by Frazer Lee
Annie raises her hand to grab Victoria. But Victoria is faster, and grabs Annie’s wrist. Victoria twists her hand over and exposes a scar on Annie’s wrist. Annie looks from Victoria’s face to her self-inflicted razor scars, and then back to the source of her own shame. Annie looks aghast. We’ve all seen it, and she knows.
Pushing Annie aside in disgust, Victoria leaves the changing room.
Saffy crouches on the floor against the lockers, spluttering and holding her belly. If I didn’t know her better by now, I’d say she might even be crying. Just then, Annie walks over to the lockers, where Saffy crouches. She offers a hand to Saffy to help her to her feet, but Saffy swats her hand away angrily.
“Fat lot of use you are,” Saffy says.
Annie backs off—
(Smart girl.)
—before rolling her eyes and following the others out of the changing room.
I follow along, too.
At the pool, I join the line of girls and wait my turn beside the water. Principal Quick prowls along with the air of a predator stalking a watering hole in the savanna, signaling to each swimmer when it’s time to dive in.
Saffy appears, uncharacteristically quiet since her standoff with Victoria in the changing room. Saffy stands in line beside me, clutching her arms around her body protectively. Maybe Victoria’s punch to the gut was harder than I thought it was? Saffy is normally such a show-off. Then I notice that she’s actually shivering. Her knees are trembling. She’s like a frightened rabbit. Saffy sees me looking, and can’t hide her obvious fear. A question forms in my mind and I am compelled to ask it, even if it risks provoking Saffy’s wrath.
“What’s wrong?” I ask.
Saffy frowns, still holding on to herself. “I don’t like the water,” she says, her voice strained.
It’s my turn next to dive into the pool, so I ready myself. But then I see someone at the opposite end of the pool, where the shadows meet the water. Her hair obscures her face, but the pallid gray of her skin is instantly familiar to me from the last time I saw her, looking down from the clock tower.
She just stands there, watching me from the perimeter of the pool. Then she starts walking toward me, toward the edge of the pool. Incredibly, she steps down from the poolside onto the surface of the water—
(Hell no, that’s just not possible.)
—but I can see her with my own unblinking eyes, walking toward me across the pool like it’s made of solid glass. She’s only a few meters away now, and my instincts finally kick in. I back away from the weird girl. But in doing so, I knock into Saffy. Our limbs entangle for a moment and Saffy, taken by surprise, shoves me away. She realizes her mistake with a yelp, and falls backward into the water.
I look down into the pool, expecting to see that Saffy has fallen onto the gray girl. But the girl has gone. Disappeared.
Principal Quick has heard Saffy’s splash and is marching her way over to where I’m standing. She has a tin whistle around her neck on a chain and she puts it to her lips and blows a shrill note of displeasure. Then she turns her viper-like eyes to me.
“What are you doing? Swim, girl. I said lengths. Get in there and put your back into it!” Principal Quick commands.
I bend my knees and dive into the water. For a fragment of time, I’m free, isolated from sound and sensation under the water, which is refreshingly cool, but not cold. Then my head breaks the surface of the water and the noises invade my ears. Principal Quick’s echoing voice, and the splashing of the other girls as they swim ahead of me, are deafening after the pleasant solitude under water.
I reach out with the flat of my right hand, then my left, and begin to swim my first length. Still stalking the poolside, Principal Quick supervises, holding a stopwatch and shouting at us to dig in, to swim faster.
Reaching the other side of the pool, I kick off onto my back and begin my return trip, swimming backstroke. I pass Saffy, whose ungainly splashes have her coughing up water. I turn my head to see Saffy reach the side of the pool, where she grabs on to the edge, catching her breath. A shadow falls over her and I see the creepy gray-skinned girl, leaning over the side of the pool and looking down at Saffy.
