Peer Pressure Read online

  The third and most recent attempt had been Charles who, despite being charming, wealthy and impressively endowed, did decide post coitus, to pop to the bathroom without putting any clothes back on. Jodie was on her way back from the kitchen with a cup of tea, when they had bumped into each other. Katy had heard that he was healing well, although not interested in a second date.

  All of which had led Katy to the conclusion that perhaps this was it: a two bedroom house, office job and Saturday’s with her sky plus box. Yet she never felt sorry for herself, or her situation. She wasn’t the first, nor would she be the last to have had a child at such a young age. And she was also aware that many of those women, in similar circumstances to her own, were shadows of the girls they had once been, that they hadn’t been given the opportunities or help that she had had. Above all, Katy understood the warmth and security of a loving family and a good home, two things she had been blessed with thanks to her own Mum and Dad, who had managed to secure her a house following her divorce from Tom. And if Katy had any life plan whatsoever at this point, it was to make sure that Jodie would never have to struggle like she had, that she would be there for her no matter what happened.

  That included pregnancy, something she had thought long and hard about, especially by the time Jodie had come of age and started taking an interest in boys. In fact, she had spent so much time thinking about it that she had come up with solutions to any number of scenarios that Jodie might eventually have thrown at her.

  Jodie would often grill her about such scenarios, trying to get a rise out of her.

  “Mum, what if I told you I’d started smoking?”

  “Well, I would just have to give your photo to every tobacco seller in Aberdeen. And yes, that includes the supermarkets!”

  “Mum, what if I told you I’d started smoking crack?”

  “Well, I would just have to kill your dealer.”

  Jodie would then go for broke, trying not to smile.

  “Mum, what if I told you I was pregnant?”

  “Well, I’d just have to kill you!”

  This would be followed by the two of them cracking up, something both cherished in each other.

  No matter what else happened they could always laugh together. Because thankfully, the small age gap hadn’t really caused any complications between the two. They had a very typical mother daughter relationship and were very close, mainly because they both already knew the sting of being left by a man and not just any man: a husband and a father.

  Jodie, of course, knew nothing of her mother’s feelings towards her when it came to boyfriends, nor could Katy have anticipated that Jodie had similar life plans of her own, none of which included becoming pregnant at seventeen.

  They both shared many things in common, but chief among them was a romantic, old fashioned ideal of love. Had they known of this particular similarity, then maybe what was to transpire over the next ten months could have been avoided.

  However, neither of them could have anticipated the arrival Rob Peer.

  FOUR

  Two miles and several streets away, on the east side of the city, Rob Peer was drinking a very strong black coffee, his third cup of the morning. He hadn’t slept well the night before but had put his anxiety down to first-day nerves.

  On the plus side, waking up at four a.m. did have its advantages; he had finished unpacking the various boxes that had been sitting in the hallway of his small, one bedroom flat for the last three weeks and had even managed to iron his shirts for the next four days.

  He had allowed himself the pleasure of a long, hot shower and had attempted to eat some breakfast, a meal he rarely had much time or appetite for. He managed one slice of toast before giving up, his stomach not up to the challenge.

  His sling bag was packed, all necessary paperwork was present, correct and signed. His mobile phone was charged, as was his iPod. He knew such timesavers would make this, his first week in a new job, far more relaxed and organized.

  He knew it, even if every inch of his body was currently disagreeing with him.

  He sat on his couch, switching between BBC News and ITV, wondering where his allegiances should lie. Truth be told though, his mind was elsewhere.

  He was thinking not only about the day ahead, but of days passed. He thought of his graduation from teacher training two years prior. He could picture his parents’ faces, how proud they had been, how proud, in fact, they still were. He thought of all the advice that had been given to him that day and he desperately wished that he had paid attention to it.

  He knew that at twenty-five, he was one of the youngest English teachers Brushwood Academy would ever have had, and that such opportunities for one so young were not afforded to just anyone.

  Rob was graced with a keen intellect, which was often belittled by his appearance. He had the grace of youth, but an old soul, the looks of an athlete, but the mind of a bookworm.

  And yet, when offered the position, he had been reluctant to take the job at first. He had suddenly found himself doubting his abilities. He felt that he needed more training, another year perhaps, and if he was completely honest with himself, more time to be a hell raising twenty-something, rather than a respectable member of an institution responsible for imparting wisdom to the youth of today.

  Many of his friends back home were still social animals, strong believers in the holy trinity of ‘Grub, pub and club’, a mantra that had passed into legend on the streets of Edinburgh over the years. But that was the old Rob and this was a new city. He rarely saw his old friends anymore.

  Those bonds forged in beer and music had started to break the moment Rob had decided to study English Lit, at the precocious age of sixteen and even the allure of stealing two cans from a pack of your friend’s Dad’s party pack couldn’t distract him from what he felt was his career ambitions. This feeling strengthened even more so once he took up his teaching placements. While his friends were out scouting for women or propping themselves up with a free hand as they urinated against a wall, Rob would sit at home, head in the books. Such thinking made him feel old. Fathers were teachers. Grandfathers even. Rob was neither of these and was beginning to get that ‘fish out of water’ feeling in the pit of his stomach. It was either that or last night’s curry.

