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  ‘I haven’t had this much fun in years. Why would I miss an old trollop like her when I can dance with a sweet young thing like you?’ He grinned a wider grin and spun Flora in a Cha Cha circle, his clammy hand straying a little too close to her bottom and planting itself there.

  Flora glared at him and wriggled to extricate herself from his grip.

  ‘Do you mind?’ she asked, with a quick sidestep that was not part of the routine. One more grope on her newly laundered frock and she was out of there, term fees or not.

  ‘May I cut in?’ A deep voice broke into her escape plans. Somber dark eyes gazed down at her. Luke. He seemed unamused at the fact that she had another partner.

  Could he cut in? Ha. Was the Pope a Catholic? Jumping out from Portly Guy’s grasp, she smiled up at Luke as, defeated, her partner stepped away. His face looked like his Mummy had taken away his favourite toy.

  ‘Thank you for the dance,’ Flora said.

  ‘Maybe we can do it again next week?’ he asked, rubbing his sweaty palms on his trouser legs in expectation.

  ‘Mmm. Maybe,’ Flora nodded.

  Not.

  Swinging away, she took Luke’s outstretched hand. It felt so firm and, well, dry. He led her through the crowd to the other side of the floor.

  ‘You can’t begin to know how happy I am to see you,’ she gushed. ‘That man was under the illusion that my bottom and hips are the same body part.’

  ‘I noticed.’ Luke turned to face her and they began to dance. His face was stern. Jealous perhaps? She could live in hope.

  ‘I think he poisoned his wife with out-of-date chicken or something,’ she tittered. ‘He kept telling me about what a hag she was and how he’d never felt free while she’d been alive. He said she was a tyrant, that next time he would like a nice young wife.’

  ‘Maybe he was lining you up for a proposal,’ Luke chuckled.

  ‘Luke!’ Flora slapped his arm. It was a relief to be dancing with him, the bumbling advances of a man old enough to be her grandad were not her style and she felt secure in the circle of his arms. It was a feeling she hadn’t experienced for a long time.

  Luke was thoughtful.

  ‘It’s the glasses,’ he commented, noting that Flora was indeed wearing them again that evening, ‘He probably likes them too.’

  Flora gave a faint hint of a smile. ‘You’d be the only ones. PJ wants to step on them.’

  ‘PJ has no taste. Though, I can see where she’s coming from…. even though I find them incredibly attractive, they hide your eyes. She probably thinks you should be showing yourself off more. As your friend, she wants you to be happy.’

  Flora flushed. That was exactly what PJ had told her. That and, ‘no one wants to shag a girl with glasses’ but she wouldn’t tell Luke that. He liked them. Maybe he was into the prissy girl type. She gazed up into his rugged face. Yes, that was probably it.

  Flora changed the subject. ‘I thought you weren’t coming tonight.’ It was more of a statement than a question. The class was half over, most people wouldn’t have bothered.

  ‘I wasn’t going to,’ he remarked, twirling her under his arm and pulling her to him, ‘but I changed my mind.’ Suddenly, their bodies were touching and his face was close to hers. Flora could feel the sparks flashing between them and her breathing quicken. Was the music still playing?

  ‘Why?’ she breathed, feeling flirtatious.

  His eyes twinkled. His lips bent to her ear. His voice was deep and lusty. ‘I think you know why, Flora.’ Then he pushed her away and manoeuvred her across the floor. It was after all a dance class, not a live sex show.

  ****

  ‘Love is in the air….’ Flora sang to herself as she strolled along Hay Street the following Saturday morning on her way to meet PJ for brunch. ‘Everywhere I look around…..’

  Alright, she thought, so it wasn’t love and she hadn’t kissed Luke yet but there was chemistry. She could feel it.

  Stopping at an alfresco café, she looked for a seat in the sun and sat down, placing her shopping beside her on the footpath. Luke was a strange one, she thought. Every time he came within a metre she could feel the pull between them but for some reason he was trying to fight it. It was just like Strictly Ballroom. She was the gawky girl with glasses who couldn’t dance. He was the man who, despite himself, was interested. The comments and the note on her windscreen were confirmation of the fact.

