you at this school.’

  Which suits me just fine. Actually, I really like her hair. She’s very pretty in fact, and those lines round her lips add character to her – stunning – face.

  ‘What department are you again?’

  ‘Special needs.’

  She nods earnestly, like she’s completely impressed. ‘Such an important job. I really take my hat off to you. Sorry, are you on a duty? Do you need to . . . ?’

  ‘No, I’m fine. I ca
n talk.’

  I wouldn’t care if eighteen girls ram-raided the toilets now and set fire to it and themselves. Missy Red Hair is flattering me.

  ‘So d’you think she did it?’

  ‘Who?’

  ‘Rochelle. What’s the word on the street?’

  ‘God, I don’t know. I mean, Custard Claire reckons something fishy’s gone on there, and Custard Claire knows everything.’

  ‘Custard Claire?’

  ‘Yeah, Claire. Dinner lady. Does the custard.’

  ‘Oh. Of course. She’s great, Custard Claire, isn’t she?’

  ‘Oh, I love her.’

  ‘Was Rochelle ever . . . violent towards you?’

  ‘Violent?’

  Kate nods. ‘Did she ever make you feel scared?’

  I shake my head. ‘I mean, she once dropped a hole punch on my foot, but that was a mistake. I really like her. She’s very good at her job.’

  Kate looks disappointed. I like her too, so feel a sudden urge to entertain and please her.

  ‘Though she would give everyone daggers, and was always creeping up on you without you knowing it.’

  ‘What, to freak people out?’

  I shrug mysteriously. ‘Will we ever know, Kate?’

  Just then I see Ethleen coming out of the main teaching block. She is on the warpath. And heading our way.

  ‘Here comes Utterly Butterly.’

  Kate suddenly turns and runs. Her Titian locks flash round like an energetic maypole and lash me across the face. She is gone, off across the playground, heading for the car park. Ethleen gives chase.

  What on earth is going on?

  ‘Stop her!’ Ethleen shouts to the children Kate is passing. ‘She’s an intruder!’

  Some kids pounce on Kate.

  I shout out, ‘She’s not – she’s a student teacher!’

  Just then Kate kicks the kids away and batters them with an umbrella. God, that’s a bit severe, isn’t it? She’ll never get her teaching qualification doing stuff like that.

  ‘Kate!’ I cry out.

  ‘Stop her – she’s a journalist!’ Ethleen screams as Kate turns a corner.

  From nowhere Meredith appears in one of her tracksuits and runs like a thunderbolt across the playground, following Kate round the corner, but the squeal of rubber on concrete tells me her getaway car is whisking her far, far away. Not even mercurial Meredith can catch her.

  Ethleen is looking at me. ‘What did you say? What did you tell her?’

  ‘Oh . . .’ I fumble ‘. . . erm . . . n-not much.’

  I don’t sound convincing.

  The pips go for the next lesson.

  The next day I buy a tabloid I very rarely buy. On page eight I am mortified by the headline ‘She Tried to Kill Me Too.’

  Oh God. I can’t bring myself to read the whole article, so I skim-read it, my eyes jumping about the page.

  The pretty young teacher, who wanted to remain anonymous for fear of reprisals by Ludlow’s family, claimed she was attacked . . .

  Wow. Kate thought I was pretty. And young. Oh my God, attacked?

  . . . in an unprovoked assault in the school’s offices six months ago.

  Where did this come from?

  ‘Rochelle looked at me with death in her eyes and asked me why I was giving her so much typing to do.’

  Kate must have talked to someone else. I never said this.

  ‘Then she took a hole punch from her desk and hurled it at me. I’m lucky to be alive.’

  Who writes this crap? Oh, of course, Kate does.

  ‘Rochelle is well known for creeping up on people and then screaming at them, causing them to jump, and I believe she confessed all to Custard Claire.’

  Custard Claire is the nickname of Fountain Woods dinner lady Claire Greengrass (pictured).

  They have taken a picture of Claire parking her moped in the car park. Bizarre.

  ‘Basically, if you want to know anything in East London, ask Custard Claire. She runs this manor with a rod of iron. She knows the truth.’

  As of yesterday Custard was unavailable for comment. A neighbour of hers commented, ‘She seems such a lovely woman. She did a sponsored run last year for breast cancer. Just goes to show – never judge a book by its cover.’

  I see the paper is shaking in my hand. I put it in the bin.

  Custard Claire isn’t speaking to me. She is the only member of staff who saw through my ‘Journalists! Why do they make up this kind of crap?’

  I carefully chose the word ‘crap’ as so few of them have heard me use anything other than the Queen’s English, but Claire wasn’t sucked in by it.

  ‘She can’t have made that up,’ she insisted as we sat together in the salad room earlier.

  ‘She did.’

  ‘Bollocks. You must’ve told her I said she done it. I never said she done it. I said there was something fishy going on.’