  His head was buzzing. Unable to focus on the news headlines, he left his coffee on a nearby table, and began to aimlessly pace around the flat. It was small, one hallway, a bathroom, kitchen, bedroom and lounge, the walls bare. It was a blank canvas, but Rob preferred that. It would allow him to put his own personal stamp on the place.

  He had only been in the place two weeks and in that time had really only done the bare minimum of work to it: a couch, a double bed, a TV and, most important of all bookshelves. To call Rob a literature junkie would not have been an unfair assessment, except that he was far more picky than most. He loved books, and like any connoisseur, he had high standards. Yet, he wasn’t a snob. First editions and collectables sat on shelves next to paperbacks, with no real order or pattern to speak of. The alphabet had no place here. It was a mark of Rob’s personality: quiet order hiding utter chaos.

  He wandered into his bedroom and stood in front of the mirror by the door. He glanced at his watch, before turning his attention to his own reflection.

  Shirt? Check.

  Trousers? Check.

  Flies done up? Double Check.

  Look of terror and inadequacy? Check, check and check.

  Dark circles had developed around his eyes, a product of two hours sleep. At least his hair was behaving itself. He’d always thought he had been cursed with his Father’s Irish hair, which maintained a kink at one side that would make it unmanageably wavy at a certain length. The small cut on his neck, administered earlier by a Gillette and a shaky hand, had faded also.

  Overall, he felt he’d done a decent job. At least he looked the part, he thought. Surely that was half the battle? The rest would be in the ‘welcome to teaching’ manual he would be handed as
soon as he walked through the school doors, wouldn’t it? Christ, he hoped they gave him a manual! Something that would tell him what to expect, what protocol there would be.

  For instance, he had never been too sure what, legally; he was supposed to do if a student picked a fight with him. He had seen what boys of fifteen or sixteen looked like these days. They were huge. If one hit him, was he allowed to hit back? Would the other teachers be on his side? What if a girl hit him? Rob’s mind was racing now. This was not a good start.

  Outside, a bus drove by, making the window rattle, a unique feature of the property that his estate agent had, oddly, failed to mention. Rob’s focus shifted from his face to his unmade bed. He flopped down upon it, limply, facing the ceiling and exhaled the word

  “Shit”.

  He checked his watch again. It was seven-thirty a.m.

  “Shit, shit, shit, shit.” He knew he would have to make a move soon. He knew that soon he would be leaving the warmth and comfort of his flat, to walk down the cold granite street to his car. That he would get in, key in the ignition, a blast of cold air in the face, a quick re-tune on the radio and then he would be off to start his career. All this he knew.

  And yet, while his heart was in it, his head and guts betrayed him and, quietly, he died inside at just the thought of putting his coat on.

  FIVE

  Nothing had changed. The granite still made the building look depressing, even more so because it was a school which, to a teenager, was already the most depressing place on earth, a reputation that it had maintained for more than seventy years

  Voices still echoed in the hallways, while the classrooms, with their massive air conditioning vents, were so dry that they could have evolved their own eco-system. The air smelled of chalk dust and disinfectant, while the huge windows taunted the building’s inhabitants with the knowledge that there was a whole world out there.

  It was always the same, five days a week. Six if you were to count Sundays, which never really felt like a day off due to the dark cloud of Monday morning looming over your head. The students all knew they lived for Friday nights and Saturday mornings. Yep, nothing had changed.

  Nothing ever changed.

  It was with this frame of mind that Jodie started her last year at Brushwood Academy.

  She had already gathered two Higher Grades the year previous, for English and Mathematics, which had earned her an ‘A ‘and ‘B’ respectively.

  This year she intended on gaining three more, in Art and Design, Drama and Geography.

  She had planned it that way, really. She had wanted her last year to be creative, freeing and fun; to be a perfect send off to her secondary education and a welcome pre-cursor to the next step, University.

  It was this step in particular that had led her to apply for sixth year studies in English, sort of an extra credit that would involve in-depth discussion and study of serious works of literature. One week you would be assessing the prose style of Hardy, the next breaking apart the structure of Dickens.

  It was perfect for Jodie, who had a vivacious appetite for reading as well as a genuine desire to study English Literature at University in a year’s time. This class would make that desire a lot easier to satisfy.

  Entering through the large double doors of Brushwood, Jodie took a deep, uncomfortable breath, as did every student that day, all left with no doubt that the summer break was truly a memory and that the next few months would primarily take place within this large, grey building.

  She stood for a moment, scanning the reception hall for familiar faces. None to be found, she made her way over to one of the large notice boards on the wall, absorbing any information that might be important or relevant to her. She didn’t get very far with this though, as her sight was suddenly obscured by a pair of hands that wrapped round her head from behind.

  “Guess who?”

  It was a female voice, warm, familiar, a slightly sarcastic tone.

