Rewind

Prologue: Nothing

I’m Allison Brown and if I die today, you won’t remember my name. I’m just a blur in the landscape because I’ve made sure it’s like that. People try to stand out, especially teenagers. I mean, I’m seventeen years old but I don’t even think of standing out among the sea of people. I’m in year thirteen, finishing college and preparing for the A Levels so I can get in a great university. I want Cambridge.

But standing out demands time and energy and to be honest, all my time and energy go to my preparation. I don’t care if you don’t remember my name today because you’ll remember it in the future. When I make a difference in the world.

Maybe I’ll discover something new that’ll change everyone’s lives.

Maybe I’ll find the cure for cancer.

Maybe I’ll come up with a new theory that’ll change all what we think we know.

The possibilities are endless and I’m doing the best I can to be the best person I can in the future. School and college are just a small part of my life. I mean, college is just two years. When we were in year eleven most people around me seemed desperate to start college, like their whole lives were depending on these two years but come on, it’s just two years. You have a whole life ahead and that’s far more important.

My parents tell me that all I do while I’m a teenager is to prepare my future, to pay the road to a bright life. I can’t waste these years in things that will go away. Knowledge and hard work will stay with me and I need that if I plan on getting in Cambridge.

April 23rd and it’s the same. Always the same. The alarm goes off like every morning. I turn it off, leaving my bed after a heavy sigh, go to the bathroom and get ready. I barely pay attention to my reflection in the mirror, I know what will look back at me. A pale girl with dull blue eyes and really blonde straight hair. Plain and boring and I don’t do anything to make it different, more alive. It’s okay like this, it’s easier to make people not notice you.

My parents are always awake when I make my way down. I’m an only child and they are both professors at Manchester University. Both for the science department and believe me, both are really strict and professionals and cold. Yes, very cold. I don’t remember the last time my mother gave me a hug or a kiss. Let’s not even mention my father. Both of them encourage me to try harder, to work harder to accomplish my dreams.

“Have a good day, Allison,” Mother and Father say every day when I leave to go to college.

On my way I keep my eyes on the ground, I don’t make eye contact with anyone. Not even in the bus, not even in the halls. And when I walk in class I just sit in front row and only listen to the professor. I think I’m the only one who really pays attention. All my other classmates are too busy being teenagers.

My parents are just professors, they are not really successful in the sense we are just middle class, that’s why we can’t afford a public school to finish my sixth form, so it has to be college. This college is a good place, though. I’m making the best out of it. I know I’ll make it anyways.

So that’s how the day goes. Never talking to anyone, never bothered by anything. And my last class is chemistry, which is my favourite. So I’m the first in the lab. I slowly see it get crowded, the students arriving and taking their seats and finally the teacher. That’s the only moment I smile. Mrs White is my favourite teacher because she’s so passionate. She wants to teach us so many things but well, the rest of my classmates are not that interested. She does what she can. We usually make some experiments to really understand the processes and I think she’s realised that the more ‘dangerous’ the experiment, the more attention the students pay. I’m pretty sure that’s not a good combination, though.