Our Last Summer

Summer

Three twenty-two in the afternoon on a Friday afternoon in sweltering thirty-two degree July heat and the unforgiving linen of a poorly-made school uniform. The rambling, distracted, droning rambling of Mr. Burke on his interpretation—because nobody cares enough to offer an alternative—of Conan Doyle’s narrative in The Adventures of Sherlock Holmescreates a stupor in the room.

If they do not move soon, they will drown.

Danny, at Ryan’s left, is already asleep. He is even snoring quietly, but the hum of the bees under the open window detracts from the noise, and little else can be heard over Mr. Burke’s stutter anyway. Tom is texting openly, not even hiding the phone, and probably arranging a date with the latest conquest to fall victim to his swaggering charm. Even Maria Marquez, she of the endless poise, grace, and triple-sized cleavage, sags in her chair.

It is the last day of school, and they all regret agreeing to take A-levels.

The school has its policy—those to take A-levels return after the GCSEs to get the first few weeks of work done. Then they can go to summer break. It is by no means the first time they have been in classrooms in early July, but it has to be the most torturous.

“And I think that-at—think that—Conan Doyle, or W-Watson, is trying to-to-to—to—remind us th-tha-that…”

There is no energy in the room, save for the perpetual nervous fumbling of Mr. Burke. He is the kind of teacher that hates his job because of the children: they mercilessly tear him to shreds, eight hours a day, for the stammer that they themselves make worse. It is their sport: English Lit, under Mr. Burke’s ineffective rule, is a favourite subject across the entire spread of the school. Ryan knows of no one that listens to, much less respects, the bumbling man.

But in July, even with the stutter at its worst, they cannot muster up the energy to so much as smirk. It is too hot: a wet, heavy heat sinking through their clothes and melting in their bones. It is so hot that the act of thinking is a sin in itself. Ignorance is the only escape, and as his stammer creates a terrible counterpoint to the endless ticking of the classroom clock, Ryan realises that it isn’t much of an escape at all.

Three twenty-four, and time seems to want to go backwards.

Ryan already knows that he will be dropping A-level English. There is simply no way he can tolerate two more years of that stammer, and of the general uproar that trails in the wake of Mr. Burke’s teaching style. In the winter, they practically riot, just to keep warm. He is a hopeless teacher, only clinging to his job out of fear, with the tenacity of a man afraid of unemployment. He is more afraid of the dole office than the children, and that is his saving grace—or his damnation.

Ryan will take history, he thinks, and endure the endless drone and sharp commands of Mrs. Kelly over this.

A bee bounces off Danny’s ear, and he wakes with a snort.

“…W-Wa—Watson—has r-realised tha-tha—that –”

Danny’s head hits the table again, and he is gone. Ryan wishes vaguely that he could do the same

“…life d-doesn’t st-sto-stop b-because we want it t-to.”

The bell explodes into the room.

Summer breaks.

* * * *

They gather by the bike shed, around Tom wrestling with his bike lock, and a brave few light their cigarettes, defying the ridiculous heat and the threat that Mr. D’Souza, the football coach, might appear around the corner at any minute.

The heat is unbearable. Even Ryan strips off his shirt, modesty for once giving way to comfort. Tom’s cigarette is obscene, its glow repugnant in the shimmering sunlight, and Tom laughs at him when he retreats to the shade.

“Bloody hell, Ryan, don’t stop the strip tease now!” he jeers. “Was just gettin’ into that!”

When Andy—new kid, expelled from his last place, some Scouse-accented git that’s been in five fights since he showed up—sneers and curls his lip, Tom almost casually clips him around the ear, and Ryan snorts.

“Yeah, you’d like that, wouldn’t you?” he snaps back, and Danny laughs from the burning metal bars he perches on.

“Get a room, y’fags,” he mocks, and turns to peer through the slats in the wall, eyeing the girls leaving. Their skirts are hiked to their knickers, their long legs on display for the world, burnt lobster-red in the new dawn of summer. They will return in the autumn, sunburned and overweight, complaining of autumnal diets and hiking their skirts high again to show off those supposedly fat thighs. Nobody minds.

It’s been a hot year, and Ryan doesn’t look forward to visiting his Nan. She lives down south, near London, in rolling countryside where the air doesn’t move and the people sit in sleepy silence until the storms break—and then only stir to complain about the rain. It is always hotter there, and time slows in the heat, until it feels as though he’ll never come home. It is endless. Sometimes, he wonders if the people aren’t trapped there, caught in the web of the heat and the stillness, and secretly want to escape as much as he does.