  PJ was late, as usual, so Flora picked up the menu and scanned. It was filled with all manner of delicious fare, much of which she would usually love, but today she felt no desire for food. Her desire had been replaced with hunger of a completely different kind. He’s being cautious, she decided. Like me. Being attracted to one of your colleagues was difficult, after all. One had to stay professional. That was why he was standoffish at times.

  ‘Flora?’

  Flora looked up through her sunglasses. ‘James. Fancy seeing you here. I thought you lived south of the river.’

  James grinned tautly. ‘I did, but I, er….moved, remember? I’m on my way to pick up a pair of trousers from the drycleaners. What about you? Meeting a boyfriend?’

  What an odd question. Flora looked at him quizzically. It was none of his business what she was doing or who she was doing it with. ‘I’m meeting PJ, actually. We’re having brunch. You can join us if you like.’ Flora didn’t want him to stay but it seemed rude not to ask him to sit when he was standing there.

  ‘Well, maybe for a coffee,’ he said, pulling out the chair beside her. ‘I have quite a bit to do today.’

  ‘Mmm. Yes, me too.’

  The waitress appeared and they gave their orders, Flora ordering double, knowing that at any moment PJ would arrive nagging about traffic and caffeine.

  ‘It’s been a busy couple of weeks,’ she said, pulling a disinfectant wipe from her bag and wiping down her section of the table. ‘Did you get your overviews in to Miriam?’

  James’s look was blank.

  ‘You know, the syllabus you borrowed from me? Did you get it done?’ Flora was finding it hard to understand how he could forget the very thing he had been so insistent about the previous week.

  James bit his lip. His eyebrows crunched together in thought. ‘Oh, um, yes. Thanks for lending it to me. I guess I was having a blonde moment, there’s been so much going on,’ he chuckled. ‘I could drop it by your place later today, if you need it.’

  ‘Don’t put yourself out. Monday’ll be fine.’

  He looked disappointed. ‘It’s no trouble. Let me put your digits into my phone and I’ll call you later to see when it’s convenient.’

  Flora pressed her lips together, trying not to laugh. She’d thought giving someone your ‘digits’ was a phrase from British pop songs not something people said in real life. James flipped his mobile from his pocket and typed in the proffered number. Then he held up the camera and snapped her face.

  ‘For my contacts,’ he explained. ‘Now every time you ring me, your picture will come up.’

  Flora nodded and shifted on her seat. She felt uneasy. She had never rung James and had no intention of ever beginning such a ritual. As a rule, she kept to herself where work colleagues were concerned. They had no need to know about her personal life, boring as it was. She watched as James fiddled with his phone some more.

  ‘Excuse me for a sec’,’ he apologised, scrolling through the screen and scanning some mystery message. ‘Look, I have to go, something’s come up. Sorry. I guess I’ll see you at school on Monday.’ He jumped up and raced off through the mall, leaving Flora staring bewildered after him. She was not an idiot. There had been no message. Just what was he up to?

  ‘Sorry I’m late, Babe; bloody car park had a queue half way up Wellington St.’ PJ swung in and tossed her Chanel shopper on the ground beside her. She seemed oblivious to the fact that her hair was at least thirty centimetres shorter than it had been the day before and was now sporting a fringe that bore a strange resemblance to the one on the Persia
n rug Flora had on her lounge room floor. ‘Did you order yet? I could kill for a latte with some real sugar. I think this new diet is making me hypo-glycemic.’ Absently, she patted the hair around her neck. It must have been cold, such a lack of hair.

  Flora, in a state of shock from the strange meeting with James, shook her head. PJ’s eyes followed the retreating figure. ‘Who was that?’

  ‘James. What happened to your hair?’

  ‘James, Year Six, James?’

  ‘Yes. What have you done to your hair?’

  PJ smiled, and smoothed the locks that remained. ‘Do you like it? Dyl’ and I had such good sex last night you know, must be the whole Katie Holmes thing.’ She gazed into the distance at James’s retreating form. ‘God, that James is a bloody weirdo, always skulking around corners and pretending to read books when he’s really listening to our conversations. What the bloody hell did he want?’

  Flora shook her head again, wondering had the waitress spiked her water. Was she hallucinating? Was PJ sitting opposite her, utterly oblivious to the fact that she looked like a reject from an Abba Tribute Band. What had Dylan done to her mind?

