The following morning my mother first picked up the Twins and all our schoolbags from Niamh’s house, then on to Ciara’s. Ciara squeezed in the back while her mother sat in the front passenger seat. As we were about to pull off, Aoife remarked that Ciara didn’t have a seat belt on; there were only three belts in the back of the car. Saoirse unclipped herself from the middle seat belt, yielding it to Ciara, unclipped my belt, snuggled in beside me, and clipped us both into the one belt.

“Sorted!” she announced and my mother pulled off again.

We arrived at the school, dropped our French essays into the box left beside reception, and headed off to class. The mothers went to meet the Transition Year head; we would find out what they had managed to negotiate for our part of the show when we got home later that day.

French Class was first after lunch. The teacher, Mr. Dunleavy, whom we called Mon Sewer in a disparaging play on the French word for “Mister”, was middle-aged, red-faced, and not very good at teaching. He shuffled in with the bundle of essays and sat down at the front of the class.

“Can the Glandoo students please stand up?”

Glandoo, an anglicisation of the Irish form of the name, was how the Black Valley was mostly called in Ballymore. We were sitting close together, not sharing desks; we tried to avoid this because of our reputation of being a bit cliquish. We slowly stood up, not sure what Mon Sewer was about.

“Well, tell me, which of you wrote the essay for the others to copy?”

We looked at each other; we had prepared collaboratively and had written the essays sitting in the one room, but we had not copied.

“We each wrote our own.” Aoife was the first to respond.

We all nodded.

“I’ll ask you again, who wrote the essay and who copied it?”

Saoirse responded next.

“Like Aoife said, we each wrote our own.”

“I don’t believe you.”

Mon Sewer thought he was being firm, but had just made an error.

“Given that you have decided to call us liars in front of the class, I think you should call the Principal.” I couldn’t believe that I’d just said that.

Mon Sewer turned a deeper shade of red. The rest of the class was beginning to shift uneasily. This form of aggression between students and teachers was just not normal in our school.

“Sit down, we’ll see about this later.”

Nobody moved to sit. Aoife inclined her head slightly towards the door. Leaving our books on our desks, we walked out of the classroom. Mon Sewer said nothing; none of us looked at him. Outside on the corridor, Ciara, probably as upset as me at what we had just done, asked:

“What now?”

“We’re going to the Principal, before he does.”

Aoife was the ringleader and was pushing this. In fairness, she had a point; the first person to get their story out sets the scene for any adjudicator. We headed towards the Principal’s office. The School Secretary’s office was beside his and she acted as a kind of unofficial gate keeper.

“We would like to speak to Mr O’Dwyer; is he in?”

This was unusual; an unannounced delegation never sought to see The Madra. This unflattering nickname, a mixture of the English definitive article and the Irish word for dog was how he was universally known throughout Ballymore. A local from a farming background, he had returned to teach in this school immediately on receiving his H.Dip. in Education and had stayed there all his career, eventually making it to Principal almost by dint of longevity. A gruff man, it was rumoured that he had smiled twice in his life, once on getting the teaching job back in this his hometown, and the second time when his now wife of thirty years said “Yes.”

Sensing something was afoot, the Secretary knocked on his door, went in and reemerged in a few minutes:

“He’ll see you now.”

We shuffled in. Not invited to sit, we stood before his desk.

“Well?”

He looked at us expectantly.

I thought that I had better start this on a polite note as I was afraid that the Twins might launch into a tirade.

“We’re sorry to disturb you Sir, but we have just had a difficult discussion with Mr. Dunleavy. He accused us of copying our essays in front of the full class.”

“And I suppose that you’re going to tell me that you didn’t?”

“No Sir, we each wrote our own.”

Ciara had finally found her voice; the Twins, still in their first year in the Irish school system, were holding fire, despite having started the war!

“Then why did Mr. Dunleavy think that you had copied from someone, or each other?”

“We can’t speak for him, Sir”

Aoife had joined the discussion; cleverly declining to speculate.

“And if I were to tell you that this is not the first time that this issue has been discussed, what would you say?”

I had half expected this and was prepared. We all knew that our essays must be similar as we had prepared together, we did this all the time, for History and English as well as French.

“We haven’t discussed this with anyone else; we don’t copy.”

This was looking too planned as we were taking turns answering; this last response had been from Saoirse.

The Madra sighed, leaned back in his desk, and looked at us.

“I didn’t say that it was discussed with you; it has been discussed in the staffroom. Your English and History Essays have also been remarkable similar. How can you explain that?”

