49
Watlingford Public School, Oxfordshire – At The Same Time
‘Sometimes; Often; and Always. All describe the passage of time,’ Petra said. She was standing in front of the whiteboard holding the blue marker with the words she’d printed behind her. She could smell the tang of the whiteboard pen; the special scent of ‘school’. In front of her the students’ faces gazed up. There was Sergei with a dark shadow on his upper lip that looked like dirt. As usual, Aneeta was next to him; today she’d tied up her wild curls exposing her neck where there was an angry love bite. Next to the Spanish girl, there was her friend: Sahar, head down, diligently copying the words into her notebook, her mouth working with concentration.
It had been two days since Petra had driven Sahar to London and back and
