Read Online Love Lessons by Nick Sharratt - Free Book Online

sighing.
    â€˜Grace! Don’t make it all messy,’ said Mum. ‘Do your name again, and try to keep your writing neat. Look, it’s all over the place. Make it smaller, to fit on the line.’
    â€˜It won’t go smaller,’ said Grace, gripping her pen so tightly her knuckles went white. She stuck her tongue out as she wrote, concentrating fiercely. Then she peered at my form. ‘Oh no! I’ve done my address wrong. I’ve mixed up the postcode letters,’ she wailed. ‘Shall I copy it out?’
    â€˜No, it’ll look even more of a mess. Just leave it. As if it matters!’ I said, though I’d written mine in my neatest printing, using my fine-line black drawing pen.
    A smart blonde woman in a black trouser suit and high-heeled boots walked past us into the headteacher’s office without even knocking.
    â€˜What a nerve! We were here first,’ said Mum. ‘Do you think she’s his secretary?’
    She wasn’t the secretary. She put her head back round the door in two minutes and beckoned us in. She was the headteacher, Miss Wilmott.
    â€˜We didn’t think you’d be a woman,’ Mum said stupidly.
    â€˜Well, I promise you I’m not a man in drag, Mrs King,’ she said.
    Mum looked dreadfully embarrassed. Grace and I sniggered uncomfortably.
    â€˜Welcome to Wentworth,’ said Miss Wilmott. ‘We’re all new girls together. I’ve only been here since the beginning of term.’
    She indicated three chairs in front of her desk. She sat behind it, resting on her elbows, her hands crossed in front of her. They were very pretty hands with beautifully shaped nails, pink with bright white tips, as perfect as a porcelain doll.
    Mum hid her own bunch-of-bananas hands in her floral lap. Grace sat on her own bitten fingernails. I made myself sit with my hands by my sides, pretending to be relaxed. I looked past Miss Wilmott at the paintings on her wall. They were mostly creation myths, but I recognized one Nativity scene, with a host of angels flying round above the stable, playing a heavenly version of ‘Ring-a-ring-a-roses’. The painting had been in the same room as Tobias and his angel.
    Miss Wilmott saw me staring. ‘Do you like my painting? It’s Italian, by Bellini.’
    â€˜No, it isn’t!’ I said, astonished. ‘It’s a Botticelli. He paints very differently, in a very poetic and ethereal way. I just adore his work.’
    â€˜I’m so pleased,’ said Miss Wilmott, though she didn’t sound pleased at all.
    â€˜She’s very into art, our Prudence,’ said Mum. ‘My husband takes both girls to all the galleries, fills them in on all the details. He’s taken such pains with them.’
    â€˜Excellent,’ said Miss Wilmott briskly. ‘Well, I’m determined there’s going to be a big emphasis on the arts in Wentworth. I’m sure your daughters will appreciate their art lessons.’
    â€˜Oh, not me!’ said Grace. ‘I don’t want to do art, thanks, because I’m useless at it. I’ll just do English and history and geography and some nature stuff, but not anything hard.’
    â€˜You’ll be given a timetable, Grace,’ said Miss Wilmott. ‘You’ll find you’ll be doing all sorts of subjects. But first of all, I’d like both of you to do a little test for me so we can sort out which year group to put you in.’
    â€˜I can’t do tests,’ said Grace anxiously, seemingly determined to convince Miss Wilmott she was totally bonkers.
    â€˜She panics,’ Mum said. ‘She’s not really that clever – she takes after me, poor girl.’ She laughed a false little ha-ha-ha. ‘Prudence is the bright one,’ Mum continued. ‘She’ll be top of her class, no problem.’
    Miss Wilmott’s smile was getting strained. ‘We’ll have the girls do their assessment