I thought that I’d better come in again. I had figured in my mind where I wanted this conversation to go and didn’t want anyone else in the group to bring it in a different direction.

“Well, you do know we study together, Sir, and that might mean that we approach our work in the same way. We help each other, but we don’t copy. We couldn’t have copied from each other in our mid-terms, could we?”

We had all done well in our mid-term examinations, conducted in a supervised environment in classrooms.

“What do you mean, study together?”

We had not told the rest of the class about our study arrangements, nor the teachers. Aoife responded:

“We have our own study club, Sir. We all work together under my mother’s studio after school. The School Study Club starts too late for us.”

“Ah, I see. How long have you been doing this?”

“Since almost the start of the year.”

“OK, so what happened today?”

Aoife recounted the story of our incident with Mon Sewer, almost calling him by that name but recovering quickly and changing it mid-word to Monsieur Dunleavy.

“So why did you leave class? You could have brought this up later with Mr. Dunleavy.”

Saoirse responded, picking her argument carefully. It was like she had tuned into my thinking.

“He chose to call us liars in front of the whole class. If we had accepted that then, everybody would have believed him, and we would be known as cheats and liars throughout the whole school. If he had approached us privately, none of this would have happened.”

The Madra ruminated.

“Go back to your next class when French is finished; we’ll talk about this tomorrow.”

We shuffled out, none of us happy with the situation that developed, and headed back towards our own classroom. In our school, the teachers moved from classroom to classroom, a much more efficient arrangement than moving all the students. A small number of students, mainly in the senior years, moved for specific subjects. The corridor quickly filled up with fast-moving teachers and some senior students and we just about made it to our classroom before the Maths teacher arrived. Thankfully we didn’t meet Mon Sewer on the corridor. We resumed our seats and our classmates didn’t have time to question us until Maths class was over. Then there was a barrage of questions shouted in our direction.

Aoife stood up and gestured for silence; the hubbub died down. Her words were well chosen:

“We’re sorry for the unpleasantness. The matter is with the Principal and we can’t discuss it any further until we have his response.”

“Discuss what?”

The Civics teacher had just arrived to take this final class of the day.

“I’m sorry Miss, it was a class issue. I’d prefer not to make it public.”

Aoife had handled that well; it would, of course become public as soon as school was finished for the day, but we would not be responsible for broadcasting it. The Civics teacher, a youngish lady and new to the school, smiled and shrugged:

“Whatever.”

She had a way of relating to us that the older teachers could not.

Class finished, we walked together to the gate, avoiding discussions with the other students as the word of the Battle of Mon Sewer V. The Glandoo Gang spread like wildfire. My mother picked us up, I climbed into the front seat, the girls into the back.

“OK; what’s happened?”

It was obvious that we were a very subdued gang. I related the story.

“So, you’ll be talking to The Madra tomorrow?”

I did mention that everybody called him The Madra!

“Yes; that’s what he said.”

“Don’t worry girls; this will be sorted!”

Was my mother talking to Aoife, Saoirse and Ciara, or was she including me?

“By the way, don’t you want to hear when you’re singing?”

Truth be told, this had disappeared from our minds.

“When?”

The words practically fell from all our mouths at the same time.

“Actually, Cailíní Canadh Ghleann Dhubh have two slots, just before the half time break, and just before the end.”

“Huh?”

“We explained that you’re a very lively act, lots of energy. So rather than a long show, you’re getting two wrap up slots, to end the halves on a high note.”

“So we’re not actually in the competition?”

Aoife was articulation what we were all feeling; we were an interval act only.

“Competition?”

Clearly the adults hadn’t got their brief right. The successful act went through to the Réaltaí Scoile, School Stars, competition, first at County level, then Provincial, then National.

“Girls, we did well to get you two slots. Just enjoy the performance; a karaoke act is not going to get to the finals!”

We had to agree. We knew that Transition and 5th Year were putting on some serious plays by Ibsen and Brecht, so our relatively frivolous interval act had no hope of progressing. First (us) and Second Year acts were effectively regarded as being in training for a possible future role. Nevertheless, we now had a problem; we had planned to do four songs, one each. With two slots, we could probably fit in six numbers; our entire repertoire!

