by Carmen Reid
‘I’m not going. No way!’
‘Oh yes, you are going. The ticket’s already booked. You arrive in Edinburgh on the twenty-fourth of April, the day before term starts, just like all the other boarders.’
‘NO!!!’
Chapter Two
THE BIG BLACK taxi, which had rattled Gina about in the back seat all the way from the airport, pulled into a side street, slowed as the driver checked out the house numbers, then came to a sudden standstill. ‘Number nine?’ the driver asked.
‘Yes . . . well . . . I think so . . . This is Bute Gardens?’ she asked.
‘Aye.’
She looked out of the window at the solid stone house beyond the thick pillars and bushy green hedge they’d pulled alongside. It was still raining. It had been raining since she stepped off the plane at Edinborrow. (It was spelled Edinburgh, by the way, but no one in Edinburgh said it like that. They said ‘Edinburra’.)
Gina had been travelling for sixteen hours. For much of that time she had read, re-read and pored over the ten-page St Jude’s handbook, trying desperately to imagine what this was going to be like. She had begun to picture a school full of beautiful, intelligent British girls: teenage Kates with long blonde hair and really posh voices. And at some point mid-Atlantic, she had started to convince herself that it might not be so bad: it might even be fun. In fact, maybe it would be really glamorous! Some of her classmates might even be related to Prince William . . . or at least know him!
Gina had also closely studied the photographs of the wood-panelled library, the grassy tennis courts and the soaring assembly hall, which came complete with those churchy lead-paned windows and wooden beams. It was all so old, so traditional – so positively historical.
‘You’ll make the most amazing friends,’ Lorelei had promised her. ‘Won’t that be great? I mean, I know you love Paula, Ria and Maddison, but you’ve known them for ever. Wouldn’t you like to meet some new people? And boarding-school friends are different,’ she had gone on; ‘boarding-school friends are like family.’
The taxi driver sat still. Gina sat still. Surely he wasn’t expecting her to carry her bags out by herself? Jeez, what kind of service was this?
She looked in her purse and brought out the sheaf of curly notes the fare required, and because she was Californian and proud of it`, she figured in a big tip as well, even though the driver was the rudest man on the planet; then she got out of the cab and hauled her two heavy black bags behind her towards the front door of number 9 Bute Gardens.
The driveway beyond the pillars was crammed full of cars, girls, luggage and parents. At the sight of so many strangers, all so different looking, Gina felt her stomach knot up. The last time she’d been a new girl at school, without a single friend, she’d been going to kindergarten for the first time and she’d had Mommy’s hand to cling onto for the whole morning.
Ever since then, she’d moved up through Junior School, then Junior High, with a gang of ready-made allies.
This was new. This was very new, and despite all Lorelei’s encouraging words, still ringing in her ears from the call made by cell phone in the back of the cab, Gina felt nervous enough to puke.
Just one look at the other girls in the driveway was enough to tell her that, despite her handbook-inspired fantasies, she was not going to fit in here. Gina was wearing heels, they were wearing sneakers; her jeans were designer, theirs were scruffy; her top and jacket were D&G, the girl in front of her was in some sort of mountaineering polar fleece. No one in a polar fleece was likely to know Prince William, were they?
The only thing that stopped Gina from calling her mom straight back to say, ‘OK, big joke over, can I come home now?’ was that, for once, she wanted to prove her mother wrong.
That night when Lorelei had first suggested St Jude’s and Gina had been utterly horrified, her mother had thrown down the challenge: Oh, I knew you wouldn’t go, you’re too scared. Too boring. Any one of your friends would have jumped at a chance like this. But not you. Eek, eek (Lorelei had added a frightened mouse squeak for effect). You won’t even go to the mall without two of your friends holding your hands.
Gina had listened stony-faced before declaring, ‘OK then, I’ll go. But only for the summer term. Just one term. I’ll work hard – what else will there be to do? And then you’ll let me come home again. OK?’
‘It’s a deal,’ her mother had promised.
But now, as Gina followed the two lanky girls in the chainstore jeans up the stone steps and manhandled her bags in through the front door, boy, did she regret her decision. This was going to be awful. Forget blonde Kates, this was going to be a term in geek hell.
