flash by flawnt

For years I tried to get this school out of my mind: the turgid turrets, the pathways, secrets to nowhere, the chalk dust that sat on the bannisters like white ash after an air raid, and the headmaster, a fat, bald, turbaned man with a clownish face and a monkey, who sat on his shoulder like a jester at the court of an anointed king. When I was in trouble, the regent turned his head to the muggins and conversed with him in a language that was rich in hushed tones and hisses, little screams and tongue-clicking, making you feel as if you were in deeper trouble than you had thought, though their unnatural dialogue was mostly the worst that happened: the headmaster would smile a bazaar owner’s smile and wave me and the poisonous cloud around my head away and out of this world, while the monkey laughed, his whole body shaking with uncanny clamor. Perhaps this primate had once been a performer who retired to our school only to torture us on behalf of our suspicious parents. When I dreamt of him he always said “je m’appelle,  je m’appelle” with pursed lips but never told me his true name.