[Milliways]: Questions for Irwin

[smallgayjew]

Posner is unpacking his bag at the table when he hears Irwin's voice from the hallway, “I manage! No questions from you, Dakin?”

“What they want to know, sir, is, 'Do you have a life?'” Dakin says as he and Irwin and the other boys come into the classroom. “Or are we it? Are we your life?”

It's more of the testing, of course, more poking to see where Irwin fits here. He may never get to the point where he's immune from it. Not in just one term.

He handles it well, though. He always does.

“Pretty dismal if you are,” Irwin says. “Because these are as dreary as ever!” he exclaims, tossing back yet another set of essays that apparently don't live up to his standards. A collective groan of disappointment comes in response. Posner's beginning to wonder if they ever will, and he thinks many of the others are as well.

“You're asked a question. You know the answer,” Irwin continues as he hands all the essays round. “But then, so does everybody else, so say something different. Say the opposite. Okay, look, uh... Take Stalin. He's...generally agreed to be a monster. And rightly so,” he's quick to interject on his own lecture, apparently anticipating the remarks the class will come up with. He's learning just as much as they are. Maybe more. “Dissent. Find something, anything, and say it in his defense.

“A question is about what you know. It's not about what you don't know. A question about Rembrandt, for instance, might prompt an answer about...Degas.”

“Is Degas an old master?” Rudge asks, leaning back, sprawled over his chair. (Posner notices the posture. It's very in keeping with Rudge's character. He wonders, too, if Rudge would have played Quidditch in Scorpius's world. Wonders if there will someday be a magazine with Rudge on the cover, posing with a rugby ball and nothing else...)

“'About suffering,'” Timms pipes in, “'they were never wrong,' sir. 'The Old Masters...How it takes place while someone's eating or opening a window.'”

“Have you done that with Mr. Hector,” Irwin says, almost snidely, almost defensively, as if he is annoyed that they've brought Hector into his classroom when he's been barred from Hector's.

“Done what, sir?” Timms asks, almost innocently.

“The poem. You're quoting somebody. Auden, isn't it?”

“Was it, sir?” Timms asks, still playing naïve. “Sometimes it just flows out, sir. You know, brims over,” he adds dramatically, and Posner suppresses a giggle.

“Does he...have a program? Or is it just at random?” Irwin asks, stopping to lean against the table between Posner and Timms.

They've got to him, Posner thinks. He's showing weakness now, and that is the one thing he must never do.


“It's knowledge, sir,” Akthar says from Posner's right.

“The pursuit of it for its own sake,” Timms adds.

“Breaking bread with the dead, sir,” Akthar continues. “That's what we do.”

“It's higher than your stuff, sir. It's nobler,” Lockwood says.

“Only not useful,” Posner feels obligated to interject. He owes Irwin something for the kinship they share, for the way their eyes are drawn to Dakin at the same time. “Mr. Hector's not as focused.”

“Not focused at all, sir,” Timms says, perverting Posner's veiled compliment. “He's blurred, sir.”

“I mean, we know what we're doing with you, sir,” Crowther says, and the mood of the classroom shifts. “Half the time, with him, we don't know what we're doing at all.”

They love Hector. All of them. But they are all beginning to feel the pressure of the encroaching examination. And as they feel that strain they are all beginning to appreciate Irwin's coaching more than Hector's silliness.

“No, we're poor, little sheep that have lost our way, sir,” Timms moans, coming across the room to take a book from Crowther. “Where are we? Where are we?”

“Sit down,” Irwin snaps, a bit more light-hearted than he would have been at the beginning of term. Scripps tosses a wad of paper at Timms as he goes.

“You're very young, sir,” Akthar says, proving that they still want to poke Irwin, appreciation or no. “This isn't your gap year, is it, sir?”

“I wish it was,” Irwin answers with a shake of his head, sounding weary and a bit lost.

“Why, sir?” Lockwood asks. “Do you not like teaching us? We're not just a...hiccup between the end of university and the beginning of life, like Auden are we, sir?”

“Do you like Auden's poetry, sir?” Dakin asks, and Posner hears something in the tone that he might have missed a year ago, or even a month. Something purposefully flirtatious. Cheeky.

“Some, yeah,” Irwin says, clearly wary.

