Writing About Art

The front door swung open violently and slammed shut with equal ferocity.

Kevin thrust his arms into his jacket and slung his rucksack onto his back, his face twisted into a sullen, angry knot. He remembered now that he'd forgotten to pack his history textbook Miss Burke had said was ‘essential’ for today’s lesson. He didn’t care. He wasn’t going back for it now. Screw Miss Burke, and screw history.

He stormed down the driveway and caught a glimpse of Rodney, eternally joyous, staring up at him from his perch on his toadstool, bright red hat jovially askew atop his snowy white hair. Kevin drew back his leg and fired a kick at his mother's favourite gnome that projected it rocket-like across the garden and straight into the fence, where the happy figurine exploded into a thousand miserable fragments. Kevin barely glanced at the shattered heap as he continued down the path and towards the school bus-stop.

As he approached the stop, Kevin spotted his best friend among the throng of unruly students gathered there. Ben Maylor was lounging on a garden wall chatting to - and no doubt trying to impress - two girls from the year below. Kevin was in no mood to flirt, so stopped a little way from the group, dropped his back on the ground and shouted to his friend.

"Mayo!"

"Alright, Fletch," Mayo jumped off the walk and sauntered over. "Where were you last night? You missed a hell of a game. Stockers nearly went for Sam Oakley. To be fair, Oakley practically crippled him in a tackle and got nowhere near the ball. How come you missed it?"

"I had to help my mum move that stupid painting to school. Bloody nightmare. She gets proper stressed if anyone breathes near her artwork. Stupid cow."

"Oh God," Mayo groaned. "That thing's today, isn't it? That assembly this afternoon? I can't deal with sitting on those chairs for that long. Should we bunk it? Or will your mum be there?"

"She'll be there. Guess she has to be when she's done the memorial for it. Though can't see why our school being around for 100 years is a good thing. Should be commiserating over it being open for another 100."

"You deffo have to be there? Your mum won't know, there'll be too many of us in the hall."

"I'm going," Kevin replied. "Up to you whether you go, but Thomas'll find out if you bunk, and it will be lunch detentions for the rest of term if she catches you again."

"Probably not worth it," Mayo conceded. "But footy on the backfield at lunch though, yeah?"

The bus slowly appeared around the corner and dragged itself to a halt with a sigh at the kerb. The doors slid open and the students descended mob-like onto the bus. Kevin, replacing his rucksack, felt the weight of his secret on his back as he followed Mayo up the stairs.

***

Kevin endured the morning in a mist of angry sullenness. He divided his time during registration, maths and history between staring out of the window at crisp packets blowing like tumbleweeds across the school yard and doodling a series of ferocious, black patchwork designs of lines in the back of his exercise books. Miss Burke hadn't given him a detention for forgetting his history textbook, but she had glared at him with a looked that emanated frustration and disappointment at his failure to be organised, his failure to be a mature adult.

'Fuck her,' Kevin thought, bitterly.

Lunchtime went a little better; scoring a hat-trick and thrashing a ball around relieved some of the tension he was feeling. The only downside had been towards the end when some of the other lads had started to give him stick about his mum coming into school that afternoon.

"Oh how la-di-da to have a gen-u-ine artist grace us with her presence," Anthony Taylor had begun. "Have we really got to sit there for an hour and hear about bloody colours and shapes and all that crap?"

"Shut it, Taylor," Mayo spat. "The painting bit's only going to be part of it. It's be bloody Crawley on the mic for most of it."

"So what's the painting like anyway?" Anthony asked Kevin.

"Dunno. Haven't seen it. No-one has. 'Spose to be some massive great surprise for the school. Not that anyone but Crawley gives a shit."

The bell had rang shortly afterwards and they'd all obediently filed into the assembly hall, passing the gauntlet of teachers demanding ties be straightened, shirts be tucked in and headphones removed this instant.

Kevin was sat amongst his form class facing the stage. An assortment of senior staff sat in rows on the stage accompanied by a handful of school governors, various big-wigs from the community – including the mayor and his entourage – and a few local journalists.

His mother sat amongst them. The local artist who’d made it big but continued to support the school ‘in any way I can’. Special transition projects for the first tears. Advanced classes for the artistically gifted. Building-self-esteem-through-art classes for the vulnerable.

A regular local hero.

They’d sat through 45 minutes of speeches, dances, uplifting songs and several first year poetry attempts. Now the Headteacher, Mr Crawley, had taken to the podium once again.

“As you’re aware, we’ve been especially honoured in our centenary celebration. Mrs Linda Fletcher, whose fabulous talent needs no introduction, incredibly kindly offered to produce a painting for our school to celebrate its last 100 years of hard-work and achievement, to be given pride of place in our reception area. Mrs Fletcher has assured me her work has been top-secret until this point, but now it’s time for the grand unveiling. Mr Wilkie, if you wouldn’t mind?” Mr Crawley motioned for the caretaker to wheel forward from the back of the stage the trolley on which the giant, veiled canvas stood.

The covered canvas took its centre-stage position. The Head reached up to grip the top corners of the blanket that concealed the painting, turned to face the students, waited a few moments longer than was absolutely necessary to create a dramatic effect, and whipped away the cover.

Kevin’s own breathing remained easy and regular while a collective horrified intake of breath was sucked in around the hall. A silence seemed to hang suspended in the air fir several moments before breaking into a wave of shocked whispers, gleeful murmurs and barely-supressed giggles that rippled around the student body, now rewarded for enduring the tedium of the ceremonious assembly with a delicious, outrageous scandal.

In contrast to the animated students, the stunned adult audience seemed united in a mortified paralysis, each unsure as to what should be done next.

Kevin’s eyes searched the painting, scrutinising his work. The word ‘liar’ in the top left corner was a little indecipherable, being the first word he spray-painted over his mother’s work. The ‘r’ looked a little like a ‘v’, but viewed in context with the other words, he knew people would get the gist and so he wasn’t too disappointed.

The ‘cheat’ looked good; a bold, fiery red fact sprayed squarely across the bottom of the canvas, letters neatly spaced and proud.

But his masterpiece was the ‘WHORE’. He’d got the hang of spray-painting by then and had deliberately left space so the word, reaching diagonally from the bottom left corner right into the top right, dominated the canvas. Kevin felt the angry and loud capitalisation of the word was an important element. Its scarlet colouring was significant too, a conscious choice he’d made when stealing the can of paint from his mother’s studio the night before – the can that now lay malevolently in the bottom of his rucksack.

Kevin slid his eyes from the canvas to find his mother on the stage and, taking in the look of stunned horror and bewilderment on her face, locked his eyes onto hers. The corners of his mouth curled upwards slightly into a sardonic grin.

‘Guess you shouldn’t have left your email inbox open on your studio computer last night.’ He hoped she could read his thoughts.

So Mr Berrick is more than just your art dealer, is he?

What about dad?

You bitch.