Read Online Reading the Ceiling by Dayo Forster - Free Book Online Page B

his cubicle. I emerge from the station into the indifferent daylight I had studied from my kitchen window. Propelled by the cold and my tardiness, I run-walk down Tottenham Court Road.
    I slip into the tiniest crack I can make in the door to get into Public Finance, but the door refuses to co-operate and shuts behind me with a thud. Dr Brian Brown – cords, brogues, check shirt, leather-elbowed jacket – reacts as he always does to latecomers. He pauses, closes his eyes tight, waves his right arm which is holding a stick of chalk in my direction, opens his mouth as if to speak, then closes it again as if compelled by his good nature to hold his tongue.
    â€˜Ms Roberts, in your fine opinion, what is the major burden excessive public debt imposes on a country?’
    All heads swivel round to me. I sit on the rind of the swing-down seat, stuck there by the large bag balancing on my knee.
    â€˜Er, I guess it commits future generations to a lifetime of debt repayments.’
    â€˜What if, at some point in the future, a country cannot repay its debts? What then?’
    â€˜Um, well, technically, a country can never become bankrupt as there will always be someone to bail it out of trouble.’
    â€˜Unlike us as individuals, Ms Roberts. Thank you, you may take your seat.’
    He turns his back to me, and his attention to the chalkboard. He scribbles: Can a country become bankrupt?
    â€˜One last thing, do file away, amongst your opinions about public debt, that I like all participants in this course to attend my lectures on time.’
    He addresses the rest of the class: ‘Would anyone else like to volunteer an alternative opinion on this?’
    I fumble in my bag to extract a notepad and pen. I stuff the bag down past my legs and let my weight push the seat down.
    Dr Brown proceeds to discuss how to deal with unrelenting inflation, when a government is so incompetent at handling its economy that the cash you thought you had at the beginning of the year is piddle-worthy at the end of it.
    Prof McIntyre’s door is wide open. He bellows into the phone, ‘Oh no, oh no no no!!’ And then slams it down, muttering, ‘The fools, the damn fools.’
    When I introduce myself with an ‘Er . . .’, he beckons me in.
    â€˜Come in, come in,’ he mangles my name, ‘Ayudel. How are you getting on?’ He points to his visitor’s chair, a leather armchair shoved up close to his corner bookshelf, and already occupied by a tottery pile of books. Sit down, sit down, push the books aside. Have some coffee, fresh. I need to make another call.’
    I busy myself with pouring into the cleanest mug in his collection and listen in.
    â€˜Bloody fools, absolutely unacceptable.’
    A pause.
    â€˜I depend on you to make them understand that some things simply must not be substituted. Bye.’
    He turns to me. ‘Administrators. Trying to cut the budget for our Christmas bash. Need someone to tell them what’s what.’ He pats the pockets of his jacket and then some papers on his desk. With an ‘Ah, here it is,’ he sticks his cherrywood pipe in his mouth, then continues searching. I hand over my lighter and he engulfs the room with tobacco-lined puffs.
    â€˜How are you?’ he says.
    â€˜Sort of OK, but there are still things to sort out.’
    â€˜Hmm, I see.’
    I hastily continue, ‘But I’ve got to go for my French class in a minute, so I can’t really talk to you right now, but just wondered if. . .’
    â€˜Free for lunch?’
    â€˜Sure.’
    â€˜OK, meet me there at one and we’ll catch up then.’
    I gather my belongings and, saying my thank-yous, leave.
    I do not know how I want to be, what I want to become. Will I ever be able to go back home and live in the chunks of expectation my mother, my relatives, the whole of Fajara, expect?
    *
    Our French lecturer, Madame LeBlanc, is wearing some sort of negligee in