AllFreeNovel
Share Us
I think in rage of yesterday, Lydia’s parting shot in the café.
Don’t you ever feel guilty, Frances?
How dare she?
Guilty? Me? For what?
Georgia and her family were to blame for everything that happened back then. They were a sordid, evil bunch. They pretended to be our friends, drew us in and then turned on us.
We tried to escape, tried to get some distance, but they didn’t like that.
Tristan is lucky to be alive. He still has that scar like a flower on his cheek.
My brother – my poor brother.
Never have I seen someone so full of hate as Georgia that last time I saw her, as if we had been the ones in the wrong. As if we had attacked them.
I feel as though pressure is building up inside of me and I struggle to breathe. I’m a shaken bottle of Coke, ready to pop. Or a volcano.
And really, there’s only one thing I know of that will help relieve me. But I don’t have what I need. I scrabble in the glovebox and then find in my handbag a pair of nail clippers which aren’t ideal but I’m desperate. I slip it up my dress, jam it against my thigh, press hard and squeeze them.
It’s only a small, sharp spike of pain, but I close my eyes and let it spread out and fill me, let it lift me up above the storm, and when I open my eyes I’m calm again.
18
NOW
I check myself in the rearview mirror, spying a white hair and plucking it out.
Everything is going to be okay. Positivity breeds positivity.
I check my watch. Ten to seven. My parents will be home. I should go. Rose isn’t going to show up here.
I message Lydia to tell her Rose definitely hasn’t just popped to the chippy and still isn’t home. I fumble closing WhatsApp and open my web browser by mistake, and the internet search I started this morning on Georgia pops up and I’m drawn to an unclicked link.
It’s an article Georgia wrote about the impact of grief on adolescents. The first line – We are never so vulnerable as when we are children but believe we are adults – feels like a stinging slap across the cheek. I click ‘back’ and I’m about to close it and try to call Jenna again when I see the link heading ‘Is Redmoor Worth It?’ and something makes me click. It’s a Mumsnet discussion of top private schools and what they’re really like. I skim some sordid tales from Eton then find the bit about Redmoor College, where Georgia was before PES. And I find this from October, just before Georgia came back here:
ComeDineWithB: Considering Redmoor for DS and DD. Is it really worth it? Love the sound of this Acting Up programme – DS a bit shy.
There are eight replies of glowing praise for the school, for Acting Up and Georgia Smith. And then this:
Yummummy25: Redmoor is a SCAM. They don’t care about your kids. They just want your £££. They’ll do anything to protect their staff, even if it means covering up an actual crime. Georgia Smith is the worst of all of them. STAY AWAY.
19
NOW
I read the warning again and again, my ears ringing. There’s just one reply:
ComeDineWithB: Oh no! What happened?
But then no answer.
I quickly find Yummummy25’s other Mumsnet posts, comments on ready meals for children, wedding guest dress etiquette, advice to a woman with a controlling husband.
I find the original thread and private message Yummummy25.
BrightSide: Georgia Smith has started teaching at my daughter’s school and I have some concerns. Please can you tell me what happened?
