SANTA MARIA HIGH (COMPLETED)

Part One: 2

Pa Jacob trudged the empty road whistling, smelling faintly of aftershave. It has been a cold night, but the sun was up early and the sky was a wide clear cloudless vault of varying shades of blue. It would get hot soon and he may walk back today holding his leather jacket instead of wearing it.

Marble statues glimmered in the early morning sun, all familiar faces.

Santa Maria high is always beautiful, at least when the students have all gone and there is no one to litter the ground, chase themselves, yelling and screeching, around the twelve acre which they were allowed to roam, or hell, beyond. The good book says children are a gift from God, and maybe they are, but they sure come with their own presents, mischief being one.

He doesn’t have a single problem with a little roughhousing, smuggling some extra candy to their rooms; even defacing library books, and thoughtful vandalism looks a mild offence compared to what some had been fishing from the devil’s jar. Last term a porter was telling him of how he caught a fourteen-year-old with a bottle of Vodka, drinking right from the bottle, he had smuggled it in, bought three of them during their excursion, even shared with his friends. Illegal drinking was just one of the things. He remembered Cletus, shivering with self-righteous rage as he went on exhausting the list of contrabands he’s seized, Tramadol, oxy, cough syrups, weed, “even stuffs I’ve only heard of!” he said, “there was this one I caught with a porn magazine, a utility knife, a pack of French letters, what are they supposed to be doing with that?” he’s asked with revulsion, “these are basically just kids for God sake!”

Cletus was new then; sure, these all look strange, Pa Jacob listened to his complains, he decided it was best to just listen, and just tell him, “they are just kids on the wrong track, that’s our job to make sure they stick to the straight and narrow. And they will thank us for it.”

He never mentioned to Cletus, how he could exhaust his fingers on how many used up johnnies he’s come across, on the lawn, by the lake, in the lab, in corridors, the list goes on; and they made him shudder in wonder which of the innocent faces around were fooling around with things they are barely legal to understand; so was the thought of walking around with the exhibit in a bag which she would shove on their faces, asking, ‘someone left this behind, who among you?’

No one would admit anyway. Only the ones caught, and they are very few. Somehow they’ve passed the memo around that has stopped. The littering, not the other that. Sadly.

Bad way to start a day. Pa Jacob told himself as he stared back at the sky. He would enjoy this decorum while he still has it, and rise to the occasion when the time comes. He walked past a blooming marigold, and tried to jog on. He ended panting after few yards and decided walking was as a good exercise as any.

Getting old is not funny, he looks at the mirror, nowadays, and wonder where all the time did go. He’s past worrying about losing his hair, he had lost it some long eons ago, he doesn’t miss that as much as he missed the few teeth he’s left behind at the dentist’s. Boy! even the bones don’t feel the same, his aches had aches no thanks to the ogre called arthritis.

He placed a hand on his waist, the other found its way to do the same, panting still. Pa Jacob kept walking.

He had heard the drone all the way from his quarters, as he neared the football pitch near the boy’s hostel, Andy hollered. He waved back, he smiled too. Now that’s a good kid. He thought “How’s your mother?” he asked.

“she’s been better.” He replied over the din of the lawn mower.

“say me well to her!”

“will do!” Andy shouted back, then returned to working the mower over the field, leaving severed guinea grass in its wake. Half of the football pitch has already been relined, Pa Jacob noticed.