We arrived at Niamh’s house and had our pre-study snack of real Oxtail Soup with Salad Rolls and got down to preparation. As usual, we would start off with a practice session so I changed in the bathroom while the (other?) three girls got dressed in the Twins bedroom. We split our repertoire into two and practiced two sessions of three songs each. We also varied the start. The first time we all opened facing away from the audience and twirled around together, the second time we did it individually. At least we had practiced this before. Ciara was operating the karaoke machine; there was no sign of Niamh. We also added two new songs, and started to practice them, both from ABBA, Mamma Mia and Voulez Vous. We were now confident in our ability to get these right in the time available. As we were getting down to study, opening practice complete, we heard the sound of tyres on gravel; my mother and Niamh had returned; we heard later this was from a “war” conference in Ciara’s house. The Ghleann Dhubh girls would have some heavy calibre support tomorrow.

Niamh and Ciara’s mother joined us for the last practice session after we finished study, Niamh again insisting on us wearing our show shoes. Then Ciara’s mother drove Ciara and I home. Though my parents did their best to calm me down, I was very worried about school the next day. It wasn’t in our nature to get engaged in a war with the teachers, even Mon Sewer, and I wasn’t at all confident that The Madra would be reasonable in his decision. It is much easier to be brave when there’s other people around, all in the same boat. Now I felt that I was very much on my own and envied the Twins. They always had company! Eventually I went to bed, almost exhausted from worry, and drifted into a fitful sleep…

“I suppose that they wouldn’t be in this situation if it wasn’t for the Twins…”

“Yeah… they’re a bit headstrong, like their mother…”
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Dawn arrived, well more correctly, it was eventually time to get up as the sun wouldn’t rise until almost 08:30. I didn’t much feel like eating, had some porridge and my mother packed a buttered scone as a mid-morning snack, feeling that I would need it by then. She drove, us four in the back again and Ciara’s mother in the front passenger seat. We were warned not to discuss the War with anyone; we had already agreed this amongst ourselves. The two mothers went in search of the Principal, something he was doubtless expecting.

Co-incidentally, the first two classes were English and History, both of which had been mentioned by The Madra in the course of our discussion yesterday. At the end of third class, Science, just before our short morning break, the teacher quietly told us to go to the Principal’s office. So off we trooped, the Twins seeming rather nonchalant, Ciara and I less so. This time there were some chairs and The Madra asked us to sit down.

“Right, I accept that you weren’t copying from each other. But in the circumstances, would you think that it was not unreasonable for Mr Dunleavy to think that you did? Your essays contained a lot of similar phrases, and you all chose to spend quite a lot of time describing the weather, the surroundings, the clothes?”

Aoife, the natural leader, responded first.

“Thank you. And I personally accept that Mr Dunleavy could have formed a suspicion, but our protest was about being accused publicly, then being told that we were not believed.”

We all nodded. A sense of relief had swept over me on hearing The Madra’s first words, and it was now a matter of getting to some form of agreement to bring the matter to a mutually acceptable conclusion. Even at that age, I realised that Mon Sewer could not be publicly humiliated; he would be unable to retain control of any class if that were to happen. I chimed in…

“Sir, given that this was already discussed in the staffroom, and nobody spoke to us before Mr Dunleavy made a public accusation, maybe the fault is not only his?”

The Madra nodded. To give him credit, he accepted an implicit criticism of himself in good grace.

“That’s true; but how does this help to fix French class?”

“Maybe Sir, if you were to visit French class as it starts and explain that the Teachers did not know that we were studying together, but NOT copying, we could say that we should have told you that we had a Study Group going?”

Aoife wasn’t impressed.

“What have we to apologise for? We did nothing wrong!”

“Maybe if we’d said that at the outset that we prepared together, it wouldn’t have gotten as bad as it did.”

The Madra kept quiet, seeing that Saoirse’s reply to her twin sister was moving this towards a satisfactory conclusion. Ciara, probably reflecting a discussion with her own parents, summed up the reality of the situation succinctly:

“After all, we have to work together for the next six years. I can speak for us if you prefer Aoife?”

Ciara’s question to Aoife reflected the fact that we all regarded her as the leader, even her twin sister deferred to her.

“Thanks Ciara, I’ll do it.”

Aoife also regarded herself as the leader and was taking responsibility for “her” team!

The Madra and Aoife exchanged a few more words, refining the terms of the proposed treaty, but they all washed over me. I was so relieved that I could have cried; it was literally like a heavy weight had been lifted off my shoulders. We eventually were sent off to class, late, but the teacher simply accepted our apologies as we joined class midway through.

Next class was French; there was an air of expectation amongst the class but nobody got to question us as the Principal and Mon Sewer entered almost immediately on the other teacher’s departure. The inter class hubbub had barely started to rise when it immediately died down. The Madra, in as pleasant a voice as he could muster, was the first to speak.