“Mr. Hector does,” Dakin says, and Posner thinks it's more than cheeky. It's dangerous, teetering on the edge of something he's only just beginning to understand. “We know about Auden.”

A low murmur of suggestive agreement slides across the room. Posner looks down at his notes, hoping he isn't blushing.

“He was a schoolmaster for a bit,” Dakin continues.

“I believe he was, yes,” Irwin confirms.

“Yeah, he was.” Dakin sounds like he's the one giving the lesson, like he has something to teach Irwin. And perhaps he does. “Do you think he was more like you? Or more like Mr. Hector.”

“I've no idea. Why should he be like either of us?” He's definitely wary now, trying to work out what trap Dakin has laid for him.

“Oh, I think he was more like Mr. Hector. Bit of a shambles? He snogged his pupils.” Dakin waits the appropriate beat for that to sink in. “Auden, sir. Not Mr. Hector.”

To his credit, Irwin only says, “So you could answer a question on Auden, then.”

“No, sir!” Timms cries defensively. “Mr. Hector's stuff's not meant for the exam! It's to make us more rounded human beings.”

“Listen,” Irwin earnestly interrupts. “This examination's gonna be about anything and everything you know and are, and if there's a question on Auden or whoever, and you know about it, answer it.”

“We couldn't do that, sir. That would be a betrayal of trust,” says Akthar.

“Yeah, is nothing sacred, sir?” Lockwood says. “We're shocked.”

It's too much for Posner, who sometimes still has trouble telling when they've gone too far, when the teacher is taking it in stride and when he's not. “I would, sir,” he argues. “And they would. They're taking the piss.”

“'England, you have been here too long
And the songs you sing now are the songs you sung
On a braver day, now they are wrong,'” Lockwood quotes.

“Who's that?” asks Irwin, the only one in the room who doesn't already know the answer, a fact made all the more obvious by the incredulous cries around him.

“Don't you know, sir?” asks Lockwood, and Irwin readily admits he does not.

“It's Stevie Smith, sir. Of 'Not Waving but Drowning' fame.”

“All right,” Irwin says, desperately turning this back to the exam. “Don't tell me that's useless knowledge. Listen, if you get an essay on post-imperial decline, losing an empire, finding a role, all that kind of stuff, and... a gobbet like that, it's the perfect way to end it.”

Silence.

Then Lockwood asks what they're all thinking, “A what, sir?”

“A gobbet. A...quotation. How much more stuff like that have you got up your sleeves?”

“We've got all sorts,” Lockwood says, leaning back in his chair until inspiration strikes and he jumps up. “Hey! The train, the train!”

Scripps is out of his seat before Irwin has the chance to protest, sliding into the seat at the piano and starting on a theme from Rachmaninov's Second Piano Concerto. Posner is right behind, taking his place in front of the classroom, bringing a little Hector to Irwin, affording him that respect.

“'I really meant to do it,'” Posner begins, channeling Celia Johnson. “'I stood there right on the edge. But I couldn't. I wasn't brave enough. I would like to be able to say it was the thought of you and the children that prevented me, but it wasn't. I had no thoughts at all. Only an overwhelming desire not to feel anything at all ever again. Not to be unhappy anymore. I went back into the refreshment room. That's when I nearly fainted.'”

“What is all this?” Irwin whispers from the back, and all the boys hush him.

Scripps stops playing as Posner takes a seat, perched on the edge of the desk. Scripps walks over to him, doing a passable impression of Cyril Raymond's poshest of accents. “'Laura.'”

“'Yest, dear,'” Posner responds.

“'Whatever your dream was, it wasn't a very happy one, was it?'”

“'No,'” Posner answers quietly, shaking his head.

“'Is there anything I can do to help?'”

“'Fred, you always help.'”

“'You've been a long way away. Thank you for coming back to me.'”

Posner sobs softly, and Scripps embraces him. Pulling away from the hug, both boys look expectantly at Irwin, who is smiling indulgently at them. After a moment, he says, “God knows why you've learned Brief Encounter.

A resounding cheer goes up from the entire class.

“But I think you ought to know, this lesson has been a complete waste of time!” he adds.

“Oh, a bit like Mr. Hector's lessons, then, sir. They're a complete waste of time too,” Dakin tosses in as a parting shot.

It lands squarely. “Yeah, you little smart-arse, but he's not trying to get you through an exam.

