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Howdy to all my Ink Well friends; on reading the prompt at the start of the week, within a second, I knew I was going to be doing something with Macbeth - but the end result was not what I had imagined in my head, initially, I had hoped to write about ambition in a 12 year old - but the character of Beth seemed to emerge and want to be the main player - a fitting demand for her character I suppose.
At the end of this piece, I identify a number of my deliberate allusions, as you read the piece, I'd invite you to see how many you recognise.
Tim
You can find @TheInkWell's prompt here:
@theinkwell/the-ink-well-prompt-54-plus-weekly-challenge-and-prize-announcement
Skill focus this week:
Story arc: A story arc is an important element of a successful story. It simply means that your story should build suspense and then come to a good resolution. Good stories have conflict, and this is what helps you build your suspense.
Beth MacDonald: Plagiarising Shakespeare's Plot
Beth let out an exasperated sigh. She looked around her empty classroom, plotting her intention to take over the school. The Principal, Miss Emmerson was spineless, and the Deputy – don’t even get her started. “Tomorrow, and tomorrow, and tomorrow”, she muttered mindlessly to herself. It had been a long day, but she was ambitious, and her need to be last vehicle in the carpark kept her tied to her desk. She looked at the sloppy garbage that young Steven Whitmore had thought was ‘handwriting’; not worth her time giving it a stamp. She glanced across her desk at Erica Linten’s multiplication quiz. Beth let out an audible ‘Ha’ – she knew she’d be giving it a 0. ‘Multiply that’, she maliciously thought.
The term was nearing the Easter break, and the big Hat Parade was the following morning. As Beth was finally allowing herself to pack up, she reached out to grab the rabbit ears which young Jessica had been colouring in earlier. She took a lot of satisfaction in balling them up and throwing them on the floor. The colour was outside of every line, and she knew it would cause the girls in the class to argue with each other when they would come into the room – Beth got a kick out of seeing them accuse each other and cry. It meant she could send the one in tears to the sickbay, and the perpetrator of the tears to the isolation room. That would save her dealing with their snot filled noses and incessant whinging!
On the way home from work, she pulled into the liquor store. A night without a merlot or pinot noir, Beth believed, was not a night worth staying awake for. Moving into the store’s parking lot, she had to pause, noting Miss Emmerson clambering out of her 2012 Ford Mondeo. The night was darkening, and no one else was around. The Principal, assuming the car in front of her had halted to let her cross the road, began to cross. Beth’s sensible shoe was pushing down heavily on the brake, and then, it was pushing down heavily on the accelerator. With a thud, the car sped off.
Arriving home, Beth’s first thought was annoyance; she had not picked up a bottle of wine and this inconvenience caused her to curse Miss Emmerson yet again. And then, she was angry at her class. It seemed she had red crayon all over her hands. How could Frank and Thomas have been so clumsy as to have not cleaned up their mess from drawing? Beth’s anger built, as she scrubbed, and scrubbed – but the crayon had seemingly stained her hands beyond what her soap would clean. She took a shower and went to bed, setting the alarm for 5am. She knew she could not be late to school tomorrow.
As the sun rose, so did Beth. She followed her normal routine, checking her emails, making sure all parent correspondence was meticulously deleted. Yet, one from Miss Emmerson stood out:
“Dear colleagues,
I am writing to inform you that I have been seriously injured, but please, do not burden yourselves with my health. Instead, let’s focus on the wonderful children and make sure they have a wonderful Easter Hat Parade, and have a fabulous week ahead of their holidays.
To ensure the continued running of the school, I have been asked by our Director to appoint Beth MacDonald to the position of Acting Principal. She has expressed a desire to take on this responsibility many times, and I’m sure we’ll all support her in this undertaking.”
Beth smiled wickedly, as her ‘Tomorrow’ had finally arrived. She dressed quickly, and again attempted to scrub the crayon from her hands. It again, would not be removed, and she resolved to get a chemical cleaner later in the day. In a pragmatic fashion, she chose an outfit which would allow her to wear gloves and she set off for her first day on her new throne.
Arriving at school, Beth opened up Miss Emmerson’s office. She picked up the ‘Principal’ badge and pinned it on her blouse. She sat down in the swivel office chair, high backed, and made of a high quality pleather. Beth opened the filing cabinet behind her and began scheduling appointments with parents for the day ahead.
10am: Expulsion meeting. 10.45am: Expulsion meeting. 12.30pm: Expulsion meeting. By the time the ‘Big Lunch’ bell sounded, a fear shivered through the school. Beth had just phoned Veronica Hansen’s classroom and invited her in for a chat. Veronica was the Year 1 teacher, and her little brats could not yet master counting coins and they were slowing down the efficiency of the canteen line. It would not be a surprise to her, Beth thought, to be given her two weeks notice.