“I understand that there was a misunderstanding in class yesterday. We weren’t aware that the Ghleann Dhubh girls… and one boy of course… had a Study Group of their own and prepared collaboratively. That meant that their essays had some similarity, but we are happy to confirm that they definitely were not copied.”

I noticed that the Madra, being completely immersed in the Irish language, had used the proper Irish words for the Black Valley as opposed to the common anglicisation “Glandoo”. I also noticed that either he had initially forgotten about me, or had subliminally classed me as a girl before correcting his “mistake”. I didn’t take any offence.

Aoife was on her feet.

“Go raibh maith agat, a Mháistir.”

“Thank you, Sir.” It was customary to use Irish for simple expressions such as Thank You, Excuse Me, etc. when addressing teachers, and often informally amongst students as well. She continued:

“The misunderstanding would not have occurred if we let you know of our studying arrangements. We didn’t foresee any issues arising so didn’t think to mention it.”

“Well, it’s all resolved now?”

“Yes, Sir.”

The Madra nodded and was exiting the door when Mon Sewer added his peace offering.

“On that basis, they were all very good essays. Well done.”

Aoife had already resumed her seat so we all murmured our thanks; class resumed as normal.

We got questioned at lunch break, naturally, but we stuck to the story. It had been a misunderstanding, all cleared up now, nothing to see here, move on! What did result, although not immediately apparent, was that the perception of the Glandoo Girls (and boy) as being cliquish was reinforced and we’d developed a reputation as not a gang to be trifled with. We were also becoming known simply as the Glandoo Girls; it was meant to be unkind to me as I was already known for not participating in the schoolyard soccer games or the Gaelic football team. I was privately quite happy with the name; my father would be less so if he found out. I hoped that Ciara would not mention it at home; her father would be sure to share the problem with mine.

That evening, Tuesday, as we got ready for our pre-study session, we decided that we were in danger of over-practicing and that we would do an exercise class, cheerleading of course, before study, and a practice session afterwards. We had just finished this and were getting down to our books when Niamh appeared. Apparently, the mothers had decided that, as we were doing two, well-separated, sessions at the concert, we should change between them so we would need a second outfit. We quickly decided that we would get the white mini, white bolero jacket and salmon/pink sweetheart tops that we had spotted in the first shopping centre that we visited. Niamh would drive us again; another opportunity for her to bring some paintings to her dealer.

The week flew by; we did our exercise classes and practice sessions each day. On Thursday evening, as she drove us from school, my mother announced that she would be bringing us all to Ballyhowan immediately after school on Friday to have our nails done. This seemed a bit extravagant. We could just have done a paint job; mine were now growing just long enough to look well when varnished, but still short enough not to be immediately noticeable in school. This was a delicate balancing act for sure! Then a problem came to mind; I obviously would be wearing my normal school uniform, as would the girls. Problem was, mine was a boy’s: I couldn’t get my nails done in that!

“No problem; I’ll bring your tan dress and you can change into that.”

My mother’s solution had a flaw.

“Where will I change?”

“In the car, like last time!”

Saoirse, seeing my discomfort, giggled:

“Don’t worry; we won’t look.”

The following morning, my mother gave me a pair of black knickers and brown tights.

“Wear these under your trousers; it’ll make it easier to change in the car.”

The brown tights wouldn’t match the blue school uniform trousers, so I pulled my own socks over them. It made my shoes a bit tight, but bearable. I felt good at school that day, wearing the knickers and tights, even if hidden under a boy’s trousers. I was also warm; tights under trousers worked well on a cold day!

My mother picked us up as promised at 4pm. Aoife had to take my usual place in the front seat while I changed in the back. This was easier that I had feared with my tights, always the most difficult, already on. I had my own long waterproof coat which wasn’t ideal but my mother did not want any glue or varnish to find its way onto my sister’s good brown woollen coat. Anyway, sometimes girls will wear boy’s coats, or so I consoled myself. Traffic was light; my mother double-parked outside the beautician’s shop and turfed us all out before driving off to park the car. We were expected, and, two at a time, were “fitted” with matching sets of long nails, like before, pink and slightly sparkling.

Niamh picked me up last the next morning so I ended up in the front seat of her Landcruiser. As before the back was completely packed with pictures in a variety of sizes. She got to the shopping centre in Galway and, knowing what we were looking for, we got down to the business of fitting on the outfits. This time I had worn nude tights under my brown ones so it was just a matter of pulling off the brown tights in the changing room. I hadn’t wanted my father to see me wearing the nude tights leaving the house; I thought that it would look too “girly”. In retrospect, this made very little sense; how does a boy dressed almost convincingly as a girl, NOT already look girly? Even worse, my mother had stitched “chicken fillets” into the bra that I was wearing under my camisole top, to give me “more shape”!

