Hannah walks into the classroom, and I freeze. It’s not the way she narrows her eyes at me as she passes, sitting next to Jess instead of me. I expected that after yesterday. No, it’s the bright red gash across her pale forehead that turns my stomach to slush. A crisp diagonal line from temple to opposite eyebrow, like a No Entry sign.
It can’t be happening. Not again.
I couldn’t believe my luck when I made friends on my first day here. After everything that went on in my old school, maybe I was going to fit in at last.
For weeks, Hannah, Jess, Katie and I were inseparable. Until yesterday, when they suddenly stopped speaking to me. Confused, I trailed after them like a lost puppy until Hannah finally said,
“Emily, why didn’t you tell us the reason you left your other school? My Mum said you stabbed some boys in their sleep.”
The others wrinkled their noses, recoiling theatrically.
“It’s not true!” I said, feeling the heat rise in my cheeks. “They hurt me. They were bullies!”
“Yeah, well my Mum said not to hang around with you anymore. You’re officially out of the group.”
She lifted the row of paper dolls we’d made and ripped one off the end of the chain. The one I’d drawn on to look like me. It floated to the ground in slow motion, smiling and unblinking. Then they each trod a muddy shoe-print across ‘my’ face as they walked away.
“But… you don’t understand!” I shouted at their retreating backs.
Their ponytails swayed like wagging fingers, their footsteps echoing ‘no, no, no’ across the yard. Memories of all the times I’d been picked on and left out tumbled into my mind, rubbing together until they burst into flames. Anger seared through my body.
I went home and did what I swore I wouldn’t do again. I made a new set of paper dolls and sliced one across the head with scissors. Only then did my rage subside.
“Emily?”
I jump, propelled into the here-and-now. Mrs. Dale, the Head Teacher is standing in front of me.
Before I know it, history is repeating. Same scene, different office.
“Do you know anything about the cut on Hannah James’s head? It bears an uncanny resemblance to the attack on those boys in St Thomas School. This is very serious, Emily.”
Just as before, no-one believes me when I say that it wasn’t me. That some dark, scary magic must be happening. Tear-stained and frustrated, I’m sent home, words like ‘police’ and ‘expulsion’ popping in my ears like bubble gum.
My Mum banishes me to my room. The inferno inside me swells again and curls my fingers around a box of matches. Staring at the paper dolls lying crumpled at the bottom of my bin, I take out a match and strike it, sulphur fumes flooding me with Christmas-level excitement. I drop the match into the bin and wait for the sound of sirens.
