"WHAT is that?"
Everything was dreadful about Monday morning. It was a pale day, and I had woken up to a disappointing breakfast. Someone had set a soggy bowl of cereal on the table. Too polite to push it away, I glumly choked down the cornflakes swimming in milk.
I wasn't even fussed about the commotion. My stepmother reacted like a corpse had been discovered on the living room floor - but nothing seem to compare to the nail-biting misery I was about to be put through.
Today was our first day of school.
"Oh, that's only Whiskers!" Daddy shouted. He was engrossed in the newspaper.
Arabella came into the kitchen. Her made-up face was creased in confusion, as is she could hardly dare to imagine a feline in her home. "Excuse me?"
"The cat. I got her for Lydia and Violet."
"Well, it would have been nice if someone had enlightened me," she said brusquely.
"Don't fret, it's only a welcoming present."
"I'm not fretting," Arabella began to adjust his collar. "It's just I've been left to organize the bake sale this weekend, and Helen still wants to bring casserole. Who would want to buy casserole at ten o'clock in the morning? The choir has booked on that day too. We might have to change venue to the tennis club, because they've claimed the hall..."
As she straightened Daddy's tie, our eyes met. I hadn't noticed I had been staring at them. A small act of marital affection seemed so alien to me. I had gone into a trance just watching the scene.
I suddenly felt embarrassed. "So, where is it? Where you work?"
"I volunteer. Haverbrook Christian church."
"That's, uh, nice."
Through the window, a school bus came to a stop at the front of the house. The familiar yellow caused a shudder to go through me, and to my horror the sound of footsteps told me I wasn't mistaken.
Rudy grabbed the paper lunch bag from the counter. His mother gave him a stern look.
"You need to stop skipping breakfast, my dear. You're not giving your body the best start for the day," she paused as Violet sauntered into the kitchen. "Have you had anything to eat?"
"I had coffee."
Our stepmother raised her elegant eyebrows.
"Drinking caffeinated beverages isn't healthy at your age. I've packed PBJ sandwiches in case you can't stomach those awful school lunches. But I want everyone to eat a substantial breakfast tomorrow. Toast, cereal, I don't care. No coffee."
The shabby district schoolbus was packed.
With quaking legs, I considered it a great achievement I had managed to board without humiliating myself. I greeted the driver with a soft 'good morning' (which he didn't acknowledge), and darted to safety - which happened to be the seat next to Violet.
I didn't dare turn around. A sea of curious faces were watching us. I could feel them observing every detail. Our fancy house. My faltering gaze. They do say you can only create a first impression once.
So far, I had already painted a portrait.
So much for a new identity.
"For God's sake Lydia, stop looking so anxious. You set me on edge," Violet hissed.
My sister was in a terrible mood. As we had made our way down the quaint garden path, she had walked the way she always did. I found myself imitating her strides - as if I could somehow step into her confidence and make it my own.
But really, I knew she was terrified.
"Oh my god," she said under her breath. "There's every class of man in this ride. Hillbillies, Mediterraneans, Negroes - the whole spectrum. D'you think they go to the public school?"
Even in my wretched state, I couldn't help but sneak a look behind us. Violet wasn't wrong - a few darker faces could be seen towards the back seats of the bus.
Even though segregation in schools was no longer legal, our middle school in Seattle was predominately white. We'd never been to school with colored folk before.
I had no idea what to comment. The kids were around our age, and appeared ordinary enough in jeans and t-shirts. Black people didn't seem too different from ourselves really, and it hardly bothered me.
But for some unspoken reason, a voice in my head whispered that it should.
"Our stepbrother didn't want to sit with us, then."
"No," I was grateful for the change of subject. "Too immersed in his novel."
"Knock it off, Edgar Allan Poe," Violet glared at me again. "You need to quit with all that intellectual speak. Other kids don't want to be friends with a walking dictionary."
For a brief moment, tears glazed over my eyes, and I was forced to blink them away furiously. I hated her when she was mean. It wasn't just an object for her to dump her frustration on.
Through the window, I could see the scenery. The bus was passing the flower fields. Outside of Haverbrook Hollow, there were a few spaces of land owned by the farmers. They were beautiful.
Basking in the glow of the morning sun, I could imagine myself lying in a flower bed. The breeze on my skin, the familiar warmth of a leather-bound book in my hands. The bright buttercups weaved into my long hair. I could create a crown, become part of nature, be the mother of...
Screeech. The bus halted to a stop. I was jolted out of my dream.
A colored boy thundered up the stairs. "Sorry for being late."
Everyone looked up to stare. Even Rudy. I could see him a few seats ahead of us, a thick paperback novel open in his hands.
As the engine rumbled to a start, I dared myself to study him properly. In most instances in the Dollhouse, I stopped myself from staring, as he was intimidating in the strangest of ways. He wasn't rude, or crass, but he had a quiet observant nature that made him even more unnerving.
Rudy, as expected, dressed expensively for school. Today he wore a sweater with the collar his shirt protruding over the top. The contrast of his black hair was alarming against his skin.
Even now and then, his pale fingertips would turn the page.
I wondered if he had any friends.
Haverbrook Hollow District School was everything I had come to expect. The whole place clearly had a low budget and stretched funding. The school consisted of a yard and a few poky classrooms, and according to the secretary, we had been shoved in the same class.
