Maddox Academy: Grievous Beginnings - Wattys 2022 Shortlister

Chapter Twenty - A Terrible, Horrible Idea

The parents left just before supper.

Katie had been roped into helping the clean-up and since I wasn't hungry, I returned to the dormitory for the rest of the evening. I removed my results from my pocket, the envelope looking a tad worse for wear, and tucked it into my nightstand drawer. Some of the girls had returned to the dormitory and talked amongst themselves, completely ignoring me. Dorothy and Louise were lying over one of the beds and Victoria was nowhere to be seen. The entire dormitory seemed a little more relaxed without her.

I swung my legs over my bed and laid on my stomach, dangling over the edge to dig something out from the bottom of my trunk. After rooting through it for several seconds, I dug out a crossword book that Michael had given me along with a pencil. None of the other girls paid me any mind and I resettled myself on the bed with my feet resting on the pillow. Although I had no intention of using the book when Michael had given it to me, but I had nothing else to do.

The sun disappeared outside, and I rolled around to switch the lamp on my nightstand on. I scribbled in answers to the crosswords, struggling with the ones that were about television broadcasts or something other than the few radio stations we had. We had never been able to afford a television, but I had seen snippets when I babysat for a neighbour. It was a good way to keep the children distracted whilst I did my schoolwork.

"How did you do on the exams?" Emma asked, throwing herself onto the bed and pulling out her own results.

"Pretty good, I managed a perfect score in History," I said.

"No surprise there." She smiled.

"What about you?"

"Eh, not too bad. Grandmother was pleased, so there's that. She thinks I need to work harder for the O-Levels, though."

"I expect we'll get that lecture next year." Emma laughed.

"Emma, go and find something else to do. I need to talk to Felicity," Victoria said, stalking down the hall and glaring at her. She folded her arms over her chest.

Emma didn't say anything. She rolled off the side of her bed and walked the short distance down the room to one of the beds nearer the door. I watched her mutter something to Barbara and turned my attention back to Victoria. My plan had been to avoid her for the entire day and perhaps even longer, but as always, Victoria had other ideas.

"Can I help you?" I asked, closing the book and pushing myself up to a sitting position. She just glared at me. "Are you lost?"

"You spoke to my father today. He seems somewhat impressed, although I don't know why. I know you don't belong here and sooner or later so will everyone else. Decent examination marks don't matter here and the quicker you realise that the better. You are not as special as everyone makes you out to be."

"Is there a point to all this Victoria? I was in the middle of a crossword puzzle and I hate to leave them unfinished." I held up the crossword book.

"Just know that you won't be making it to the project presentations, I'll make sure of that. We don't need people like you here. We never have." She glared at me.

"Thank you for that insightful conversation." I rolled my eyes. Victoria had started to sound like a broken record, and it was getting really tiresome. "You can leave now."

"You should have realised by now that you can't get rid of me. My father is head of the Governors and Mrs Maddox will do anything to keep him. I have all the power here."

"That's nice."

I swung my legs back over and laid down on the bed, pressing my toes into the pillow and opening the crossword book. She continued to stand looking at me, her arms folded over her chest as though expecting me to say something to get me into trouble. Victoria wasn't worth it, and I knew she had a point. Her father's position as a Governor gave her permission to get away with anything. I could plead until I was blue in the face and she would still get away with it no matter what she did.