  ‘I have no idea,’ she replied, ‘none at all.’

  Chapter 10

  If there was one reason why Flora would be glad to see the back of her class, it would have little to do with Jayden and his let-me-give-you-a-home-nose-job tantrums and everything to do with Mrs Edwina Barker.

  Edwina Barker had made Flora’s life hell for the entire thirty-four weeks her son, Brooke with an ‘e’, had been in Year One. Now, with six weeks to go, Mrs Barker was on the warpath again and Flora was counting the days until she saw her bony bottom walk out the door for the last time. Despite the fact that the woman was only five feet one, she was very intimidating.

  Earlier that morning, Edwina had stormed into the classroom demanding an interview after school. Flora had no idea what the problem was this time but she figured its foundation would be somewhere in Mrs Barker’s deranged mind and nowhere in reality. Like so many of the mothers at the school, Mrs Barker didn’t work because her husband was filthy, stinking rich. Therefore, she filled her days living vicariously through her son and inventing ways to annoy those around her. Mrs Barker had way too much time on her hands and not enough sense to use it wisely.

  After the terminal illness episode of last term - Mrs Barker had convinced the entire staff that Brooke had contracted cancer when all he had was bronchitis - Flora was wary. She was certain the woman had a screw loose or at the very least was suffering from Munchausen’s by Proxy or whatever it was called. At any rate, the woman was a psycho and she had the ability to cause untold amounts of damage.

  As Flora prepared herself for the meeting, setting an adult sized chair to the opposite side of her desk and putting away any assessments the woman could look at and talk about to others, she considered Mrs Barker’s behaviour throughout the year. She had endured Edwina Barker’s tirades for the past thirty-four weeks. She had bowed and scraped. She had placated and soothed. But now she had had enough. Decisively, she sat down in her chair and opened the notebook she kept for parent interviews. It was about time that woman faced reality.

  ‘Brooke hates school,’ Mrs Barker stated as she bent her twig-like body onto the edge of the plastic chair and assumed a position that made her appear like a praying mantis about to attack.

  That’s possibly because the other kids tease him about the ridiculous name you gave him, Flora thought. Everyone in the entire world knew Brooke was a girl’s name. Hello! Hadn’t she ever heard of Brooke Shields? Blue Lagoon?

  ‘It’s entirely your fault,’ Mrs Barker continued, glaring. ‘We never had this problem when he was in Kindy. He loved school.’

  It was odd, but Mrs Barker’s account of Brooke’s preschool experience didn’t marry with what Carmel, his former teacher, had said. According to Carmel, Brooke was an overweight bully whose greatest pleasure came from terrorising other five year olds into submission by threatening to sit on them. He was lazy, pampered and not overly endowed with intelligence. Not that Mrs Barker could see that. To her, Brooke was a genius and future Rhodes Scholar.

  Flora picked up a pen and began to write. ‘I hope you don’t mind me noting your concerns, Mrs Barker. We like to keep abreast of issues, just so that we can both be clear about what has been discussed and any action we’ve decided upon,’ she said, marvelling at how calm and in control she felt. If that cow thought she was getting out of the room without signing it, Flora was going to shove it down her throat. ‘Now, maybe you could elaborate on the specific problems and we’ll see what we can do to resolve them.’

  Mrs Barker groaned in a way that could only be described as melodramatic. ‘You can stop picking on him, for one. Brooke is a very sensitive boy.’

  Of course, and Flora was Anna Nicole Smith’s left breast.

  ‘You’re harassing him and victimising him and if you continue I’ll take both you and the school to court. It will be very ugly.’

  Just like your face without botox, thought Flora, in a moment of uncharacteristic bitchiness. If only she had the nerve to confront the woman out loud. But she could never do that. It would be so unprofessional.

  Trying to keep her face empathetic, Flora tilted her head to the side and looked into Mrs Barker’s eyes. She had definitely been hanging out with PJ too long. Her sarcastic mannerisms were beginning to rub off. ‘Could you tell me exactly what I’m doing that upsets Brooke so? I don’t quite understand.’ Apart from the fact that Brooke was an indolent little mummy’s boy who could probably be cured with a few boundaries thrown in his direction, Flora couldn’t see anything wrong at all.

