I Think of You: Stories Read Online Free PDF Page A

what?”
    “Like a teacher, you know.”
    I did know. I knew they were speaking Cockney and I was speaking proper English. But surely I was the one who was right. My instincts, however, warned me not to tell them that.
    “How many wives does your father have?”
    I bridled. “One.”
    “Oh, he don’t have ten, then? What does he do anyway?”
    “Both my parents teach in the university.” A mistake this, one I would live to regret; I was affiliated with the enemy profession.
    “Oh, teachers, are they?”
    “In the university, ” I supplied.
    “Sarah’s dad’s an engineer. He makes a hundred pounds a week. How much does yours make?”
    Sarah’s dad was obviously the financial top dog in the third form. But what was I supposed to say? Nothing, actually, he lives on a grant? But don’t you see, we’re intellectuals, we’re classless? Yo u can’t ask me such a vulgar question?
    “I don’t know.”
    “Well, d’you have bags of money?”
    I heard my mother’s voice. “We spend our money on travel, books, records, on culture …”
    This was met with silence. Then: “D’you have a boyfriend?”
    Again I heard my mother’s voice: “I know boys who are friends.”
    “D’you have a special boyfriend?”
    I thought quickly. David hardly qualified as my boyfriend. But for status, I lied. “Yes.”
    “D’you kiss him?”
    “Do I what?” I stalled. I didn’t really want to share that. And something told me it would unleash other questions I wouldn’t be able to answer.
    “D’you kiss him?”
    “No.”
    “D’you sit on his knee?”
    “No.”
    “Well, how far have you got, then?”
    “ We went to the theater,” I said. They lost interest at that point. Just moved on and never paid me much attention again. There was a girl there with blue eyes and straight black hair and her second name was Shakespear. I could have made friends with her, I thought. But she was Susan’s best friend and I would not compete.
    School was a disaster. The white girls lived in a world of glamour and boyfriends to which I had no passport. The black girls lived in a ghetto world of whispers and regarded me with suspicious dislike. I was too middle of the road for them. Therewas one girl of Greek parentage, Andrea. She came home with me one day. She came into our kitchen as my mother was preparing dinner. “Cor blimey!” she cried. “Olives. Can I have one?” Smiling kindly, my mother pressed her to take several. But to me she seemed unmitigatedly gross, and although I was polite to her, I could not make myself be her friend.
    Academically, it wasn’t much better. I only scraped through most subjects and was terrible at math. I couldn’t understand why at the time because I was doing fine with the math I was studying at home on my own. Looking back, I realize it was because I didn’t know the terminology in English. The teacher was a harassed, birdlike man in white shirtsleeves, with huge eyes swimming behind his rimless spectacles, and he looked so helpless that it never occurred to me to ask him for help.
    As for brilliance, I could not have chosen an unluckier subject to excel in: English. The class would have forgiven me outstanding performance in science or sports, but English? And Mrs. Braithwaite, with her gray bun, her glasses over sharp blue eyes, her tweed suit hanging lower at the front than it did at the back, booming out, “The Egyptian gets it every time. It takes someone from Africa, a foreigner, to teach you about your native language. You should be ashamed.” At first I was proud and thought how dumb they were not to know that birds of a feather “flocked together,” that worms “turned,” and that Shy-lock wanted his “pound of flesh.” But as the hostility grew I realized I had made another mistake. I tried to fade into silence, but it was no use. Those sharp blue eyes would seek me out and
    she would call me by name, and I was not humble enough to give a wrong answer or say I didn’t