Falling in love with You

I saw her at lunchtime in the kitchen. She was working in the there as part of the new cookery course I think. There’s a few of them. They work in the kitchen some days and the rest of their time they are in the day centre in classes. She had a blue hairnet thing over her head but she still looked really pretty. I remembered her from school. Not the special school but the one I went to after that. We were in the same class for a year or so. She’s called Tina. The class was called ‘the remedials’. Mr Walsh used to say we were ‘special kids in very un-special school’ whatever that meant. Anyway, I remember thinking then that I liked her. I am not sure if she saw me when I was queuing up for lunch. She turned her head but I looked at my shoes.

I had a real chance to speak to her today but I couldn’t. She was buying some crisps next to me in the shop. She was with Tasneem Hussain.  She was looking for her money in a purse and I really nearly spoke but no words came out. When she walked passed me after Tasneem she looked at me. I felt my face burn. When I see her my tummy goes funny and my face goes red and it keeps happening. I sat on the wall outside the centre by the garden. I was going to eat the Twix I had bought but I couldn’t even do that because of my tummy because I was thinking of Tina. It was a Kingsize Twix an all. I gave it to Paul Dacre.    

We talked a bit today. Well, she did. I was in the queue for dinner. She asked me if I wanted a sandwich. When I nodded she said ‘you always have a sandwich, don’t you?’. I smiled and nodded and she smiled. And when she smiled her eyes sort of smiled too. I have never seen that before.  In the afternoon I went to the music room for drumming. Dave asked me why I was smiling. I couldn’t tell him. I played the best drums ever. And I just kept thinking about her face. At home I didn’t eat my tea again.

We had a joke today. We were stood outside the room for music and Dave came passed. He was looking at his phone and didn’t speak to anyone. I didn’t know Tina was next to me until I heard her say ‘I am staff, so I look at my phone’ in a pretend Dave voice and a bit like a robot or a dalek. I turned to her and she started laughing and I did too. We talked about school for a bit. She hated it too but she said she remembered me and knew I was called Martin. 

Today me and Tina had been talking for a bit on our own then other people came and joined in. So there was a bit of a crowd. And that’s when it first happened. When the crowd came. We were sort of stood with our backs to each other and we were both talking to different people. Well she wasn’t talking, she was listening to Alison Woodman. Then the backs of our hands touched together. Like our knuckles touched. Like they rested together and stayed like that. Not for long but for a few seconds. I knew it was her hand because of where she was standing but I couldn’t see her face. I was wondering if she was still smiling because she was smiling when I was talking to her. At first I wasn’t sure if she knew our hands had touched or whether she knew it was my hand. She might not have noticed. Or maybe she thought it was someone else’s hand. I felt a bit sick and happy and scared all at the same time. Eventually I moved my hand out a bit to see if it happened again. It did. And this time we put our fingertips together. Then we had to go. People dashing everywhere. I had to talk to Marcia about a job in a cafe with my Tuesday group and she had a class about money that she had previously told me she really knew money and it ‘pants’ but better than maths and it made me laugh. Oh my god.

Take my hand

Take my whole life too

For I can’t help falling in love with you