All through science she has thought about him, scribbling his name on the palm of her hand, doodling his name on the inside cover of her exercise book. The teacher rattles on about chemicals, about combinations, of numbers, but Christina isn't listening, she's gazing out the window at the sports field over the way, there where she and Benedict go some lunch times if it's fine and she's not stuck in the girls playground watching other girls play at skip rope or other childish games or chatter. The weather looks fine, the sky blue, clouds sparse. Good. Be out there. He will be there, too. Miss him when he's not about. A piece of chalk whizzes by her head and the teacher calls her name and to concentrate and not daydream. She turns to the front and picks up her pen and takes down the writing on the board. The teacher scowls, eyes like hawk's. She saw him at morning break in passing by the tuck shop. He gazed at her. Sent tingles through her. Watched until he was out of sight. She scribbles in the exercise book, writes down the script on the board. Last night she dreamed of him. Had his photo under her pillow. Her head inches away from him. She pretended he had come to her room at midnight(the parents were downstairs still) and stood by the door looking at her. She told him to come closer and he came and sat on her bed. Seemed so real. Mere inches away. Hand near mine, pretended to touch. The teacher talks on boringly, she writes faster. The other kids seem to focus, make effort, look up, write down. At breakfast her mother was in a mood. Dark mood day. Moaned about state of my bedroom. Clothes everywhere, she said, books, paper, I won't have it. Christina puts down her pen. Inky fingers, pen leaks. ****. She wipes on a tissue, rubs away. Still stained. The other day she held Benedict's hand palm upward and read his lines. Wanted to see how many children he'd have or his wife. Couldn't decide. Wasn't sure. She liked his hand in hers, his fingers, the smoothness, the skin on skin thing. They kissed briefly, other kids were watching, making silly sounds, comments. She thinks her twin brother says things about her to their mother, not out of spite or telltale, but innocently in chatter over the dinner table or by way of idle talk. Her mother invited Benedict to lunch one school day. Studied him, questioned him. One of her black mood days. She managed to take him to her room for a few moments while her mother was out and showed him her bed and her doll collection and such and kissed quickly until they heard her mother's return. The lesson will soon be over. She cannot wait. Bored titless. She closes her exercise book and puts the cap on her pen and stares at the teacher as she finishes her talk. Her big brother has books under his bed. She saw one the other week while looking for his record player to borrow. Magazines of naked women. Piles stacked neatly. She removed one and opened the pages. She stopped at a page where a woman was kneeling dog like. A man was there ,too. She blushed, closed the magazine, shoved it back under the bed and went out of the room and to her own room. What the hell was that all about? She tried to push it from her mind. Her big brother had touched her in her room and she said nothing. The magazines were still there, she supposes, watching the teacher answer questions of those who were interested or pretended they were to get in the teacher's good books. Hands rose in the air by those with questions of science. Christina ponders a question: why do some women kneel dog like? She doesn't ask. Imagines the teacher's face, giggles from other kids. Best not to. The biology teacher was best to ask. But he will probably blush. So would she. She wishes time would fly. The sky is still blue. Clouds drift lazily. Her big brother lifted her skirt under the dinning room table and touched her leg. She said nothing, but stiffened, he smiled. Mother moaned about my untidy room, the ***** clothes under the bed, put in the wash basket, she went on. A bell rings from the passage, lesson over, thank God, she thinks, shoving her books in her bag. She goes to the washroom and enters a cubicle. The fingers are still ink stained. Benedict's name is written small there on her palm. She kisses her palm. She remembers the first time she saw him. He was new to the school, came just before Christmas. He stood in the assembly hall in a year above hers. His sister was in her class. They talked about him. She introduced him to her one lunch time on the sports field. They talked shyly, sat near, didn't touch, uneasy the first time. She left the cubicle, washed her hands, scrubbed her fingers with the white soap. Cleaner, still slightly stained. Try again later. She leaves the wash room and goes along the passage hoping to see him. Crowds of kids pass by. A boy and girl by the gym door smooch, his hand on her thigh, her hand on his neck. But no Benedict. She stares about her. No. Not about. She moves towards the next lesson, maths, double, time passes, boring, wants to see him. The bell rings, next lesson, his sister walks beside her, not him, o if it was him, if only. The passageway is dull, her life seems dim.
PROSE POEM. SET IN SCHOOL IN 1962.