  ‘Brookie says you made him sit in the time out area at lunch again today,’ Mrs Barker answered, folding her bony arms over her D & G handbag in a ‘get-that-missy’ sort of attitude.

  Under her breath Flora tried not to snigger. She looked like an anorexic barbecue chicken. The woman had called her son ‘Brookie.’ Oh. My. God! Next she’d be dressing him in girls’ clothes and sending him to ballet classes. No wonder the child was the way he was.

  ‘He said you made him stay on that bench all lunch time. Don’t you feel that’s a little excessive for such a minor infringement?’

  Flora paused to consider the accusation. The woman was a fruitloop. But, how did she know these things? Was Brookie micro-chipped? Did she follow his every movement with a Nanny-cam? Because try as she might Flora couldn’t discern any other possible explanation as to how she could have found that out in the two minutes between the dismissal bell and the commencement of the interview.

  ‘Yes,’ Flora replied, ‘Yes, I did, but it wasn’t for the whole of lunch, only ten minutes, and he did bite Sarah Watkins on the arm. He drew blood. She had to be taken to the doctor for testing. Her mother wasn’t at all happy, as you could understand.’ Flora straightened in her chair. She was doing it; she was silencing Mrs Barker with the undeniable evidence of truth.

  But Mrs Barker was not ready to shrivel and die. Her mouth fell open. Her skeletal body, which looked as if it would collapse were she to put any more clothes on it, began to heave and tremble. ‘Are you insinuating that my child has some sort of infectious disease?’ Her eyes bulged menacingly as she gripped her handbag with whitened knuckles.

  Flora stared at the big cream bag. She knew she had nothing to fear, she was following the discipline policy set in place by the school yet, still, the woman was more than a little intimidating. ‘No. I’m not saying anything like that; I’m merely telling you what happened as a result of Brooke’s behaviour.’

  Go Flora Go! went the little cheer squad inside her head. You can do it! You’re not a doormat! She watched as the skinny sticklike frame shuddered and Mrs Barkers face darkened.

  ‘He said Sarah hit him with her lunchbox and you wouldn’t listen when he tried to explain.’

  ‘Mrs Barker, Sarah Watkins did not hit Brooke. I saw the whole incident. She was on the swing and Brooke wanted
to get on. When she wouldn’t move he grabbed the chain of the swing, pulled it to a halt, bit her, and then sat on her. There was no lunchbox involved and Sarah did nothing to warrant such an attack. Thus, I didn’t feel it was necessary to listen to his excuses.’

  Mrs Barker snorted, ‘Well!’ and dived into her handbag and producing a folded, typed list. Studying the contents for a minute, she handed Flora a copy ‘for her records’. At least she wouldn’t have to take any more notes, Flora thought, and scanned the page of ridiculous and unfounded grievances.

  ‘Right,’ said Mrs Barker, quoting number one on the list. ‘Brooke said you growled at him in class last Friday because his handwriting is messy. I’ve heard you yelling. The other parents hate you.’

  Flora’s reply was calm and unwavering. Even she couldn’t believe it. ‘Mrs Barker, I made Brooke erase his work because he had scribbled over the page, not because it was messy.’ Get that, you cow.

  ‘Hmm.’ Mrs Barker consulted her list again. ‘You didn’t let him join in free play time on Tuesday either. How will his creative juices be stimulated if he is never allowed to play? ’

  Oh p - lease, Flora thought.

  ‘Free play time is a privilege that is earned during the week. If the children finish all their tasks they are able to participate. Brooke and two other children had one task to finish. They only missed a few minutes of play time.’

  ‘He told me you yelled at him in front of the entire class.’

  God! When had she done that? She had no recollection of yelling at him. How could she defend an accusation she could not remember?

  Putting her head to her notebook, Flora made another note and attempted to remain calm but Mrs Barker was starting to get under her skin. She didn’t know how much longer she could deflect the barrage of insults. Her bravado was fading faster than that cheap t-shirt she’d bought at the Fremantle markets. Then she remembered an incident the previous day but it had been so minor, she’d dismissed it. She turned back to Mrs Barker.

  ‘Yes, I did growl at him Mrs Barker but I did not yell. Brooke was throwing pencils at the other children, which I think you’ll agree is very dangerous. It was a spur of the moment thing. As a rule I try not to raise my voice to the children.’