I complete my length and stop at the end of the pool. Out of the shadows and beneath the pool room’s skylight, the gray girl’s pallid skin looks as though it’s stretched over her oddly distended body. Her hair is tangled like she’s just crawled from out of the grave. Saffy sees me looking. Her puzzled expression gives way to a yelp of shock as she glances above her to see the weird girl gazing down at her. Saffy gasps and kicks her legs hard in a panic, making great splashes in the water.
“No time for breaks, Emily! Another length!” Principal Quick commands from across the pool.
I kick off into a front crawl. Saffy swims past me in a flurry of splashes and foam when I’m a third of the way across. Her terror has made her more of a swimmer, at least. She’ll be at the side of the pool in no time at the pace she’s going. I finish my length and pause to take a look. Sure enough, Saffy has reached the other end and is treading water, all the while looking around fearfully. The gray girl is nowhere to be seen.
But Principal Quick is omnipresent. “Shall I get you a sun lounger?” she asks Saffy, who just grasps on to the overflow ledge behind her like it’s a life preserver.
She looks bloody terrified.
“Please. I want to get out,” she pleads with Quick, and you can hear the raw fear in her voice.
“You’ve hardly even started,” the principal says dismissively. “Get to it, girl, swim! Reach and kick, breathe and repeat!”
“Please! I need to get out!” Saffy’s anguished cry almost has me feeling sorry for her. She sounds genuinely distressed. I notice that she isn’t looking at Principal Quick, but is instead gazing down into the water directly below her.
There’s a muffled cry as suddenly, and inexplicably, Saffy is pulled under the water, as if by a shark. She rises momentarily, screeching for a second before going under again. Seconds pass, and some bubbles arise and break on the surface of the water.
Saffy is still down there.
The principal peers down into the pool with a look of mild resentment on her face. It’s as though Saffy’s apparent drowning-in-progress is just another inconvenience to her. What a bitch.
I glance around at the others and see Lena is nearest to where Saffy went under. Lena takes a breath and then dives underwater. The pool room is quiet now, save for the lapping of the water around the sill behind me.
With a sudden splash, Saffy resurfaces, followed quickly after by Lena, who spits out a mouthful of water like an Olympian.
Within seconds, more arms are grabbing her and Saffy is hauled up onto the side of the pool. She’s a coughing and spluttering mess. I think she’s actually crying. Principal Quick and the other girls stand around Saffy, trying to calm her as she kicks and convulses.
“Get away from her,” the principal commands, before stooping down and sliding a supportive arm under Saffy’s shoulders. Quick drags Saffy to her feet and leads her away. The other girls follow, crowding around their leader. Victoria stops and looks at me, hesitant for a second, then she joins the others.
I’m all alone in the pool now. I look in the direction where I saw the gray girl. No one is there. But my flesh still tingles as I tread water. I swim to the side of the pool and clamber out.
After wrapping myself in a towel, I follow the sounds of Saffy’s sobs and moans and find her in the corridor that leads from the changing room. Principal Quick looks to be having real difficulty holding on to Saffy as she walks her down the corridor. Saffy is still really freaking out, and her garbled murmurs are barely understandable. I do catch the words ‘coming to get me’, though. Saffy glances feverishly around, seemingly oblivious to Quick, or Lena and Annie, who follow close behind. Victoria, I notice, is keeping her distance.
&n
bsp; “Pull yourself together, girl,” Principal Quick says, before slapping Saffy hard across the face.
Wow. We’re all a little shocked by that.
But not quite as shocked as Saffy, who slumps into a swoon.
“Hold her,” the principal commands. Annie and Lena snap to it, propping Saffy up.
Quick takes her bunch of keys from her belt, then unlocks the door. I catch up to them and the principal gives me a cursory look.
“You,” she says, “in here with me.”
I step past catatonic Saffy, still being held upright by Annie and Lena, who looks entranced by what she sees through the open door. I’m in a storeroom, lined with shelves and cabinets, filled floor to ceiling with various medicine cartons. I glance back at Lena, whose eyes have lit up at the sight of so many meds.