She stepped into a lurid hall with a red plastic floor, red and gold striped wallpaper and lots of other people who all seemed to know each other. All around her girls were kissing, hugging and shrieking greetings:
‘Suze! How are you?’
‘Good hols? You are so brown!’
‘Holly! Your hair! It’s amazing!’
Gina looked at her bags as if she hoped for a moment they might spring to life and start talking to her, so that she didn’t feel quite so lost and awkward in this hallway.
Then a great booming female baritone broke over her. ‘Aha, I spy a new girl . . . Give me one guess,’ the voice exclaimed. ‘Gina Winkelmann-Peterson? All the way from California? Am I right?’
Gina turned to see a smartly dressed middle-aged woman with a terrifying blonde hairdo marching over towards her.
The woman was short, but made up for this with ramrod posture and a chin that stuck high into the air. Her generously plump figure had been neatly parcelled into a plum tweed jacket and skirt enhanced with the extravagant, silky pussycat bow of a pink blouse. The hair, solid as a helmet, moved not one millimetre as the woman approached.
‘Goodness me, you do look awfully tired,’ the hairdo pronounced loudly, extending a hand. ‘I’m Norah Knebworth, but that’s Mrs Knebworth to you, the mistress of this house; your keeper, so to speak.’ She squeezed Gina’s hand briefly.
‘Hi,’ Gina said. ‘Yeah, I’m Gina and I’ve been on a plane for, like, days.’
‘Wonderful,’ said Mrs Knebworth enthusiastically but inappropriately because her eye had already travelled beyond Gina’s shoulder and towards the next set of parents entering through the front door. Her freshly rearranged broad and welcoming smile was now directed at them.
‘Where do I go?’ Gina asked, worried she was about to be left in the hall on her own again.
‘Oh!’ Mrs Knebworth scanned the room, then clapped a hand on the shoulder of one of the lanky, scruffy-jeaned girls and asked, ‘Morag? Can you take our new girl, Gina – from California, no less – up to the Daffodil dorm?’
Morag didn’t seem overjoyed at the task. She and Gina looked each other up and down. To Morag, Gina looked like an off-duty pop princess. To Gina, Morag looked like a stable girl. There just wasn’t any hope that they were going to have anything in common. Why bother trying? Was every girl here going to be like this? Gina wondered.
With a shrug of her shoulders, Morag said, ‘Follow me.’
Gina grasped her bags and began to haul them down a long corridor and then up a flight of carpeted wooden stairs. Then came more stairs, and even more – narrower, twisting up to the top floor.
She was struggling with the bags while Morag leaped on ahead like a damn mountain goat.
It wasn’t what she wanted to do at all, but finally Gina had to say, ‘Please can you help me with one of these?’
Morag wordlessly bounded back down the stairs, took hold of a bag and was now following behind Gina.
‘Keep going up. It’s the third floor, the attic rooms,’ Morag instructed. ‘First on the right.’
Finally Gina was standing in front of a slightly battered-looking white door decorated with a painted tile: a daffodil, obviously.
She waited for Morag to come up behind her, and the pause was just long enough for them both to hear: ‘A new
girl?!’ ring out from behind the door, followed by: ‘The Neb has lumped the three of us with a bloody new girl? From the States? God, I hate that woman. I absolutely hate her. The complete cow!’
Although Gina would have liked to wait a moment so that it wasn’t quite so obvious she’d heard this, Morag pushed open the door and dumped one of the heavy black bags on the floor with the words: ‘And here she is – your new girl. Hello, and welcome back to hell.’
Standing in the uncomfortable silence, all Gina could think was: Oh, great!
Then she cast her eyes about the room and tried to take in as much as she could. First of all she looked at the three faces turned in her direction: there was a pretty Asian girl with elbow-length black hair and molten chocolate eyes, who was wearing a sparkling pink and gold sari – though there were jeans and a geeky sweatshirt laid out on her bed as if she was about to get changed.
Sprawled across another of the narrow beds was a tall, strangely horsy-looking girl with a long, pale face, bright blue eyes and a big nose. Her jeans were grubby and tattered, and as for her jumper . . .! Even from her position in the doorway, Gina could see the holes in the sleeves and the white dog hairs scattered across the front.
