Skippy Dies Read Online Free PDF Page B

what they call him.
Howard the Coward
. Feathers; eggs left on his seat; a yellow streak, executed in chalk, on his teacher’s cape; once a whole frozen chicken
     there on the desk, trussed, dimpled, humiliated.
    ‘It’s because it rhymes with Howard, that’s all,’ Halley tells him. ‘Like if your name was Ray, they’d call you Gay Ray. Or
     if it was Mary, they’d call you Scary Mary. It’s just the way their brains work. It doesn’t mean anything.’
    ‘It means they
know
.’
    ‘Oh God, Howard, one little bump, and it was years and years ago. How could they possibly know about that?’
    ‘They just do.’
    ‘Well, even if they do.
I
know you’re not a coward. They’re just kids, they can’t see into your soul.’
    But she is wrong. That is exactly what they can do. Old enough to have a decent mechanical understanding of how the world
     works, but young enough for their judgements to remain unfogged by anything like mercy or compassion or the realization that
     all this will one day happen to them, the boys – his students – are machines for seeing through the apparatus of worldliness
     that adulthood, as figured by their teachers, surrounds itself with, to the grinding emptiness at its heart. They find it
     hilarious. And the names they give the other teachers seem so unerringly
right
. Malco the Alco? Big Fat Johnson? Lurch?
    Howard the Coward. Fuck! Who told her?
    The car starts on the third try and putters past slow droves of boys babbling and throwing conkers at each other till it reaches
     the gate, where it joins a tailback waiting for a space to open up
on the road. Years ago, on their very last day of school, Howard and his friends had paused beneath this same gate – SEABROOK COLLEGE arching above them in reversed gold letters – and turned to give what was now their alma mater the finger, before passing
     through and out into the exhilarating panorama of passion and adventure that would be the setting for their adult lives. Sometimes
     – often – he wonders if by that small gesture, in a life otherwise bare of gestures or dissent, he had doomed himself to return
     here, to spend the rest of his days scrubbing away at that solitary mark of rebellion. God loves these broad ironies.
    He reaches the top of the line, indicating right. There’s the ragged beginnings of a sunset visible over the city, a lush
     melange of magentas and crimsons; he sits there as witty responses crash belatedly into his mind, one after another.
    Never say never
.
    That’s what you think
.
    Better join the queue
.
    The car behind honks as a gap opens up. At the last second, Howard switches the indicator and turns left instead.
    Halley is on the phone when he gets home; she swivels her chair around to him, rolling her eyes and making a
blah blah
shape with her hand. The air is dense with a day’s smoke, and the ashtray piled high with crushed butts and frazzled matchsticks.
     He mouths
Hi
to her and goes into the bathroom. His own phone starts to ring as he’s washing his hands. ‘Farley?’ he whispers.
    ‘Howard?’
    ‘I called you three times, where have you been?’
    ‘I had to do some work with my third-years for the Science Fair. What’s wrong? Is everything okay? I can’t hear you very well.’
    ‘Hold on’ – Howard reaches in and turns on the shower. In his natural voice he says, ‘Listen, something very –’
    ‘Are you in the shower?’
    ‘No, I’m standing outside it.’
    ‘Maybe I should call you back.’
    ‘No – listen, I wanted to – something very strange has just
happened. I was talking to the new girl, the substitute, you know, who teaches Geography –’
    ‘Aurelie?’
    ‘What?’
    ‘Aurelie. It’s her name.’
    ‘How do you know?’
    ‘What do you mean, how do I know?’
    ‘I mean’ – he feels his cheeks go crimson – ‘I meant, what kind of name is Aurelie?’
    ‘It’s French. She’s part-French.’ Farley chuckles lasciviously. ‘I wonder which part. Are