Principal Quick unlocks a tall cabinet, opens it, and then selects a couple of cartons from inside. She then closes and locks the cabinet before unpacking the cartons. After a few moments, she returns with a freshly prepared syringe in her right hand, and a bottle and some cotton wool in her left.
“Hold this,” she instructs, and I take the loaded syringe from her.
I can almost feel Annie and Lena’s eyes on me. I guess they’re willing me to stick the needle into Principal Quick so we can escape or something. But they’ve forgotten that I escaped already, and there’s really nothing much to say for it save for mud, rain, and disappointment. So I just watch as Principal Quick swabs Saffy’s inner elbow with antiseptic. She discards the cotton wool ball and places the bottle in my free hand before taking the syringe from my other. Holding Saffy’s arm tight, the principal squeezes to make the vein pop out a little. Then she injects her. Saffy murmurs something unintelligible and visibly relaxes into a slump.
Lena watches with a weird kind of hunger on her face, as Principal Quick tosses the used syringe into a sharps bin. The principal shuts and locks the storeroom door.
“Help me carry her to the dormitory,” she says.
* * *
Night has fallen over Greyfriars Reformatory by the time we get Saffy settled.
I brush my teeth and get changed into my nightclothes. When I return to the dormitory, the room feels so desolate and cold.
Saffy lies on her bed, looking worse for wear after her ordeal at the swimming pool. At least the sedative seems to be doing its work – she’s stopped mumbling and thrashing about. Her eyes seem fixed on a point somewhere in the middle of the room. She’s staring into space, in other words. Still, the other girls stand silently by. Saffy’s loyal troops. Only Victoria keeps her distance, hanging back, looking awkward and out of place. I walk toward my bed and something unexpected happens. The other girls, except Victoria, form a line in front of my bed – an impenetrable wall of bitches.
I steel myself and try to push through them to get to my bed. Lena and Annie lock arms—
(Yes, they actually lock arms!)
—and shove me back.
I’m new to this game, but not defeated yet, so I beat a quick retreat and then attempt to skirt around the line of girls in order to approach my bed from the other side. But my different-angle idea fails. Too quickly, they extend the line and once again, they shove me back.
Then, I hear Saffy’s voice cut through the tense silence.
“And you.”
Victoria, head lowered, joins their ranks. When it was just her versus Saffy earlier, Victoria’s anger gave her the upper hand. But without the element of surprise, and with Saffy’s crew putting on a united front – let’s just say I don’t blame her for playing ball this time.
Saffy looks bolstered by her little triumph. She nods at the others.
“Grab her,” she orders.
They grab my hair and the pain is so bad it feels like my roots are on fire. The pain forces my head down and I feel rough hands twisting my right arm behind my back. That hurts too, and I’m dreading hearing a tearing sound because it feels for sure like they are going to twist my arm from its socket.
Slowly and deliberately, Saffy gets up from her bed. She stands over me, a surrogate Principal Quick, and I begin to wonder if the two aren’t related.
“Quick’s aren’t the only rules here, Emily,” Saffy purrs, as though reading my thoughts.
The grip on my hair tightens, and all I can do is swallow the pain.
Saffy crouches until her cruel face is in my eye line. “What did you see? At the pool?”
Considering my position, I decide that honesty really is the best policy, however odd it might sound.
“I saw her. That strange girl.” I try to breathe through the searing pain at my scalp and elbows. “Then she…well, she disappeared.”
“Any of you lot see her?”
Saffy glances around at her cohorts. No one speaks.
“I don’t know what you’re playing at,” Saffy continues, “but I do know you’re up to something.” Saffy glares at me, and then glances over her shoulder.
“Both of you,” she says, and I know she’s referring to Victoria, who’s still cowering a short distance away. “You get lucky, throw a punch to wind me, and then…. One pushes me into the water, causing a distraction while the other—”
I look at Saffy, who seems to have drifted off into some other, darker place. To be honest with you, she looks a bit stoned. Must have been one hell of an injection. I’m almost jealous.
“The other does what?” I ask.
