1. Crow #2
I thought I was a front-runner before this.
Capable, intelligent—how could Cambridge refuse?
I didn’t realize how sparse our classrooms were, how little we were offered.
We walked through that grammar school and saw state-of-the-art facilities, saw teachers with “Dr.” in front of their names tutoring students one-on-one, and had the mock interviews in a library filled with more books than I’d ever seen, computers so new I was terrified to touch them.
Wren wasn’t the only one of us three who stumbled over her words, flushed red when put on the spot in the middle of an unforgiving circle of smugly confident students.
I didn’t understand a question and sat there like a gaping fish while the others smirked or looked on pityingly, probably wondering what on earth these girls were doing here in their pristine school wearing hand-me-down uniforms and shoes from the discount outlet.
They leaned back, frames wide and cocksure, ready to dismiss any challenge, because what could possibly test their innate superiority?
When they spoke, they had sophistication, an ease and wit that flowed like syrup from their throats.
They were lyrical, arrogant, passionate; they knew their voices mattered, that they were destined to be somebodies.
Starling and Wren called them stuck-up afterward, said of course they sounded smart when they parroted their expensive teachers and academic parents, but they don’t get it. I want to wear one of them like a suit.
I see the gap like a chasm; one misstep and I will fall and never recover.
“Do it Strangers on a Train–style,” Starling suggests. “If you’re both on the same page, it’s perfect. You get to murder who you want with none of the repercussions.” She lights up when she says this, but then she would, being as obsessed with true crime as she is.
So here we are. The five of us: Goldie, Starling, Wren, Cuckoo, and me.
The best and brightest in our school, though maybe that’s not saying much when Wren is the first to go to Cambridge in years.
We’re friends because that’s what the smart kids in our kinds of schools do, isn’t it?
Group together, shoulder the burden of being different from the rest. The casual teasing for going against a fundamental pride in not working hard.
In not trying at school. In not believing there is anything but this, forever.
In Miss White’s photo of us winning the poetry competition, Goldie is in the center, but I’m the one actually lifting the trophy up.
Starling is beside me, and Wren and Cuckoo flank Goldie on the other side.
We’re beaming, the others mid-laughter, me making sure I’m posed exactly right in our moment of glory.
When different species of birds flock together, there is always a reason. An advantage gained. A great feeding spot. Shelter from the cold. Protection from a predator.
“What if they want to murder someone innocent?” Wren protests. “Someone who doesn’t deserve to die?”
“Does anyone deserve to die?” Miss White asks.
Cuckoo’s response is immediate. “Yes.”
A beat of silence follows; we all know who she is talking about.
The bell rings, bursting Dylan and Jordan from their screen stupor.
It always goes on a fraction too long, a maliciously vibrating high pitch.
Miss White nods at Dylan and Jordan that they can go, and after a hasty gathering of their things, they’re out the door, no ceremony involved, nothing missed, the corridors a quiet echo of footsteps rather than the stampede of noise they usually are.
“I’m not sure when school will start up again,” Miss White says, “but online lessons will be running. Provided laptops should be coming your way as soon as possible.”
She is addressing Cuckoo and Goldie. I should tell Miss White my computer is ten years old, given to the family by one of our cousins. Mum uses it to look at millionaire homes on Rightmove, but otherwise it sits dormant and dusty in the corner of our living room. I don’t think it even has a camera.
“What’s going to happen with exams?” Starling says, all talk of murder forgotten. “Are you really deciding our grades, Miss?”
“I’m not sure of all the details at the moment. But as soon as I have that information, I will pass it on. Don’t worry. Everything is going to be fine.”
We’re about to head out the door when I turn back on the threshold. “Miss White?”
She has started packing away her own things, but stops at the sound of my voice. “Yes?”
My heart hammers in my chest, and I have the sudden thought that this might be the last time I see this woman, who told me in Year Seven I had a talent for English and should be proud of my work, and I’ve made writing my personality ever since.
The only person to make me feel worthwhile.
I want to tell her how much she means to me because if I don’t now, I might never get the chance.
“Nothing,” I say instead. “See you soon.”
She gives me a smile and a nod, and then turns away again.
There’s nothing left to do. This classroom, with its outdated displays and wobbly tables, means everything to me.
It’s my ticket, how I pass to the next stage.
It feels bizarre to leave it like this. But the others have gone on ahead, and I have to hurry after them, gazing around to try and take in every detail because if I don’t focus, these memories might vanish.
“This is so weird,” Starling says as I catch up. “And we might not ever come back.”
“We’ll be back,” Cuckoo says. “This will all turn out to be nothing.”
We walk together toward the school gates, ready to go our separate ways.
Cuckoo off to the council estate, the big blocks of flats that loom in the near distance.
Goldie has a flat she lives in with her aunt right opposite the school.
The grass is never mowed and someone left a graffiti tag on the wall a few years ago, but their landlord refuses to do anything about it.
Which makes the place look horrible, not that I’d ever say it.
Graffiti is disgusting. Wren and Starling carry on farther, through the park.
They live in proper houses, and Wren’s parents even own theirs.
I walk left, round the back of the school and far away enough that no one’s ever come round, and I wouldn’t want them to.
I don’t want them to see the peeling wallpaper, the furniture dumped outside, Mum still in her tatty dressing gown.
My bedroom hasn’t been redecorated since I was a kid, so I study for exams under the watchful gaze of My Little Ponies and Barbies.
When we cross the playground outside, the streets past the gates are empty.
They would usually be teeming with other students, jostling and shoving and yelling and laughing, and now it’s quiet enough to hear someone putting their bins out down the street.
There isn’t even anyone walking past, no cars driving down the road.
The world has closed its shutters, and we’ve been left outside.
“We’ll see each other soon though, right?” Starling says. “In a few weeks?”
She is always upset if she believes she has missed out on something.
“They can’t take our whole summer away,” Goldie says. “We’ve earned it.”
But we all hesitate at the school gates, each of us looking back at the school building as if it really might be the last time.
Goldie goes first, unbothered as she always is, but breaking into a laugh when Cuckoo dives dramatically through them after her.
Wren follows, cautious as ever, tucking her hair behind her ears and biting her lip.
Starling, sensing my reluctance, takes my hand and pulls me through together with her.
“We’ll be back,” I say, more to convince myself than the rest of them. But the words sound empty even to me, as if they know better than I do that they aren’t true.