  It had to be Laura.

  “Mum?” Jodie replied, wryly.

  “Close enough.”

  She removed her hands from Jodie’s eyes, allowing her to turn and face her. They shared a friendly hug.

  “Morning loser,” was Jodie’s way of saying that she had missed her this summer.

  “Morning bitch,” was Laura’s.

  Pleasantries out of the way, the two friends began to walk slowly down the hall, falling back into the never-ending conversation that had existed between the two of them since they first met four years earlier at a play rehearsal. And while they hadn’t seen each other in the last five weeks, thanks to Laura’s father living in Milton Keynes and it being his turn to spend the summer with her, it felt as though no time had passed. A sign of true friendship.

  “And so it begins,” said Laura, with a melodramatic head tilt.

  “It’s only one more year.” Jodie said this to be consoling, but really it sounded more like a judge passing a criminal sentence.

  “Says you, little miss perfect.”

  “Laura, we’ve been over this. If you fail sixth year, they don’t make you re-sit it, they just throw you out.” Jodie laughed and gave Laura a gentle nudge with her shoulder.

  “Well, that’s comforting,” she replied, with a roll of the eyes.

  “So, you’re really doing this, are you?”

  “Doing what?”

  “The whole sixth year studies thing?”

  “I kind of have to. The head of department called my mum about it. They seem to think it would be ‘beneficial’ for me.”

  “Listen,” Laura added, “if we’re going to hang out together this year, can you stop using big words like ‘mum’?”

  “Ha-ha!” Jodie humored her, “Did you get your timetable yet?”

  “Yeah, take a look.” Laura pulled out a freshly laminated piece of card from her coat pocket and handed it to Jodie. Laura’s timetable was erratic and confusing; Jodie raised an eyebrow.

  “This doesn’t bode well for me, by the looks of it.”

  “Well, you can dry your eyes on mine,” Jodie replied, handing her own timetable to Laura, who studied her friend’s schedule with a certain degree of envy, before shaking her head and looking at her own one again, saying,

  “It’s pretty shit, isn’t it?”

  Jodie didn’t know what to tell her, but gave it a crack anyway.

  “It’s not shit; it’s just...well yeah, pretty shit.”

  The two friends looked at each other and chuckled.

  “Did you hear,” Laura added, “Mr. Phillips retired?”

  “Is that right?” Jodie replied, genuinely surprised, given that he was supposed to be her English teacher this year, “So that means..?”

  “That means,” Laura continued, “new teacher. Lucky you, I can just see him now: short, blazer wearing, bearded.”

  “And if it’s a woman?”

  “Same.”

  The two friends shared a laugh, safe in the knowledge that if they were to endure another year at Brushwood, at least they were to endure it together.

  Rob arrived at ten to eight, but had had trouble finding a parking space in the staff car park. Eventually, he managed to squeeze his Fiesta between a Mini metro and a motorbike, although he had to climb over to the passenger’s side to get out. He had made his way to the reception desk, passing by students, all of whom studied his every move with glances, not sure what to make of this obvious new arrival.

  “Hi, I’m Robert Peer,” he stated in an oddly high pitched voice, to a receptionist who appeared to be one hundred and twenty years old, “I’m starting today in the English department.”

  The receptionist stared at him for what seemed like an eternity. Rob tried smiling at her, but that just seemed to make her angry. She typed his name into her computer, before sliding him a small card with his schedule on it.

  “Someone will be with you shortly,” she said.

  God, Rob thought, she even sounds one hundred and twenty.

  “Thanks.” Rob
took his schedule and sat down in the waiting area beside the reception desk. He tried to stay calm, but nerves were getting the better of him. He found his right leg wouldn’t stay still, only content to bob up and down repeatedly, while his hands were shaking.

  He took a few deep breaths, but that just made him feel sick. He looked up, scanning the walls. A large wooden sign bore the Brushwood Academy logo, with a small quote underneath.

  It read ‘Big trees grow from little sticks’.

  Or at least that’s what it would have said, had someone not used a marker pen to replace the word ‘sticks’ with ‘pricks’.

  Rob took a certain comfort in the knowledge that school pranks never really changed, but it was a passing comfort at best. In the end, he decided to focus on his schedule, which might as well have been written in Latin, as no one had explained it to him yet. It looked more like a mathematical equation than a schedule.

  Rob heard the squeak, squeak, squeak of trainers on linoleum and looked up to be faced with a man-mountain, dressed in tracksuit bottoms, t-shirt, carrying a clipboard with a stopwatch draped around his neck. The mountain spoke.

  “You must be Rob.”

  Rob stood up and they shook hands.

  “That’s me,” he replied, his voice thankfully back to its normal tone.

  “John Marker. I’m head of P.E. The rector wanted me to show you around.”

  “Oh, right. He’s not here right now?”

  “No he’s here, it’s just you know, being the first day of school and all, he’s a little busy.

  You’re scheduled to meet him later today for the traditional ‘meet and greet’ in the faculty lounge. Until then, you’ve got me.”