Saffy blinks as though she’s banishing unwelcome memories. Her expression hardens again.
“There’s only one way to redeem yourselves, get back in my good books.”
Saffy looks around at the engrossed faces of her foot soldiers with a sly grin. She mimes smoking a cigarette, putting the imaginary cigarette to her lips. The girls giggle approvingly.
“Smoke run,” Lena says.
“Smoke run?” I ask. Fair question, I’m sure anyone would agree. I mean, what the heck is a smoke run?
“Cigarettes, dear,” Saffy says. “Currency. The only thing worth a damn round here. You made light work of it before, lifting a pack from old Quick. This time see if she’s got any booze as well. Bet she has, sour-faced old hag.”
“But she’ll miss it,” I counter, “and anyway her office will be locked for sure.”
Saffy just smirks at me.
“You need to learn to use the eyes God gave you. The door to the courtyard is unlocked. From there you can access Principal Quick’s office through the window. Don’t forget to close the window on your way out.”
“Smoke run,” I repeat.
Saffy nods. “Perfect for someone shifty like you.”
Well, now. I’ve never really thought of myself as being shifty. I’m not sure I like the connotation. And I think maybe Saffy can guess that I don’t from the way her eyes are twinkling at me.
Then she turns her attention to Victoria.
“And you. Come back with the goods and maybe I’ll be willing to overlook your little dog and pony show at the pool.”
I don’t feel like asking her what she’ll do if we come back empty handed.
* * *
We steal down the hallway, treading as softly as we can, trying not to make a sound. It’s going pretty well until we both see a huge black shadow moving across the wall. Victoria freaks out and I think she’s going to scream, so I clamp my hand over her mouth. I can feel her trembling, and the rise and fall of her breathing getting quicker. Still holding my hand over her mouth, I poke my head out around the corner to take a furtive look. I release my hand and gesture to Victoria that the coast is clear. We round the corner together and, looking fearfully to the window, Victoria sees what I just saw. The source of the shadow is just a tree outside, its branches swaying in the wind. Victoria sighs heavily with relief. We move on together in the direction of the exercise yard.
I
open the door and quickly move into the courtyard. I hang back in the shadows and check the coast is clear before waving Victoria through. Then, I close the door behind us quietly.
Ominous shadows dance across the stone surfaces of the eerily quiet space. I watch their darkly fluid forms – phantoms cast by the moonlight and clouds. Victoria looks alert, and completely on edge. She creeps over to the window, shoulders hunched. I’m still watching the shadows until she hisses at me under her breath to get a move on.
I join her over by the window. We check it over and find it’s unlatched. I keep watch while Victoria slides the window up and open. With our point of entry secured, Victoria cradles her hands together and mimes giving me a leg up. I nod before placing one hand on the windowsill, and the other on Victoria’s shoulder to steady myself. I lift my right foot and Victoria bends her knees, lowering her body so she can cup my foot in her hand. I push down with my foot and my hands, and up I go. I wriggle through the window and then drop to the floor. I give the office a cursory look, making sure it really is unoccupied and half expecting Principal Quick to be asleep at her desk. Satisfied that she’s not around, I turn back to the window and raise it higher, widening the gap. Then I reach through with my hands and upper body. Victoria grasps my hands in hers, and I pull her inside.
Something white on the desk catches my eye. I walk over to take a closer look and see the thick manuscript that Principal Quick filed away before. Right next to it is Quick’s clipboard. I begin to leaf through the papers that are mounted on the clipboard. Each one has a mugshot of one of the girls, and a bunch of handwritten case notes. Curiosity makes me want to read them, to know what path brought each of them here. I’m just wondering if my own case file is included among them, when Victoria waves at me to get my attention.
“We have to be quick.”
I look back down at the case files. Quick would come down on us like a ton of bricks if they went missing. Oh, but it is tempting though.
“You know what I mean,” Victoria says, and this time I catch the urgency in her voice. She looks really anxious. Then I see her nod at Quick’s desk drawer. “In there?” she asks.
