Young Wives' Tales Read Online Free PDF Page B

This isn’t a come-on. I know that women like Mrs Foster (over thirty-five, never been especially hot, hard-working hubby, who she’s gratefulto and for) are not the type to proposition strange men found wandering through the school corridors, even if they make especially nice comments about the artistic integrity of the Year 2 wall frieze: subject, autumn. She just wants to help me in some innocuous way, if at all possible, because she likes me. Women do.
    As I open the door to Craig’s office I’m overwhelmed by an enormous jumble of papers and books. His jacket is hung on a hook behind the door and it actually has cord patches on the elbows. It’s so funny that everyone has their little affectations, even those who you’d believe to be above (or below) such things. I mean, what is old Weedie Walker trying to say? He’s not some don floating around the lofty spires in Oxford, is he? He’s a headmaster at a local primary school.
    Craig’s work environment could not be more dissimilar to my own. His little, cramped, dusty, academic office is diametrically opposed to my spacious, dynamic, bright-young-thing environment. There are wall-to-wall books and files which are occasionally interrupted by a photo of some class or other, lots of identikit kids grinning manically for the camera. His large desk looks like it’s been purchased from one of those pointless little magazines that you find stuffed in the back of the Sunday newspapers. I wonder if it came with a pack of video covers that are supposed to look like great classic novels. You can’t see much of the offensive fake leather anyway, as the desk is covered with papers, pens, pencils, stamps, elastic bands, paperclips, pencil sharpeners, etc. Hasn’t the man heard of the digital age?
    In my management consultancy firm no one has a set desk, or even a drawer, let alone an entire office. That sort of ownership is regarded as stultifying; we hot-desk. Which means we are forced to carry our laptops, mobiles and BlackBerrys around with us as though they were second skin. The idea is when you arrive at work each morning you enter the reception (acres of granite and glass) and are checked in to an available desk. The hope is to stop cliques forming, to encourage integration of staff and the dissimilation of new ideas and some other bollocks – I forget. To be honest it’s a bit of a pain in the arse. There comes a time, in every man’s life, when the need to lay his hat somewhere becomes paramount. I have to admit, Weedie Walker’s office, for all the chaos, has a certain charm.
    ‘Mate!’
    I stand with my arms wide open, an enthusiastic grin bursting off my face. Craig looks up from the papers he’s marking and smiles at me. At first he’s unsure, a little shy, and then a big grin cracks across his face. His grin is actually very cool, and he looks much less of a nerd when he’s smiling.
    Craig stands up, walks towards me and holds out his hand for me to shake. I pump it and pull him into a hug. Thing is, Weedie or Weeie he may have been, but he was my mate. Still is. He’s a good bloke. Better than me, which I don’t have a problem with. Nearly everyone I know is more principled than me but I take comfort in the fact that few of them are as happy as I am. The two facts are related.
    It’s been about six months since Craig and I last saw one another. This in boy world causes no problem at all. If two girlies who’d been mates since primary school hadn’t seen each other in six months, I swear to you, there would be grief, guilt and recriminations by the bucketful. Both would feel neglected or insulted. It must be crap being a girl, with all that emotional stuff all the time. Whereas being a guy is great. More pay, same work, no childbirth, no glass ceilings, no desire to write thank-you notes. Ace.
    ‘Nice office, mate. But serious lack of totty mummy at the school gate. That’s all I came down here for.’
    ‘John, if you were expecting totty mummy