Ahead of his Time by Adrian Cousins (children's books read aloud .txt) 📕

Mum will be whacked out after having Beth all day and doing the school run to get Christopher. Will you be late?”

“I might be as I’ve had a distress call from Jess this afternoon. She said she urgently needs to speak to me about Paul Colney. I think I need to go and find out what it’s all about.”

“Oh no, not him again?”

“Yes, exactly. That bloody family!”

“You’re not going up the estate, are you?”

“No, I said I’d meet her at six in the Bramingham Arms. I’ll quickly see what she’s got to say and be over about seven. Is that okay?”

“Yes, darling. But please be careful, won’t you?”

“I will, Mrs Apsley.”

“Good to hear, Mr Apsley!”

~

The Bramingham Arms Pub situated on Eaton Road often played host to the school teachers after a particularly difficult day and always after parents’ evenings, which were torrid affairs. It always seemed to be the ‘posh’ fathers who were not happy with their little ‘Jonny’s’ school report that caused the problems. Their views were it must be the teachers’ incompetence and not their own spoilt little brats who were the cause of the poor feedback received. So far, I’d only had the pleasure of one parents’ evening and according to my peers, it lived up to its typical hellish experience.

I had to intervene to calm down a particularly obnoxious tosser who told Jayne Hart she was incompetent and should be at home doing a real woman’s job – which in his view was looking after her husband instead of ruining his child’s education. Then I had no choice but to get involved with another posh pillock. This particular prat said his son was destined to be Prime Minister and Colin Pool’s assessment of his son’s slow performance was totally inaccurate.

Graham Holborn struggled with most lessons, and I knew it was due to his dyslexia. Although a recognised condition, I discovered that rarely did schools in this era accommodate and support pupils with this affliction. No, the way we dealt with it was to call them slow and drop them to the lower bands. Graham was exceptionally skilled at practical science experiments, verbally competent and had above-average intelligence. However, his written English and numerical skills were horrific.

After trying to explain to a red-faced Mr Holborn that his son had dyslexia and we would like to support him with extra lessons, the conversation turned heated.

Mr Holborn sprung up from his chair and warned me if I ever repeated the accusation his son had a ‘condition’, he’d see to it that I never taught again. He had connections, and members of his club would ensure I regretted what I’d said. Roy, a member of the same club, expertly smoothed things over in his office after I’d called Mr Holborn a dick-head. After this incident, Roy quite rightly reprimanded me about my choice of words but did agree with my assessment of Mr Holborn. During the whole unfortunate encounter, Mrs Holborn picked her fingernails and made no eye contact; I suspected she agreed with my assessment of her husband.

After this eventful evening, we all hit the pub. Swigging our pints, G&T’s and glasses of wine, we collectively discussed the claim that Mr Holborn had made that his son was destined to be Prime Minister. We all agreed as most Prime Ministers managed to competently perform like dick-heads, and if Graham followed his father’s lead, it was highly likely.

Over the five months of teaching, I’d gained the respect of my peers. That respect flew up several notches as they all recounted the evening’s events and specifically when I’d delivered my assessment of Mr Holborn for most of the assembly hall to hear.

~

I arrived before Jess, so I grabbed a barstool and had a chat with Derek, the landlord. He knew most of the teachers by name and many of the sixth form students as well. But hey, it was his licence to worry about, not mine.

After putting the world to rights with Derek, which involved slaughtering Jim Callaghan and Dennis Healy’s economic policies, Jess arrived before the conversation moved to religion. Thank God – no pun intended – as Derek was very opinionated and would’ve got on well with me in my previous life. Although an okay guy to chat to, Derek was a miserable bugger that reminded me of someone I wished to forget. Jess’s arrival saved me from regressing and becoming one of those wretched souls at the end of the bar, nursing a pint and feeling how unfair the world was.

I ordered an orange juice for her, and a Coke to replace my half-drunk pint. Jess appeared quiet, and the radiance I’d seen from the last time we’d spoken had evaporated. As she had asked to meet, and the subject matter was all to do with Paul Colney, then no surprise. To get her away from that evil man, I thought Jenny’s suggestion about getting her into number eight when Martin moved on seemed like the best idea.

Jess ran through the news that Paul Colney had admitted raping her – a shocking account. I held her hand as she re-lived the hideous events of that night after our first meeting. Although she was not my daughter, it hurt me to see her pain as if she was my own. This undoubtedly gave great sway to suggest Paul Colney was the rapist of the two women last year, which were in the news reports George had unearthed from the Chronicle archives. Presumably, it also confirmed he must be Martin’s father, suggesting his reign of terror continued for many years.

I tried to think of any news stories when I was a teenager or young adult of a serial rapist caught in Fairfield, but I couldn’t. Therefore, I could only conclude, either he went on raping indiscriminately for decades or ran out of steam at some point. On his current run-rate, he could progress to rape over a hundred women. Paul Colney was turning out to be potentially as bad as