Lowewood Academy

“Nice stripes Cass,” Claudia laughed, and I sighed.

“Courtesy of a misinformed Maverick- don’t ask… let’s just focus on the task in hand. This greater-striped Abbotts is ready for some serious Dashwood domination on the track.” I grinned.

“Too right, let’s do this - hands in,” Theresa Malone replied. “DASHWOOD!” we all shouted then headed off down to the track.

Inter-house athletics is a fairly major school sporting event and we were all pretty psyched up. With the prefects customarily out of the picture for inter-house competition and into organising roles we mere mortals took the starring roles and stepped up to fill the rather big shoes the likes of Elizabeth and Jessica had left behind. I for one was up for it in every sense of the word- I was racing the 400m, 800m and 400m relay, and was hungry for some wins.

(more…)

“And just what exactly do you think you are doing?” roared Mr. Basford.

I jumped and clapped my hands over my mouth. Jen, however, continued to draw another arm onto the little stick man in front us with an expression of dreamy indifference on her face. “Playing hangman, Sir,” she replied. She turned to me, “Your go, Faye.”

“Oh no, it most certainly isn’t!” raged Mr. Basford and he wrenched the piece of paper out of Jen’s grip and screwed it up into an angry little ball. “Adamson, get to the front of the class! Right now! You too, Dennington-Glass!”

“Aww but Sir, I was winning!” said Jen.

A few people laughed, Rosie groaned audibly and I noticed Juliet Aston-Beresford shaking her head disapprovingly from her prime front-row location in the History classroom. Oh God, Jen…

(more…)

“Whatever.”

Suddenly Alex came up behind me, where I was rummaging through the piles of paperwork on my desk looking for my History prep, and, grabbing me by the shoulders, whirled me around to face him.

“What is wrong with you, Pippa? You don’t normally sound like a petulant 13 year old. You’ve been off like this for days, now. What on earth’s the matter?”

“What’s the matter? Okay, where the fuck do I start? Organising the Leavers’ Ball is driving me nuts; Juliet is the micro-manager from hell, nothing seems to be panning out properly, and yesterday the Eiffel tower collapsed so we’ve got to start that again.

“Then there’s the fact the whole fucking school witnessed my absurd efforts in the inter-house athletics; after all this ridiculous practising, to foul all three of my throws was just an utter disaster. Ms Lesbos won’t speak to me, I’ve had the cold shoulder from Elizabeth Somerton, and the whole thing’s just a complete and total waste of time. Oh, except that my entire future rides on it.

“And now, now, I can’t even find my fucking History prep and I put so much effort into it, and if I don’t find it soon I’ll have both Gabby and Mr Basford on my case…”

I burst into tears.

(more…)