Finally Gina’s eyes fell on the sophisticate of the group: a glossy, smooth and straightened blonde with red lipstick, eyeliner and base who was – halleluiah! – in the kind of hot jeans and top that Gina might have picked out for herself.
However, this good-looking, tanned girl wasn’t giving off any sort of friendly vibe; in fact her look was cold and even slightly competitive. Gina understood: this girl was doing what she was doing. They were both sizing each other up and deciding which of them was prettier.
When the eye contact was over, Gina saw beyond the girls a cramped room, filled to the brim with four beds, four chests of drawers and all manner of clothes, books, tennis rackets, cases and just stuff, everywhere. Despite wall-to-wall alarmingly loud yellow and orange wallpaper, the room seemed dark and dingy. Just two small arched windows on one side let in the damp, grey evening light.
She hated it. She hated them. She hated this. Gripping her bags tightly, she wished more than anything that she could turn round, run out of this awful place and fly straight home. She’d never, ever do anything to annoy her mother ever again, never.
Then the girl with the big nose gave something of a smile, sat up on her bed, crossing her long legs underneath her, and waved Gina into the room.
‘Oh, it’s OK, we won’t bite,’ she said – in a beautiful voice, Gina couldn’t help noticing. It was low and slightly husky, totally upper-class English, but so melodious. ‘I’m sorry you heard what you heard. It’s just that the three of us have known each other for ever. We weren’t really wanting to share with anyone else.’
‘Oh,’ was the best Gina could offer, followed by, ‘I don’t really want to share with you.’
‘Well . . . at least that’s honest. This is Min, by the way’ – Big Nose pointed to the Asian girl, who gave a slight smile – ‘our superbabe, Amy’ – this was directed at the sophisticate, who just twitched an eyebrow – ‘and I’m Niffy.’
‘Niffy?’ Gina repeated.
‘Her real name’s Luella and she’s always said it stinks,’ Min explained.
‘So, you must be Gina, the Yank?’ Niffy asked.
‘Yes,’ Gina replied simply. The Yank?! She decided on the spot that if they weren’t going to be friendly, then neither was she. She didn’t need these dorky girls. She would just keep her head down and try and get out of this terrible place as soon as possible.
Chapter Three
‘THAT’S YOUR BED over there, by the way. And your chest of drawers,’ instructed the girl who went by the ridiculous name of Niffy.
She pointed to a narrow iron bed covered with a pink towelling bedspread. When Gina pulled the bedspread back, she saw pink woollen blankets and white sheets pulled criminally tight round a thin mattress.
‘If you fly to school, you can’t bring a duvet, so you get blankets. It’s grim.’ This came from Min, who gestured at her similarly made-up bed. She had an unexpected accent; it took Gina a moment or two to place it: South African, maybe? A South African Asian girl?
‘Just buy yourself a duvet, Min! I can’t believe you’ve been coming here for two years and you still haven’t bought yourself a duvet! They’re cheap as chips.’ Amy’s voice was unmistakably Scottish. ‘I’ll buy you one. Meet me in Debenhams at the weekend.’
‘OK, Miss Moneybags!’ Niffy teased. ‘We don’t all have your dad paying our allowance every month!’
‘Your dad still too busy trying to keep the leaky ancestral roof above his head, is he?’ Amy shot back.
‘What I want to know,’ Niffy went on, ignoring the dig, ‘is why Gina’s been sent to us all the way from California?’ She cupped her face in her hands and looked ready to listen. ‘Boy trouble?’ she prompted. ‘Not doing well at school? Pushy mother? Or all of the above?’
‘Well . . . ummm . . .’ Gina was not ready to give anything away. She pulled her bags to a standstill in front of the rickety little chest of drawers and wondered how on earth she was going to fit everything she’d brought with her into this old-fashioned bit of junk. One of the drawers was half open and inside she saw several items, brand new, still in their wrappers.
She pulled out the first one: a folded cardigan, the most revolting shade of sludge green. Then came a white shirt and a grey skirt. There were socks in there too – green, scratchy woollen socks – and other things she didn’t even want to investigate just yet.