It's a testament to how much they have honestly come to respect him that the only reaction is a chorus of cat-calls.

***

It's because of that class, as much as anything else, that Posner decides to go to Irwin for advice. Because Irwin let himself be a bit vulnerable, let his insecurity about Hector show through.

He stops by Irwin's classroom after school one day and asks if he can talk. Irwin seems surprised, but he nods and invites Posner in, and before long, he's seated across from his teacher.

There was a bit of build up to it, of course, but almost before he can decide if he wants to or not, he finds himself saying, “Sir, I think I may be homosexual.” It's the first time he's said it aloud like that. Labeling it is somehow different from telling Scorpius or anyone else in Milliways that he thinks he might fancy boys. It's more permanent. More...damning.

Irwin sits back, and Posner can tell he's surprised, but he doesn't look disapproving, so Posner continues.

“I love Dakin,” he says, suspecting this will resonate with Irwin, create a common ground of sorts.

“Does Dakin know?” Irwin asks after a brief pause.

“Yes,” Posner admits easily. “He doesn't think it's surprising. Though...Dakin likes girls, basically.”

Irwin nods, and he makes an attempt to be sympathetic. He uses general terms, never speaks specifically to what it may be like for someone like Posner, or even what it's like to love someone like Dakin.

“Is it a phase, sir?” Posner asks. This is what he's most been wondering. Is it temporary? Will it go away? What will I be when it does, if it does?

“Do you think it's a phase?”

He can't answer immediately. It wasn't the response he was expecting. “Some of the literature says it will pass,” he says eventually. “I'm not sure I want it to pass.” There is something noble in that suffering, and it has become such a part of him recently that he wouldn't like to have to start all over again in figuring himself out.

“I want to get into Oxford,” he adds, sure of this one thing. “If I do, Dakin might love me.

“Or I might stop caring.”

Irwin says nothing, and for a moment neither does Posner, until, “Do you look at your life, sir?”

“I thought everybody did.”

Posner nods. It's nice to be included in 'everybody' sometimes.

“I'm a Jew,” he says, recounting the things he's considered. “I'm small. I'm...homosexual. And I live in Sheffield.” There's a pause as he sums it up in his head. “I'm fucked.”

It's a test. He's feeling Irwin out, wondering if he's ceased to be a teacher and become a friend. And Irwin lets it go, and he has his answer.

He's getting ready to leave, when Irwin says, “Posner?”

“Sir?”

“What goes on in Mr. Hector's lessons?”

“Nothing, sir,” Posner says, a bit worried that Irwin even asked. “Anyway, you shouldn't ask me that, sir.”

“Quid proquo,” Irwin says, which Posner supposes is fair.

Still, he only answers, “I have to go now, sir.”

“You learn poetry,” Irwin continues, as if he hadn't spoken. “Off your own bat?”

“Sometimes,” Posner admits. “He makes you want to, sir.”

“How?”

“It's a conspiracy, sir,” Posner answers, feeling a bit like a snitch, a traitor.

“Who against?”

“The world, sir.” He frowns, worried he's said too much already. “I hate this, sir. Can I go?”

“Is that why he locks the door?” Irwin asks, as if he knows Posner will not leave without being dismissed.

“So that it's not part of he system, sir,” Posner answers, nodding. “Time out. Nobody's business. Useless knowledge.

“Can I go, sir?”

“Why didn't you ask Mr. Hector about Dakin?”

This, at least, is something Posner can answer without guilt, though it takes him a moment to decide if Irwin is good enough a friend to say this to.

“I wanted advice, sir. Mr. Hector would just have given me a quotation. Housman, sir, probably. Literature is medicine, wisdom, elastoplast. Everything. It isn't, though, is it, sir?”

“It will pass,” Irwin answers, and it's cold comfort at best.

“Yes, sir.”

“And Posner,” Irwin adds.

“Sir?”

“You must try and acquire the habit of contradiction. You are too much in the acquiescent mode.”

“Yes, sir,” Posner answers, frowning, feeling the shift back from friend to teacher. “No, sir,” he corrects himself.

And he goes, and he finds that he still has no answers, but he doesn't feel as bad about it as he did when he arrived.


[ooc: All dialogue comes from the Fox Searchlight film The History Boys or the Alan Bennett play of the same name.]