They sit through reading, writing, and arithmetic; watching and listening to the teacher at the front who addresses the class collectively as ‘girls’ as in ‘pay attention girls’ and ‘now girls, who can tell me..?’ and ‘good girl’ even when poor Billy sheepishly answered a question. Just like his old school, the morning lessons are divided by play-time, but unlike his old school where Billy felt largely ignored, here he’s the center of attention. “Do you like being a girl?” they ask. “Are you really a boy?” they query. “Do you always wear dresses?” they quiz.
It’s all quite worrying and Billy feels flustered by all the questions and attention. Mrs Wainwright walks over suggests that the girls don’t crowd him and sends most of them to play elsewhere in the yard, leaving Billy with a small handful of girls to deal with. “Why don’t you show Billy how to play hop-scotch… that’ll be fun won’t it.” the teacher suggests.
