We're delighted to have an extract from The Incident by Maggie Redding today. Nervous new teacher Vida Hartley is trying to navigate life in a rough school. She starts the day with a significant encounter.
With her energy and wild, red hair, the woman appeared like an avenging angel pouncing on poor Dudley Waters. He had just run in front of Vida Hartley’s car in the staff car park. The woman was unknown to Vida. She did, however. vaguely recognise Dudley Waters. Everyone at Hill Common School knew of Dudley Waters, Year Nine and difficult. Now he was being marched rapidly up to Vida. The red-haired woman held onto him by the collar of his blazer.
‘Say sorry to this lady,’ this vivid stranger instructed him. ‘You gave her a fright. Look how white she’s gone.’
‘White?’ He grinned up at Vida, who, conscious of her colour, was not sure if his query was a cheeky reference to it. ‘Sorry’, he added.
Vida thanked him.
‘Off you go and in future, take care around cars,’ he was told by the woman. He scampered off as though triumphant. She turned to Vida. ‘Saucy little devil,’ she gave a laugh. ‘White! Hello, I’m the newly assigned Ed. Psych. to this school, Elin Lewis Jones. You teach here?’
Vida took the proffered hand. There had been talk of the new Educational Psychologist in the staff room, with sniffs of disdain, but no one had referred to her striking appearance nor to her Welsh accent.
‘Yes, I do. I’m Davida Hartley, always known as Vida, new this term. Must hurry. I’m late.’
‘Maybe we’ll meet up in the staff room.’
Not if she could help it, Vida told herself. Elin Lewis Jones was not the route to the acceptance of her colleagues that Vida needed. She’d already found the staff room unfriendly.
At break, she was helping herself to coffee when a quiet voice behind her said, ‘Mucky lot, teachers.’
She turned, mug in hand, to see Elin Lewis Jones reaching past her to lift a tea towel from the countertop and proceed to mop up spills with it. She then dumped it on the counter.
‘Are you sitting with particular friends?’ Elin said as she helped herself to coffee.
‘I don’t sit with anyone.’
She gazed at Vida. ‘You are a Nervous Nelly, Vida.’ Her voice was surprisingly kind. Vida could have become tearful at that gentle tone in this otherwise hostile place. Elin surveyed the prospect of a seat, or two seats, in the room, overcrowded and, to Vida, daunting.
‘I still feel very new here,’ Vida said, relenting because of the soft voice.
‘Look, there are two upright chairs over there,'' Elin said, as she took Vida’s elbow to steer her across the staff-room.
‘Are you Welsh?’ she said as they both sat down. ‘I ask because of your name, Davida.’
‘Everyone calls me Vida.’
‘Not Welsh, though?’
‘No. Just a boring Londoner.’
‘Being a Londoner, that's not boring. What’s your subject?’
‘History. And cynicism.’
Elin smiled. ‘Oh, a wit.’
‘It's not original. My previous Head of History used to say it.’
‘It can save some angst, though, can’t it, a little cynicism?’
Vida looked at the woman properly for the first time. Her hair was auburn, wild and curly and there were hints of freckles on her creamy skin. She was enviably slender, in a white blouse and black culottes. Her Welsh voice was devoid of harshness. ‘I agree,’ Vida said.
‘What made you want to be a teacher?’
‘My mother, I suppose.’
‘It was her idea? Was your mother a teacher, then?’
‘No. She wanted a daughter who was a teacher. I was an obedient daughter. She died some years ago.’ Vida told Elin a little about her life as an only child of a single mother in North London.
‘Have you settled in at Hill Common?’
‘I have not.’ Her own vehemence surprised her.
‘I can imagine you haven’t. There are many problems in this school and in the estate around it. I am thinking you could maybe ratify my opinions about this place.’
The signal for the end of break sounded throughout the school.
‘Back to the grindstone,’ Elin said, rising. ‘I’ll see you again.’
The following day, at break, by the time Elin Lewis Jones strode into the staff-room, Vida was already engaged in a conversation with Kelly Bedford. Elin’s presence seemed to be a focus in the room and to have a tug on Vida’s awareness, perhaps because of her eagerness to avoid her.
Kelly had introduced herself: ‘You’re new, aren’t you? How are you coping? I’m Kelly Bedford. Maths.’
Vida smiled - with relief as much as anything. She had been so aware of her isolation in the staff-room. 'Vida Hartley, history. I’m coping in fear and trepidation, most of the time,’ she said.
‘I know. I came in January. You’ll soon get used to it.’
‘I’m not sure that I want to. In my worst moments, I hesitate at the car park entrance and I’m tempted to go back home.’ Vida felt her gaze drawn to the corner where Elin stood, tall, elegant, aloof and alone, without any apparent concern.
‘Oh, we all feel like that, all the time,’ Kelly was saying.
Vida and Kelly sipped coffee. ‘They’re all so angry, aren’t they?’ Vida said.
‘I suppose it’s not their fault. They don’t choose to live on Hill Common estate, do they?’
Vida glanced at her, trying to hide her alarm. Kelly picked it up, though.
‘Or did you mean the staff?’ She threw her head back and gave a gurgling laugh. ‘In another week, you’ll be the same.’
Vida laughed sheepishly. ‘Perhaps I am now.’ Oh, she hoped not.
‘Who do you have next lesson?’
‘A Year Eleven. For the Civil War. They are quite a decent crowd.’
‘My son, Ben Morrison, is in year Eleven. But you don’t have him, do you? Oh, that’s the bell for the end of break, already. Peace doesn’t last long, does it? Keep your pecker up, Vida.’