As the final bell rang for the day, thunder clapped and the clouds broke open. Beth was oddly relieved. Her mobile phone lit up, and she could see her school district’s head office flash up. Beth was delighted; she hadn’t been expecting a congratulatory phone call after her first day. ‘Good afternoon, Beth MacDonald speaking’.
The director was on his way. Beth had sensed a tone of unease in his voice. She was requested to stay behind until he arrived. Her hesitation soon gave way to a hideous grin; she would be attending a promotion meeting, regardless of the meeting’s agenda.
The Director, Eric Abletly, a formidable man with a creased forehead parked just outside the school’s Admin building not too long after. He opened the door of his Subaru Forester, and immediately stepped in a puddle. He shook his boot, and briefcase in hand, strode to the reception area and straight to the closed door marked, ‘Principal’, to the left of the overwatered ficus. He knocked three times – as if the gates of Hell were not expecting him. He paused, knocked, and took a deliberate step inside the darkened office.
Upon entering he looked around the room; it was empty. His forehead creased into a further furrow, and he may have scratched his head, had his balding head not been boinked with a large encyclopedia. Beth scuttled out from behind the door, and gave off a hiccupping chuckle. The director, laying on the floor, looked like her father had, sleeping in the hospital, before he left, many years ago.
Triumphantly, she had done it; she had left the Director in a concussed state; he'd be out for hours now! Her first action was to remove her badge from her blouse, and to replace it with the pin from Eric’s own blazer. She was now in charge – and her first action was to move the body to the Deputy Principal’s office. She grabbed both feet; one in each hand, and began to drag him, step by step, to the door on the right of the overwatered ficus.
On opening the door, she gasped. Beth had not expected to see the spineless Deputy in his own office at 3.48pm! She looked intently into his eyes, seeing daggers float before her. The Deputy Principal had stayed back today to make some phone calls and to get himself ready for his paternity leave. He was currently on the phone to a specialist at the hospital, booking in his wife’s imminent caesarean. His stunned shock turned into calm reasoning, and he spoke very deliberately into the phone: ‘Beth MacDonald has just assaulted the Director of Schools. Call the police and get them here immediately’. The villain shrieked, and did not wait for any further conversation or allegation to unfurl; she took off, kicking over the overwatered ficus on her way, dampening the carpet with its excess water.
The next day, Beth’s headshot had been plastered all over the newspapers and onto ‘Most Wanted’ posters all over town. Limping through the pain, Miss Emmerson re-attended the school, immediately ceasing her sick leave, needing to restore order from the chaos. Her first job to attend to, the re-instating of the cancelled enrollments and the re-hiring of one of her most considerate teachers. The evil, she knew, had to be undone. She of course was commended by the Director, who, after a few ibuprofen tablets, was back to his old stern self.
In the days following, Beth’s abandoned car had been located near a remote lookout called ‘The Three Sisters’. It was a wild spot, and its jagged cliffs loomed over the ocean. Later, Beth MacDonald’s case file was closed. The guilt, they reasoned, could turn the ocean red. And, while no one was ever sure what happened to her, her teaching accreditation was cancelled, and never again, did she ever darken a classroom.
Some Notes:
- ‘Tomorrow, Tomorrow, Tomorrow’ is one of Macbeth’s famous soliloquy’s, uttered before his downfall, and on the suicide of his wife, Lady Macbeth. It foreshadows his own demise.
- Ambition was Macbeth’s fatal flaw, one which Beth shares. Her intention to climb the school ladder will ultimately lead to her downfall.
- The imagined crayon on Beth’s hands, mirroring the blood on Lady Macbeth’s which she imagines will never be clean.
- The expulsion meetings and giving staff notice mirroring the terror that Macbeth inflicted on Scotland.
- The Director’s Subaru Forester – the Dunsinane Forest moving would signal Macbeth’s downfall as it arrives at his castle.
- When Macduff knocks on Macbeth’s castle, the castle’s Porter (drunk) imagines he is guarding the gates of Hell.
- Three knocks, three mentions of the ficus – repetition of three was a motif in Macbeth (3 witches, 3 prophecies at a time, 3 titles etc).
- The only man who can defeat Macbeth is ‘not born from a woman’ – Macduff can defeat him, as he was ‘ripped from his mother’ – a caesarean birth; which the Deputy Principal was organising for his wife.
- It wasn't subtle, but when Beth entered the Deputy's office, she saw floating daggers - obviously linking to the dagger Macbeth hallucinated and saw.
- Macbeth is beheaded by Macduff; here, Beth’s head is in all the newspaper – a figurative beheading, if you will.
- Beth, perhaps you might infer, falling from the cliffs, mirroring Lady Macbeth throwing herself off the side of the caslte.
- The suggestion that Beth's guilt could turn the blood red, alluding to one of my favourite passages from the play:
