Dreams at Silver Spires

by Ann Bryant

  It was a relief when the bell for the end of afternoon school finally went, and I was free to shoot out of the classroom and over to Forest Ash at top speed.

  On the internet I found loads of sites about wormeries and I studied them all carefully so Mrs. Pridham would be impressed with my thorough research. It was a question of finding the most suitable type of wormery for Silver Spires. We needed something really big to go outside at the back of the kitchens so the dinner ladies could compost all the food scraps, and then we also needed two or three small wheelie bins in central places around the Silver Spires grounds for us girls to chuck our apple cores and things into. It would be easy to wheel the bins round to the wormery. And then I read that you could recycle old newspapers in wormeries too. Yes, of course, because paper comes from trees. I’d never thought of that.

  “Hi, Ems, I’ve been looking for you all over the place!” Bryony had come into the internet room and was trying to see what was fascinating me so much on the screen. “I never thought I’d find you in here!”

  I jumped up and grabbed her hands. “Good news!”

  She gave me one of her frowns. “Why do I get the feeling I’m about to hear about a brand new crazy Em-plan…?” She pulled her hands away, peered at the screen and started reading. “These worms differ from normal garden worms in that they eat and live on the decaying food on the surface… Mmm…sounds charming. So their pooh is the compost?”

  I couldn’t help laughing at the look of disgust on Bryony’s face. “Yes – it’s no different from using horse manure as a compost.”

  “So what does the actual wormery look like?”

  “Like a dustbin or a big bucket and you can get ones that look like trays stacked up. There are all different kinds and it’s exactly what we need here at Silver Spires!” I told her in a gabble. “I’m going to order one off the internet. Everyone will love it, because you can see it working right before your eyes, and the worms leave behind a fantastic compost, really high in nutrients. That means that when it gets dug back into the ground to grow more vegetables, they’ll be so much better for us all to eat than the stuff we usually have…”

  Bryony suddenly put her hands up like a policeman stopping traffic. “Ems, Ems, hang on a sec! How are you going to afford it?”

  It was actually quite a nice surprise when Bryony said that, because what I’d thought she was going to point out was that Miss Gerard had already told me she wasn’t changing the way Silver Spires worked, and hearing that out loud would have really spoiled my dream for good.

  “Er…” How was I going to afford it? I hadn’t thought about that. I racked my brains hard. “Er…”

  I felt myself starting to deflate, but I so wanted to stay on my high, so I blurted out my thoughts as they jumped into my head. “I could save and save… No, that’d take too long… Mum and Dad might agree to raising my allowance…” Bryony was shaking her head. She must have known I was clutching at straws. “What about if I sold something?” It felt as though I’d caught a glimpse of a little chink of light at the end of the tunnel. “Yes, I could sell that pink top that Aunty Mand got me when I was into pink. It’s too tight now anyway.”

  Bryony was frowning again.

  I had to think harder. “And I’m sure I could find other stuff to sell… Wh…what about you, Bry? Have you got any clothes you don’t really want?”

  Bryony’s frown lifted when I said that, which was so lovely, because I hadn’t really thought it was much of an idea at all, but she started nodding slowly and thoughtfully. “Yes, that’s a good idea. We could have a clothes sale. I bet people wouldn’t mind donating clothes they didn’t like any more or whatever. And everyone would definitely love buying new clothes for themselves, and all the money could go towards your wormery.”

  “Bry, you’re a genius!”

  “No, you thought of it!”

  I could have pretended that was true, but I’d never lie to Bryony, not even a white lie. “No, I was actually only thinking of you and me selling our clothes. I never thought about anyone else!”

  “Well, I’ve got nothing and your top’s very nice, Ems, but I doubt it would raise enough for a wormery! How much does one cost anyway?”

  “Depends. Small ones are about twenty-five pounds, I think it said on one website, but we’d need a really big one – plus the wheelie bins.”

  We were looking up prices on the internet when Antonia and Nicole came in and asked us what was so interesting.

  “We’re researching Emily’s latest plan,” Bryony replied, looking mysterious. “Listen to this!”

  She did a grand gesture with her hands and grinned at me as though I was about to make a big announcement.

  “Well,” I began excitedly, “I’ve been finding out about wormeries, and they’re brilliant for recycling food waste and I reckon the school could do with at least one. And we’re going to hold a clothes sale to raise the money!”

  “Hey, great!” said Nicole straight away.

  “Yes, great…” echoed Antonia with a puzzled look on her face. “Er…I’ve got quite a few clothes I can sell for your wormery thing.”

  It was so sweet of her to want to help me when it was obvious she didn’t really understand where the money was going, and probably hadn’t ever come across the word “worm” before. So I explained a bit more and she wrinkled up her nose in disgust.

  “What does Mrs. Pridham think about it?” asked Nicole.

  There was another silence while I took in what she’d just said and realized that, actually, I had a long way to go before I could get my wormery.

  Nicole was really frowning now. “You have asked her about the clothes sale, haven’t you?”

  I shook my head. “I’ve only just thought of the plan.” I glanced at my watch. It was nearly time for supper.

  “Better leave it till later,” said Bryony, reading my mind. “I’ll come with you if you want.”

  “Thanks, Bry.”

  There were a few minutes between supper and prep and I couldn’t make myself wait till prep was over, so I persuaded Bryony that we should go to see Mrs. Pridham straight after we’d eaten. I was a bit nervous when she opened the door looking flustered, because I needed her in a good mood, not a flustered one, when I talked to her about wormeries and the clothes sale. On the other hand, perhaps if she was a bit distracted and busy she might just quickly say, “Yes, that’s fine” to get rid of us.

  Her glasses were on the top of her head, kind of stuffed crookedly in her hair, making it stick up on one side.

  “Yes, girls, what can I do for you? Is it something that can wait? It’s not the best time right now…”

  She was trying to smile but it wasn’t working very well.

  “We can come back—” Bryony started to say, but I interrupted her, speaking in one of my top-speed gabbles.

  “It was just to ask you if it would be all right to hold a clothes sale in aid of a wormery for recycling for the school. It would be really good – really environmentally friendly and green. You put your apple cores and banana peel in it and the worms turn it into compost, and then we can use the compost for growing vegetables.”

  Mrs. Pridham’s eyes were very wide, as though she hadn’t a clue what I was talking about, and I noticed Bryony suddenly seemed to be standing very close to me. She was tapping my leg and I guessed it was to tell me to be quiet. Instantly I regretted my big mouth. I’d probably put Mrs. Pridham off the idea by talking about it when she was obviously trying to deal with something else.

  “So this is…for your gardening club?” she asked, still looking confused.

  “Yes, yes…for the gardening club,” I said, giving her a bright smile.

  “Right, and Tony thinks it’s a good idea? Or is it something you’ve thought of yourself?”

  “I haven’t mentioned it to Tony yet…but I’m sure he’d agree…because it’s like recycling paper, only it’s for food waste.”

  “They’re very common. You can buy them ver
y easily off the internet,” said Bryony. Already Mrs. Pridham was looking a bit less confused. “So we just need to check that it’s okay for us to organize a clothes sale to pay for it,” Bryony went on. “Just a small sale one weekend where girls could bring along a top or a belt or something they didn’t want any more and people would buy the stuff to raise the money for the wormery. Emerald dorm will organize the whole thing.”

  Mrs. Pridham’s face had completely lost its bewildered look. “Yes, that sounds all right, on the face of it,” she said, glancing at her watch. She seemed to understand Bryony so much better than me. Why was I so terrible at explaining things? Then it was just as though she’d gone back to whatever she was thinking about before we knocked at her door, because her eyes were all distracted again. “Let’s talk about it properly when I have a little more time.” She was starting to close the door. “Sorry, girls…”

  “That’s okay, we’ll be getting the posters organized,” said Bryony. “Can we have it here at Forest Ash? In the common room?”