‘The Neb’s been shopping for you. That’s a very bad thing,’ Niffy informed her.
The Neb? Did Niffy Big Nose mean Mrs Knebworth?
‘Because our housemistress is, let’s be honest, the size of a beached whale, she thinks a fourteen is small. Your skirt will be massive,’ said Amy, looking almost pleased at this.
‘Just like mine.’ Min held up a grey sack with box pleats which looked big enough to provide temporary shelter for a whole family. ‘Don’t worry, I’ve got safety pins.’
‘OK, unpack, Gina, fair enough, but at least give us a clue as to why you’re here,’ Niffy urged. ‘Then we’ll show you round before supper.’
‘Well . . .’ Gina wondered what the shortest way out of this line of questioning would be. ‘I guess . . . my mom was at this school and she wanted me to come here too, for a little while,’ she added with emphasis.
Unfortunately this comment seemed to spark more interest than she’d expected.
‘Your mum was here?’ Niffy chipped in. ‘Your mother is a St Jude’s old girl?’
‘Yeah.’ Gina wasn’t sure why this was quite so interesting.
‘My mum was here too,’ said Niffy. ‘How old is yours? Maybe they knew each other! That would be freaky.’
‘Your mum came here all the way from California?’ Amy sounded surprised.
‘She’s English,’ Gina explained. ‘Well . . . and half German.’
‘She’s German?’ Amy asked in such a scornful way that it made Gina flush with annoyance.
‘My mom’s forty-four.’ Gina looked at Niffy and pretended not to have heard Amy.
‘Mine’s forty-three. They must have known each other because the school was much smaller then. Was your mum a boarder?’
Gina nodded.
‘What’s her name?’ Niffy asked
‘Lorelei Winkelmann,’ Gina said grudgingly, hating the idea that there might be some sort of connection between her and this weird girl.
‘Lorelei Winkelmann! Yes, I’ve seen her!’ Niffy exclaimed. ‘Definitely! In one of Mum’s old school photos. You don’t forget a name like that. Plus she looked really out of place: crazy bleached blonde hair and masses of eyeliner. That’s her, isn’t it? Stuck out like a sore thumb and was obviously way too cool for school.’
Now Gina was relieved. Niffy didn’t know anything about her or her mother. She was totally wrong, and Gina was going to enjoy tell
ing her so. ‘No way,’ she said. ‘Not my mom. No way.’
Gina thought of the school photos she’d seen of her mother, all mouse-brown hair and plaits. ‘She was your regular straight-A student,’ she added. ‘She’s real clever and I bet she was real boring at school.’
But Niffy looked back at her defiantly and asked, ‘Are you sure?’
‘Of course I’m sure! She’s my mom, isn’t she!’
‘Well, there must be loads of things I don’t know about my mother,’ Niffy said. ‘I think we’ll have to do a search of the Banshee office archives one day – find out more about the intriguing Ms Winkelmann.’
‘The Banshee?’ Gina had to ask, although she felt slightly outraged that this girl could look up her mother.
‘Banshee Bannerman, our headmistress. Banshee: a wailing Irish fairy, harbinger of doom. Don’t worry – you’ll catch up.’ Niffy was unfolding her long legs, but her interest in Gina did not seem to be waning. ‘So your mum now lives in California – doing . . .?’
‘Computer stuff,’ Gina filled in.
‘Cool. And she’s decided to inflict St Jude’s on you, maybe so you can get some idea of what she went through.’
‘Maybe.’ Gina was not going to offer any further explanation about her home life to this irritating stranger. ‘I’m only going to be here a term,’ she reminded them all, certain in her mind that this was true. She’d do nothing but work and work. Get the grades and be out of here – maybe even by half term.
‘So, to recap on the Daffodil dorm Easter holiday experience,’ Niffy began, a grin spreading across her face, ‘Min went home to Durban, wore her sari and her hair long . . .’ This brought a laugh from Min, who was now in jeans and sweatshirt, plaiting her hair together.
‘She ate fantastic curries twice a day,’ Niffy continued, ‘and listened to lectures from her doctor dad about how great it is to be a doctor and what a great doctor she’d make.’