  ‘I said she should ask you. I said you knew everything.’

  ‘Are you calling me a gossip?’

  ‘No! God, as if I would! It’s just . . . Well, round here the only person who seems to have a clue about anything is you. You’re so wise, Claire, that’s all. I’m really sorry. I genuinely thought she was a student teacher.’

  Claire didn’t look impressed. ‘All that stuff about me running this manor.’

  ‘Well, I certainly never said that. You must believe that at least.’

  She didn’t look so sure.

  ‘Look – my head’s all over the place, what with Michael leaving me, but I know what I said to her, and I didn’t say anything that she said I did in the article.’

  ‘I liked you, Karen. I felt sorry for you.’

  ‘I don’t need your pity, Claire.’

  ‘Do you not, darlin’?’ she said in quite an arch way. She pushed back her chair, stood, looked down at me. ‘Well, that’s a matter of opinion, innit?’ and she walked away. She’s not spoken to me since.

  What did she mean? That’s a matter of opinion. Why do people have to feel sorry for me? Relationships break down all the time – what’s so special about me? What do I have to do to get people to stop feeling sorry for me? Go out and murder someone? This is karma. This is payback for me being such a horrible cow when I was a kid that I pretended my mum had died. It’s unforgivable and now my karmic chickens are coming home to roost. I should have been proud of my mum’s achievements as a ventriloquist. I should have celebrated the showbiz arrival of Cheeky the Liverpool Bear. Maybe I can make amends by apologizing to Mum tonight, explaining to her why I killed her off to my classmates. Maybe that will make everything all right in the here and now. Maybe then Claire will forgive me.

  I can’t, though. I can’t face saying that to Mum. I will have to make amends in some other way.

  Anyway, I can’t think of that now. It’s Friday. Lessons have just finished. I am stood in the small office off my tutor room applying a bit of lippy. I’ve said I’ll have a quick drink with Meredith in the Who’d’ve Thought It? before going to the wake.

  This is not a date, I keep telling myself. This is not a date. You are going to be supportive to a young lad in your class and you will be representing the school.

  So what if his dad’s gorgeous? So what if you keep rereading the letter he sent in on Monday and thinking to yourself, Gosh, his handwriting’s so neat for a man? Hmm. Once you’re there, it will all be very different. You will be among a mourning family and you will behave with dignity and professionalism.

  In fact, this is how you will make amends to the universe for screwing up over Cheeky the Liverpool Bear. This is how you will right the wrong of being flattered into spilling some beans to a journalist you mistook for a student teacher.

  I rearrange my pencil skirt, cloud myself in Pulse by Beyoncé and head for the exit, my stilettos echoing on the parquet.

  I bump into Constantine, the French teacher, on the stairs.

  ‘My God, Karen! You look amazing! Going somewhere special?’


  I wither her with a look. ‘A funeral,’ I say, and walk on.

  SEVEN

  The Who’d’ve Thought It? is a 1970s breezeblock construction painted in gaudy red and black with interiors to match that wouldn’t look out of place in a Ken Loach film from the same period. Still, it’s the nearest pub to the school, so some of the teachers venture in on the odd occasion, despite the inherent likelihoodofbumping into POTBs (Parents ofthe Brats). Really it should be called the Who’d’ve Thought They Could Make a Pub So Hideous?, but the drink is cheap and the mahoosive telly boasts a variety of sports, mostly on grass, which ticks a lot of boxes with the male members of staff. And Meredith.

  She makes me have two gin and tonics before I head to the wake. She does, she makes me, her rationale being that everyone else will be tipsy by the time I get to the do so I may as well play catch-up now. I find myself powerless to disagree. She sits in the corner booth and I thank my lucky stars, not for the first time, that I don’t teach PE like her. I couldn’t be seen out on the streets or in public places like this in a shell suit. I can’t imagine getting up in the morning and thinking, Yay, another day. And another chance to rock the sporty lez look. Which actually is exactly what she is. And nothing says ‘Sporty Lez’ more than a shell suit and a tiny ponytail. Practically speaking, her hair’s too short for a ponytail, but she always manages to yank it into one, giving her pulled, taut skin around the cheek area the same texture as a tambourine. I’ve never told her this, though three G&Ts and I might.

  Meredith is my favourite lesbian (actually, one of the few I know. I’m not keen on Sonia from humanities – or Sonia from inhumanities, as we hilariously refer to her, as she wears a constant scowl and clompy Birkenstocks) and always looks like she’s just dusted her cheeks and forehead with blusher. She’s not actually wearing any make-up; it’s just that she is permanently rosy of cheek and brow, having just come straight from the sports hall or playground after refereeing something lively and bracing. I suppose what she oozes is health. A foreign concept to me. She also has a whistle dangling round her neck. She’s never blown it at me, but it lurks, like a warning. One day she might.