Niamh stayed with us as we got ourselves fitted out, looking through the shoe section of the shop. Eventually, ably assisted by her daughters, she had picked out white, high-heeled ankle boots, with heels slightly higher that our other show shoes. They looked thrashy, but worked well enough for our purpose. Then, just as I thought we were finished, Aoife decided that the nude tights that we were all wearing were not optimal and went hunting through the tights section. This was a down-market cheap shop so no shop assistants were hovering, or even available, but she eventually found a shade that she said matched the salmon/pink tops we were wearing under our little bolero jackets. We all had to try these on as well.

We packed up all our purchases and Niamh paid. No discount this time; the store specialized in selling cheap, almost disposable, clothing at rock bottom prices and was not in the business of negotiating. Take it, or leave it. We all traipsed out of the shop, stowed our purchases in the Landcruiser, and went back to the small corner snack bar where Aoife had enthralled the lads last week with her legs. Sadly, they weren’t here this time so we had our cokes without entertainment and left.

I, and presumably the girls, had expected that Niamh would now dispose of her paintings and head home. She parked in the same school carpark as the previous week, close enough to her art dealer in any event, paid the fee, declined our offer to carry the paintings and led us to a hairdressers, just a little way up Shop Street, near the store where we had bought our initial show outfits. She then disappeared, presumably to sell her artwork. Again, like the salon in Ballyhowan, this hair appointment was obviously pre-arranged as we were quickly seated, washed and blow dried. From there, and again clearly by prior arrangement, we were passed to the beauticians next door, our make up removed, and redone, this time quite heavily. The beauticians were conferring, working to a plan, but wouldn’t tell us.

“You’ll see, my dear”, was all the response that I could get.

Eventually, Niamh returned and we were all ready. She had a brief discussion with the manager of the beauticians, and we all headed off. I didn’t see her pay; maybe she had pre-paid? We turned to go back to the Landcruiser before being corrected and we ended up in the store where we bought our matching dresses et al last week. And there we were, in person, but also on a life-sized picture above the area where last weeks dresses were on display. There was a camera, lights and backing screen set up in a corner of the store and suddenly the penny, or rather the Euro cent, dropped. Apparently our modelling debut had been a success, the picture had proved to be very popular, and we were to do some more.

“You could have told us!”

The Twins could even talk to their mother in perfect unison!

Niamh smiled:

“I didn’t want you to be nervous.”

“Us, nervous?”

Niamh was probably thinking about Ciara and me; the Twins were in their element.

We had a lady assigned to look after us, probably an assistant manager, and the photographer was the same lady as last week. The manager came, spoke briefly to Niamh, then left about his business. The next two hours were a frenzy of changing, posing, being photographed, changing again, repeat. It was hard work, and I absolutely loved it. It felt like I got to wear almost every item in the early teen girl section of the shop. I quickly lost any inhibitions and just imagined myself as a girl, delighting in dressing and looking, at least moderately, pretty. The problems of last week, in particular the incident with Mon Sewer, seemed a world away. The shop was open for business and shoppers stopped as they wandered around to look at the scene; it didn’t bother me. Some of them noticed that we were the girls in the big picture, looking up at it, then at us and moving on to do whatever they had come to do in the first place.

I realised, at some point, that I didn’t mind having an audience.

Eventually, it was all over. Exhausted, we changed back into our own clothes and prepared to leave. My eye was taken by a girl’s coat, fawn coloured, double breasted, long, warm. I went over to look at it, feel its texture, admire the oversized cuffs on the sleeves.

“Try it on”.

Saoirse was beside me. She held my own coat while I slipped the coat on. Just a little big.

“You’ll grow into it.”

Saoirse was echoing a phrase common amongst older folks when buying for us kids.

But I knew that I wouldn’t. In just a few weeks this adventure would be over. There was no point in buying a relatively expensive coat for that length of time, and I knew that I wouldn’t have the girl-time left to “grow into it.” I looked at Saoirse, smiled and shook my head. Back to reality, I felt a little sad; maybe not just a little. I hung the coat back on the hanger, slipped my own back on, hitched the strap of my bag across my chest in case a knacker tried to grab it, and moved over to where Ciara and Aoife were standing near the door, waiting for Niamh to finish her conversation with the manager. He had a brown envelope in his hand.

Out of the corner of my eye, I saw Saoirse pick up the coat and go over to Niamh. The fawn colour would look lovely with her hair.
****************************************************