Back to Crestwood
Scott returned to Crestwood College in Eastleigh to speak to pupils making early career choices. The school presented its former pupil as a role model, a description neither Scott nor his teachers would have predicted during his own time there.
His former English teacher came back to see him, while the familiar corridors and assembly room seemed smaller than he remembered. Scott spoke to Years 8, 10 and 11, then received a Deputy Head Boy badge and an invitation to attend a school parliament meeting two weeks later.
Chris questioned why an adult visitor had been given the deputy position rather than the full title. Scott accepted that he could not be Head Boy without attending every day, but wanted to know what privileges remained. Former pupil leaders reported special rooms, responsibility for prefects and, at some schools, improbable access to goats, horses or permission to grow a moustache.
Fernando’s difficult plus-one
Chris’s friend Fernando arrived with a Watford problem. A senior figure at the club had offered him hospitality and a plus-one for the FA Cup semi-final against Crystal Palace. In the excitement, Fernando mentioned the invitation to his girlfriend Genevieve before remembering that his best friend Dugsy was the more committed Watford supporter.
Listeners overwhelmingly advised him to take his football-loving friend and accept the short-term consequences at home. Scott noticed the striking similarities between Fernando’s voice, friendships and circumstances and Chris’s own life, but respected the repeated assurance that Fernando was an entirely independent man.
Tomorrow at Fleet
Fleet Services confirmed that the Scott Mills Bridge now had its plaque and would receive an official opening the following afternoon. Scott was invited but could not abandon the programme, leaving Chris to attend as his representative.
Chris promised a speech, while a small pair of curtains would cover the plaque until the ceremony. Welcome Break’s chief executive Rod would be present to perform the formal unveiling. Scott had begun the day with a school badge and ended it preparing to have a piece of motorway infrastructure officially dedicated to him.
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