  “Maybe, of the two common rooms, the break-out room would be better,” said Mrs. Pridham, “as there are some spare trestle tables in there you could use. I’ll have a think.”

  “Okay, thanks, Mrs. Pridham.”

  “Yes, thanks, Mrs. Pridham,” I echoed.

  And then she shut the door and left us standing there.

  We stayed quite still and silent for a few seconds, then slowly turned to each other, smiling. Well, Bryony was smiling. I was grinning my head off.

  Chapter Eight

  “Look, this is a general noticeboard,” said Izzy. “It’ll be fine to put it up here.”

  The six of us were in the reception area of the swimming pool building. We’d already put up two posters about the clothes sale – one in the corridor outside the dining hall and one in the hall of the main building – and it was only eight o’clock on Friday morning.

  I’d felt really happy when all my friends got into the idea of the clothes sale so quickly. Bryony and I had explained about our chat with Mrs. Pridham, and then straight after prep the six of us had grabbed some sheets of A3 from the printer in the internet room. The next day we’d got into pairs and whenever we could grab a moment we worked on posters announcing the sale that was taking place in the break-out room at Forest Ash at three o’clock on Sunday. Nicole had wondered whether it might have been better to leave it till the following weekend to give everyone enough time to see the posters, but I’d said no because I was in my usual hurry now my new plan had started to take shape, and I just had the feeling that I must get on with it as soon as possible. After all, the sooner we had the sale, the sooner we’d be able to order the wormery, and then the sooner I could get the food recycling started. And once the teachers saw the recycling working so well, there was bound to be more chance that they’d get into the whole growing-vegetables-on-the-premises thing. I’d also taken the chance to mention the “great new gardening club” that was starting up, and asked for anyone interested to see Emily Dowd.

  At the bottom of the posters there was information about bringing your unwanted clothes to the break-out room at Forest Ash by one o’clock this Sunday, and that the money was going to a very worthy cause. Nicole and Izzy both thought it would be better to actually mention what the money from the sale was going towards, in case people thought I was keeping it for myself or something, but the rest of us were anxious that if we mentioned a wormery some girls might not completely get what that was, or think it was silly, or might even think it was a joke. It was such a good idea of Bryony’s to just put that the money was going to a worthy cause instead.

  But as we put up Sasha and Izzy’s poster, I had the same twinges of guilt that I’d felt when we’d been sticking the other two up, because Mrs. Pridham hadn’t exactly given us permission for this clothes sale. She’d said she was going to have a think about it. She had said the idea was fine on the face of it, though, and she’d even suggested that the break-out room would be better than the common room, so that was practically saying we could go ahead, wasn’t it? And she was perfectly happy with the wormery idea when we told her it was for my gardening club. So, as we admired the lovely bright poster on the wall in the swimming pool building, I told myself to stop being silly. Then my stomach did an enormous rumble, reminding us that it was time for breakfast, and we made for the door.

  “What’s this?” came a voice from just behind us, as we were about to go outside.

  I turned to see Juliet and her friends coming out of the changing room. But it was a girl called Mel who’d spotted our poster. Juliet was looking at her mobile, and I knew I ought to go before she saw me, but I couldn’t stop myself from hanging back to hear what she said about the clothes sale.

  “Oh great, it’s my mum,” she announced, still reading the text.

  “Oh, is it something about your birthday?” asked one of her friends.

  “Certainly is!” she replied, looking mysterious. Then she broke into a wide smile. “Mum’s having a massive five-tiered cake delivered, guys. So Oakley’s the place to be on Saturday afternoon! I expect it’ll be the best party that our boarding house has ever known.” A second later her expression turned into a mixture of half bored and half sulky as her eye caught the poster. “So what’s this, then?”

