Tim felt at once they were not a receptive audience. There were few earnest faces among them, while others pretended, thinking perhaps he had more authority than he did, when in fact he had none. Worse, he felt empty of a sudden. It had seemed a little thing at the time, just to come along and talk. But an audience's attention isn't guaranteed, especially not a captive one like this. He'd have to work at it. Then having won it, he'd have to come up with something worth saying, and fast. What he'd planned to say, aided by these stilted notes in his sweaty palm, just wasn't going to do the job.

It had started as a joke. He'd written a little book about trees called,… well,… "A Little Book About Trees." It had taken him all of an evening, and he'd posted it online, like he did with his other stuff. And like all his other stuff, some of it going back twenty years, he'd not given publishing a second thought. But then the impossible happened, and a publisher emailed him. This really doesn't happen, ever, he'd thought, and especially not for a joke title like: "A Little Book About Trees" by Tim Burr. I mean,… the publisher knew it was a joke, right?

The publisher wasn't one of the big six, of course, but a small, local press, who handled history and nature. The book would be a good fit, he said, after cautioning Tim there'd be hardly any money in it, but he'd like to print the book anyway, if Tim had no objection. Well, Tim had no objection. It would even be funny, he thought, seeing it on the shelves. Trees weren't exactly his forte. He'd simply blagged the information from a dozen places around the web and put it into his own words. Then he'd illustrated it with his own photographs. Literature it was not. Poetic it was not. And of all the things he'd ever written, this, he felt, was the least worthy of anyone's attention.

What he had that he felt was of infinitely more value was a dozen epic novels of a romantic and metaphysical nature. With all his heart, he still believed in them, but they sat up on his web-site with the rest of his stuff, and hardly anyone ever read them. Still, he wondered if one thing might lead to another,… and then,… well,…

With publishing, there also comes marketing, so Tim found himself on a bit of a promotional book tour. Or rather, he ended up with a five-minute phone-in slot on the BBC local radio station. Then there was a morning in a bookshop with a pile of his books for signing. He dressed up in tweed for that, but no one got the joke, just like they didn't get the Tim Burr bit, and no one was buying either. Tim didn't mind that so much, and even understood it, having by now seen the cover-art foisted upon him by the publisher's graphic designer. It looked like it had been dashed off in half an hour, which was fair enough, this also being about how long it had taken Tim to write the book.

That said, the book did go on to sell a thousand copies, which just about broke even. You'll still see the occasional one in publishers clearance, but it's fair to say Tim's brief moment in the spotlight has faded back into obscurity. So it goes, thought Tim. It never did lead to anything else, and nobody got the joke, but then,...

There was this teacher of English to adolescent students. She was the sister of a friend of a friend of Tim's, and she'd arranged a speaker to come into school for book week, but they'd cancelled at the last minute. This was an esteemed professor, author and arts critic, who sounded to Tim like the real thing, except he was too busy, and also rather rude having cancelled at so short a notice. So, there was a desperate trawl for anyone who might know someone who knew someone half resembling a writer. And that, to cut a long story short, is the only reason Tim was standing there now.

"Just talk a bit about writing," the teacher had said.

Simple enough, thought Tim. Except, right now he couldn't think of a thing to say, and his notes were of no help. And he wondered if part of the reason was he knew nothing about writing after all, or if he did, he'd forgotten it, and his dozen novels of a romantic and metaphysical nature meant nothing in the scheme of things. So there was no point trying to enthuse such a reluctant, and by now fidgety crowd of youngsters over the wonder and the mystery of the literary creative arts, when Tim was losing the plot of it anyway, and the surest route to even a modicum of recognition after a lifetime of labours was a spoof title called "A Little Book About Trees".

The teacher, a trim, middle-aged lady with a permanently harassed expression, and greying hair, was starting to look less harassed, and more worried. Was Tim all right? I mean, he was a writer, wasn't he? And there was nothing writers liked more than boring the pants off others about their writing. So go on, Tim, just say something,… anything.

There came a titter from the back of the class. In Tim's day there would have been spitballs to follow, but they did not seem an overly violent bunch, and he took comfort from that.

"So,…" he said, a little too loud, but this didn't stop the kids looking at their watches. It was a half hour slot, but there was a risk this was going to be the longest half hour of his, and their lives.

"So," he said again, softly this time. "How many writers have we got in the room? Put your hands up. Let's see them."

Tim put his hand up. No one else did.

"All right, he said. "Let's call it something else. Who keeps a diary?"

He put his hand up. Glances were exchanged. A dozen hands went up, shy at first, but helped by the hand of the teacher.

"So, you were having me on," he said. "I'm not on my own after all. There are lots of writers." Titters again, but this time he felt they were with him, and he relaxed. "Can you tell me this, though," he said: "Would you ever show your diary to someone else?"

There were no takers for that. "Why write it then?" he asked. The atmosphere had changed. Already they were five minutes in, and he'd barely scratched the surface. "That's a mystery, isn't it? Let's think about that."

Then he remembered why he was a writer, and realised he'd just woken a dozen kids up to the fact they were writers too. And those who weren't? Well, by the time he was done, he'd have shown them they could be writers too if they wanted. He was doing none of them any favours, of course, because it was an odd thing, to be a writer. But the blood-writers among them would know that,...

And they'd go on to do it anyway.