The Colour of Words

4.

I was frozen to my seat. This isn't  a normal occurance for me, and I could tell it showed.

'Sure', said the girls, with much too much enthusiasm for my liking. 'Sit! We don't mind do we?'

They looked round questioningly at me. As so they should. I am in charge of situations like this. I make the decisions, give the orders, make the cutting side remarks, order people out of our sight or invite them to join us. Which isn't often.  I do, not them.

But with her, with Hilda, I couldn't. And they sensed that.

Tally was the only loyal one. As I sat, rigid with the black shadow of the past tying me down, she looked at me with curiousity in her eyes. Curiousity and fear.

Hilda, standing there- bold as brass and knowing full well what was going on- took it all in and plonked herself down on the seat opposite me.

"So hi!" she said, in that icy voice of hers. The voice that could cut glass, spread fear and hypnotise any victim. Although I was the only one who seemed to be aware of it.

The girls looked at me pointedly, and with good reason.  I was now the one who was supposed to strike up rigged conversation and cuttingly quiz the newcomer, for us to then decide, loudly and rudely, if she was to stay or not. Not many of them did.

A long pause. Everyone's eyes were fixed on me. Tally gazed desperately up at me, whilst the girls just looked quizzically in my general direction. Only Hilda had a sort of smirk playing on her lips, daring me to speak. She had that look in her eyes, as if she knew what was going through my head. Which she totally did.

Eventually, I spoke.

"Right back at you." It came out a bit less forcefully than intended. And now, amusement was definitely set upon that precious face of hers.

"Is that it? Or is there more to come?" Her words were dripping with sarcasm.

Another pause followed.

One of the girls, obviously bored with the pointlessness of the conversaton, cut in.

"So, you're Hilda?"

Hilda tore her gaze away from me, which was a relief, and looked closely at the said party member. Not that you could really call it a party.

"Yeah, I'm Hilda. New at this school. Same year as you, cause I know she's in your year." She nodded her head in my direction, but her eyes never left who she was talking to.

She paused for breath, then carried on,  "Hey, are those shoes the new Converse? I soooo wanted to get them but my dad was just like, 'no, you have to wait  until your birthday'. "

The girls quickly seemed to be in awe of her, even Tally. One of them dared to interrupt her flow with an excited squeak of, "I wanted them too, but my parents can't afford it. It's soooo unfair."

Hilda barely glanced up, and silenced her with one of her icy stares. The moment passed though and soon they were chatting away as if they had known each other for years. Which, I thought bitterly, if they had, I wouldn't have been in such a horrible situation now.

Only Tally noticed my pain. Well Hilda, totally did; she kept shooting loaded looks in my direction. She didn't just notice my pain; she basked in it.

No, Tally was the only one who felt my pain. As we drew nearer the school stop, and everyone clamboured over bags and random trainers to get off the now extremely over-crowded bus, I felt a little hand slip into the crook of my elbow, pulling me back down into the seat I had just vacated. Noramally, I would have given this person a right talking to about personal space and who did they think they were, ordering me about like that?

But today was not a normal day, so I obeyed the little hand, and waited until everyone else had left, giggling and laughing,  to hear Tally whisper almost in-audibly in my ear, 'It's okay, I don't like her either.'

It wasn't much, and it wasn't what I was expecting, but as I turned round to face her- or look down at her- I felt a rush of love for my little friend.

She obviously thought I was going to start my ranting then instead, as she smiled slightly warily, and didn't try to push past me to get of the bus that any moment was going to leave.

Instead she looked vaguely surprised when I smiled back, then turned and walked down the length of the bus.

As we clamboured down the stairs, the bus began to pull away, and we were flung backwards, Tally into an old man this time, who actually looked worridly pleased to find a teenage girl suddenly in his lap.

I grimaced, and waited for Tally to hurridly stammer her apologies (to which he answered with a wink and a slightly disturbing, 'any time love, any time'), before finishing the careful trek down the stairs, squeezing past all the sad people at the front of the bus who had no seat or personal hygiene (why are they always the ones that you have to get up close and personal with?), before finally commanding the bus driver to stop. He did (they always do, although they don't half grumble about it), and finally we stepped out of the sweat and into the fresh air: me and Tally together.