"There's been a mistake, you've given us the exact same papers," Violet insisted. Her mood had not made any improvement.
"No mistake, sweetie. Any student above the age of thirteen is in with Mrs. Appleby. We're quite the small community. I know you girls aren't used to the country," the woman laughed pleasantly. "Your mother told me on the telephone."
Violet stiffened. "She isn't–"
"Thank you for your help," I cut in.
The classrooms didn't have many students. It was a dingy room with an absence of warmth or color, with rows of desks with scratched surfaces, each seating a bored-looking teenager. I tried not to make eye contact with any of them. However, Mrs. Appleby forced me up the front.
"State your name for the class," she commanded.
"Lydia Fitzgerald."
I focused on the world map thumb-tacked to the wall. The teacher made Violet go through the same agony of introduction, although she got berated for saying it with attitude. I hardly noticed nor cared when she was cast towards the back, Mrs. Appleby already sighing with frustration. My sister just had that affect on authority.
"Not just a pretty face, but arrogant too," the teacher sniffed.
It was as if I could see myself through everyone's eyes. The headband pulling back my red hair, the pastel dress, white socks - I was prim as they came. Nothing I did called attention to myself. In honesty, I craved the opposite.
"Sit where I tell you so."
Mrs. Appleby. If anything, she was a vulture. The schoolteacher even resembled a bird, with a thin nose and sharp cheekbones. Her Brillo-pad hair even made me think of unruly black feathers.
There was no warmth in her voice. The woman dealt in short, direct commands. I already knew that I disliked her.
The classroom was in a constant state of silence. Everyone in the room appeared to be on edge, as if they anticipated punishment at any moment. The teacher loomed in front of the blackboard.
The morning was fast-paced. We studied literacy to begin with, which suited me perfectly. I was almost thankful for the quiet. I didn't have the make small talk yet, even with the stranger next to me.
Betsy Dawson was the name scribbled on her books. She wore a loud floral top over flared pants. Her fair hair - which was frankly, impossible not to stare at - was in the longest braid I had ever seen. It brushed the top of her legs while she was seated.
She had a habit of chewing on the end of her pencil. When the teacher made an announcement, she didn't even pretend to look up.
"Class, I'm just going to head to the office for a few minutes. I trust you can behave yourselves in that time."
A few heads nodded. Ms. Appleby swept the room with her piercing gaze, as if she could catch out any troublemakers before they even lifted a finger. Abruptly, she turned on her heel, and left the room until we could hear the sound of her sensible shoes fade away.
There was an immediate shift in the room.
Several people yawned. The boy in front of gave an enormous stretch, slumping in his plastic chair. Chatter broke out, the room alive with buzzing conversation. A great atmosphere had been lifted, as if we had come to the end of a long exam.
A voice broke through my thoughts.
"I didn't know Rudy had any sisters."
The statement made me jump. I had been in the clouds for so long, I had forgotten that an actual person was beside me. I turned my head to look for the source of the voice. It was the long-haired blonde girl.
"Oh, yeah," I attempted a smile. "We just moved here."
"I heard your sister," the girl nodded. "A boarding school in Seattle, huh? That's quite the distance. I've met your parents too. Seen them at the church a few times. My name's Betsy if you were wondering."
I stared at her for a few seconds.
Boarding school? She had spoken with such certainty, as if the information was common knowledge. Perhaps like the secretary, they had assumed we were the children of Daddy and my stepmother. Unless someone had said otherwise.
"Gum?"
"No thank you," I pushed away the offer.
"That old cow may make you miserable at first, but you learn not to take it so seriously. Just so you know, I'm not normally in the habit of talking bad about people, but like - she made me cry in my transition week - and she wasn't even my teacher! My dumb ass got lost in the corridors because I didn't know how to read a timetable."
Betsy leaned back in her seat. I could feel her watching me with curiosity, snapping the chewing gum between her teeth.
Violet's soft laughter reached my ears from a few rows behind. I turned around to look. She was speaking with two boys, both whom were hanging off her every word. Her body was twisted around in her seat in an alluring fashion.
"Fuckin' A," one of them said enthusiastically.
I could just about overhear the conversation.
"Boarding school isn't that bad," she was lamenting. "It's a lot larger than this dump, obviously. There were more things to see and do in the city, and they threatened to hit you if you flunked your grades. But I knew we'd come home in the end."
I stared at her.
What was she doing?
In fact, the majority of boys and girls were listening in. Some pretended not to, but their pens were poised mid-air, eavesdropping.
Violet spoke knowing the class was her audience.
"No, it wasn't a religious school, silly! I don't think the nuns would tolerate me. I barely attend church, only if my parents make me. Yeah, they made us come back now we're older. Who knows. I'll probably leave school next year."
Memories of our first night in the Dollhouse resurfaced. I could picture the blurred outline of my face in the dirty mirror. Not everyone in life gets the chance to start again. Sensing my gaze, my sister's eyes cast in my direction.
She knew I was listening.
The clock on the wall ticked over every second, counting down the minutes until we could leave hell.
"They might say I'm just a pretty face," I heard her biting laugh. "But trust me, I'm no fool."