  A girl called Adelaide noticed us lot hanging about by the door and asked, “Which one of you lot put this up? Was it Emily Dowd, by any chance?”

  “Yes it was!” I said. And the moment the words were out of my mouth I regretted them.

  “We all put it up,” Bryony quickly said. Then she jerked her head and gave me a look as if to say, Come on, let’s go.

  But Jet’s mocking voice stopped me from moving even a centimetre. “In aid of a worthy cause,” she read out loud. “Hmmm, I wonder what that might be? The Emily Dowd Is Very Green fund?”

  I thought she was going to say something much more insulting than that, so it was quite a relief that she’d only more or less come out with the truth. I turned to follow Bryony.

  But then Adelaide burst out laughing. “Green! Oh, I get it!”

  “What?” I asked, turning round impulsively.

  The rest of her friends were all killing themselves, and I knew I should have just ignored them and walked away, but I hated to think that they were making fun of me, and it made it ten times worse that I didn’t even get the joke. I looked at Nicole to see whether she’d got it, as she’s really quick to catch on to things, and I could tell she did and she was cross, because she was giving Juliet a real evil. So was Bryony.

  “What’s so wrong with being green?” I asked, trying to sound as confident as possible.

  Well, that made the Year Eights fall about laughing even more.

  “Depends which sort of green you’re talking about,” said Juliet, running her fingers through her hair as she pushed past me. Then: “Somehow I don’t think you’ll get many girls coming,” she said, pushing the door open. “Why should anyone want to hand over their money when they don’t even know what you’re spending it on? I know I wouldn’t!”

  “What did she mean? I didn’t get her!” I asked, the moment she’d gone off with her friends, rushing because there were cameras not far away.

  “The word ‘green’ means ‘naïve’, as well as meaning ‘environmentally friendly’,” Nicole explained quietly as we slowly left the building, following at a distance behind Juliet and her friends. I noticed Juliet’s hair was swinging from side to side like a pendulum on a clock and I wondered if she’d had to perfect a certain way of walking to make it do that.

  “What is wrong with that girl?” Bryony asked through clenched teeth. But then she answered her own question. “It’s all because of that time when the cameras followed you and Emily out of the party, and she didn’t know where you were going and you wouldn’t tell her and so the spotlight wasn’t on her for once.”

  “Well I’m not going to let her get to me,” I said firmly, even though I was feeling uncomf
ortable inside. It’s not very nice when someone’s horrible to you the whole time.

  Antonia looked cross. “I don’t like the way her friends all…what do you say in English…you know, they are too much of a friend to Jet?”

  “They suck up to her,” said Bryony flatly. “That’s what we say.”

  We were a despondent little group walking over to breakfast, but we’d cheered up by the time we got our food, because in the queue we heard quite a few people talking about the clothes sale and saying how great it was going to be. Then, when we were sitting down, there seemed to be even more people talking about it. Everyone was saying that they’d got something or other to bring along to sell and there was lots of chatter about how cool it would be to get new clothes for not much money and without even having to go shopping.

  Only two days to go! At last something good was happening.

  I woke up on Saturday morning with the lovely feeling I always have when it’s the weekend and I’ve only got morning lessons to get through before I can do what I want. I leaped out of bed and went over to the window. Good, it looked as though it had only rained a bit during the night, so the ground wouldn’t be too soaked. And already there was a pale sun winking at me through the clouds. I felt a bit sad that I’d decided to miss riding just this once, but the garden was so important to me, and I badly wanted to use the time to get it properly started. Also, I wouldn’t have to put up with Jet showing off, or making fun of me, or both.

  As soon as lessons finished, we six had a quick lunch, then went over to the garden and set to work. My friends were brilliant. They didn’t really have much idea of what they were supposed to do, but once I’d showed them, they seemed to really enjoy it. The only trouble was that it started to drizzle, and after a while we were all beginning to get soaked. I could tell that Antonia and Izzy were fed up, so in the end I told them not to worry about carrying on any longer.