When they arrived at class, David guided her to his table which he shared with two other students. They were just waiting for the buzzer when Mrs. Whitely approached them.
‘Young lady, do you have permission to be here? If so, no one informed me.’
Monica stared, wondering whether she had got the sack, and was about to speak when Mrs. Whitely gaped at her in sudden recognition.
‘Monica Gedde! I would never have believed this if I hadn’t seen it with my own eyes! Well! If this isn’t an improvement!’
As the woman spoke, there was no tittering or muttering of Monkey Guts. There was only a sort of mute, dumbfounded silence.
At last, someone at the back said, ‘Come off it, Mrs. W! You taking the piss or what? What’s the new girl’s name?’
Mrs. Whitely, a popular and outgoing matronly sort who openly encouraged such frank banter, told Monica to stand up and turn around, which she did, but she stared at the floor as she did so, crimson to the tips of her ears.
‘Why don’t you judge for yourself, Ian? The lot of you for that matter.’
‘Toldja you should cut your hair!’ shouted Anne, getting a general chuckle. Monica almost smiled involuntarily. Anne was the only girl in the school who had actually tried to befriend her, having tried unsuccessfully on a number of occasions to talk the girl into making herself over.