Chapter 2 – School Smells
Harry sat in class in his usual seat by the window. The reason for this was so that the window could be opened by the teacher and the foul stench from Harry’s feet could escape out of the room. This meant that he was usually very cold. Summer was fine but in December his fingers always turned blue as they struggled to bend around his pencil. As Harry had got older and moved up the school, the space around his table had slowly grown bigger and bigger as the other children moved further and further away from him – or more specifically – from his feet. This meant that it was difficult for Harry to make many friends as no one could bear to spend much time in the same room as his feet and this made Harry miserable.
Harry’s biggest problem was that, strange as it sounds, the smelliness of his feet depended on how he was feeling. The worse he felt, the smellier his feet became. He had started out with fairly smelly feet and this made him miserable because it meant that other children didn’t want to be his friend and called him names. And because this made him miserable, it made his feet smell even more, which made him even more miserable which made his feet smell even more. This went on and on making Harry more and more miserable and making his feet smellier and smellier.
* * * *
As all children will know, the worst time to be in school is on a Monday because you know you have a whole week to go until the weekend, especially if the weather outside it sunny and the lesson inside is boring. It was on one of these Monday mornings when Harry learned something special about his feet. He was sitting by his window looking outside at the birds and the sunshine and the blue sky and thinking about how much he would rather be out there than in class listening to Mrs Tantrum ranting on about Tudors. He didn’t see the point of learning about Tudors as they were all dead so he was never likely to meet any of them. Mind you, he did like the bit about Henry VIII chopping his wives’ heads off.
The hot sun beat through the window onto his face and the warm breeze drifted through the open window and ruffled his hair. Mrs Tantrum’s voice seemed to fade away and he found himself thinking about different ways to get out of class. He imagined a run away elephant from the zoo racing through the school knocking down walls and everyone getting sent home. But that was a bit far fetched. Next he imagined all of the teachers being struck by a sudden illness which turned their brains to jelly. This, he decided was just as unlikely – but he had to smile at the thought of Mrs Tantrum as a jelly-brain. A fire, that was more likely. Nothing too big, just enough to get them sent home for a few days so he could play out, or play Mega Battle Bots 4 on his computer. He imagined the flames licking at the door and the smell of the smoke. He even imagined how exciting it would be if they had to climb out of the window onto the playground.
“Aarrgggh!”
The scream made Harry jump and he suddenly found himself back in the room and aware of what was happening around him.
“Fire!” Screamed Mrs Tantrum. “Fire! Help us! N-Now don’t panic children” she screamed, panicking herself.
There was definitely a strong smell of smoke in the class room thought Harry. He couldn’t see any smoke and he couldn’t see any sign of fire, but he definitely could smell it.
Excited children from all classes marched single file out of the class rooms, into the corridors and out onto the playground where they stood looking back at the school for signs of fire. A hot and flustered Mrs Tantrum fanned herself with the class register as she checked all of the class were there.
“There’s no sign of a fire inside” said Mr Thumbscrew the headmaster walking away from the school towards the waiting teachers. “The smell has almost disappeared. In fact…” he added sticking his nose in the air and taking a long deep sniff through his bony nose, “it smells more out here now than it does in school.”
There was still a definite smell of smoke in the air and it must have been covering the smell of his feet thought Harry as the other children were standing much closer to Harry than usual. This cheered Harry up and he found his mind wandering again. He looked around at the school field and gardens. He watched the birds flying over the school. They didn’t need to learn about Tudors, or fractions or speech marks. They could fly wherever they wanted when ever they felt like it. He imagined flying high above the school in circles watching the wobbly lines of students looking like ants on the playground. Then he imagined flying down towards the flowerbeds. Now he was a round little bumblebee flying from flower to flower. He could smell the sweet, fragrant aroma of the blooms wafting up his nostrils as he collected the pollen.
His daydream was broken by the sirens of the approaching fire engines. Little boys all over the playground strained their eyes and peered carefully to catch a glimpse of enormous red trucks. Harry though was to busy peering around him. There were people standing next to him. Actually standing next to him. There was usually an invisible circle of about 2 metres which no one dared to enter because they couldn’t bear the smell of those feet but nobody had even held their nose, or screwed up their faces or even stuck their jumpers up over their faces to cover their noses. Nobody had even noticed he was there at all. It was the happiest day Harry could ever remember. To make the situation even more unusual, he could still smell the flowers from his day dream.
“It is a beautiful day,” thought Harry. “It isn’t that unusual to smell flowers on such a nice day, I suppose.” But he wasn’t convinced.
* * * *
It had been a funny sort of day thought Harry as he walked home down Hollywell Avenue. The fire alarm had been fun in its own way, but he couldn’t help thinking about the smell of smoke and flowers just as he was thinking about them.
