A Rainbow in the Basement

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What does Good Friday, mean to us… Callum?’ ‘Eh, I don’t know, Miss.’ Callum’s desk was at the front of the class where Miss Kerr could keep an eye on him. Miss Kerr clapped her hands. ‘That will be quite enough sniggering, thank you,’ she said sternly, directing her words at the clean-socks-and-shiny shoes brigade at the back of her classroom. You could have heard a feather drop after that. ‘What do you mean, you don’t know? Your hand was up, was it not?’ ‘Aye, Miss, but—’ ‘But what, Callum?’ she interrupted. ‘So was everybody else’s…and…i didn’t want to get left out.’

Miss Kerr stared silently at Callum, before turning sharply away from him. ‘Right then, can anyone else...enlighten us?’

My arm was beginning to get tired. I tried supporting it with my other one. ‘Matthew?’ I jumped at the sound of my own name. Teachers are good at that. They can make your name sound like: you will die in five seconds unless you give me your undivided attention and total obedience NOW!

‘Matthew?’ This time the sound of Miss Kerr’s voice meant: you can begin any time you wish as long as it’s IMMEDIATELY!

‘It’s the day that Jesus was crucified,’ I said, hoping this would be enough of an answer to get me off the hook.

‘And when did this event take place?’ she inquired, glancing around the classroom.

‘About 2,000 years ago, Miss.’ Going by the Christian calendar. It’s a little bit different if you’re a Muslim, Dad had told me.

Miss Kerr sat down at her desk. ‘Anything else you can tell us, Mr Ellis?’

‘Jesus had to be crucified and then buried on what we now call Good Friday, because the following day was the Jewish Sabbath, when no one was allowed to work.’ Something else Dad had told me, so I knew it was also true. Miss Kerr was quiet. The class was quiet. ‘And where did this take place, Matthew?’ Miss Kerr asked carefully. ‘In Israel, which was occupied by the Romans?’ ‘The crucifixion, I mean. Where exactly did it take place?’

Scraping my chair back until it touched the wall, I got to my feet, clean-socks-and-shinyshoes to my left and right. ‘Calvary,’ I answered. ‘And where is Calvary?’ ‘There!’ I replied, pointing towards the enormous window above Miss Kerr’s head.