Alice Ross - An Autumn Affair

‘We’re going to use the money to send you to a better school.’

Miranda’s heart skipped a beat. Her mouth grew dry and for a few seconds she thought she might pass out. But perhaps she hadn’t heard properly. ‘A … a better school?’

‘That’s right, love.’

Miranda shook her head in an attempt to clear it. This was becoming surreal. Were they really having this conversation? ‘B … but what’s wrong with the Comp?’

‘Far too much, in our opinion,’ huffed her mum. ‘That school’s been going downhill for years. And now we have the money to get you out of there, that’s exactly what we’re going to do. We want to give you the best start in life we can, sweetheart. Send you somewhere that will bring out your potential. You’re a clever girl and I don’t want to see you wasting your life working in the factory like me.’

‘We obviously need to do a lot more research,’ her dad ploughed on. ‘But the solicitor has recommended the school his own daughters went to. It’s called Briardene in Derbyshire.’

Miranda spotted a glimmer of hope. ‘Derbyshire? But I can’t travel to and from there every day.’

‘You won’t have to,’ said her mum smugly. ‘It’s a boarding school, so you’ll be living there. It’ll be a fantastic experience. Just like something out of Enid Blyton.’

But Briardene, Miranda soon discovered, was as far away from the world of Enid Blyton as Jarrow was from Jamaica. From the moment she stepped into the marbled foyer of what had obviously once been a spectacular stately home, she felt as though she were on another planet. Her crimson uniform might be the same as those of the other girls, but there endeth any similarity. Her fellow incumbents’ rosy cheeks hinted at hours outdoors riding their ponies; their glossy hair reeked of expensive products; and their plummy accents wouldn’t have sounded out of place in Buckingham Palace. Plus they all exuded a confidence that wafted about only the truly moneyed.

Miranda wished Tina could see them – flicking locks; kissing cheeks; clunking hockey sticks, lacrosse sticks and tennis racquets. She’d find the whole thing hilarious.

‘Lady Bloody Mucks,’ she’d call them. Or words to that effect.

But Tina wasn’t there. She was at the Comp. Probably sporting an outrageous pair of earrings that would be confiscated within the first ten minutes, before being ordered to the toilets to wash off her eye make-up. Miranda had never been one of the Comp’s biggest fans, but at that moment she’d never wanted to be anywhere more in her entire life.

Miranda had never had a problem making friends in the past. In fact, she’d been pretty popular at the Comp. But she soon discovered that the cliques at Briardene were constructed with the same impenetrability as Norman fortresses. With her pitiful armoury of a strong local accent, a gangly awkwardness, and a blatant lack of upper-class breeding, she didn’t have a hope of infiltrating a single one of them.

Her weekly phone calls to her parents were strained. ‘I know it’s hard, love’ was batted back with depressing regularity. ‘But it’s for the best. You’ll soon settle in. You’ll see.’

But Miranda knew the chances of her settling into Briardene were as likely as a penguin calling the numbers in her mum’s bingo hall. In the absence of any better distractions, she threw herself into her studies. Despite the huge amount of money being invested in her education though, and her parents’ unwarranted confidence in her academic ability, she remained just as average at Briardene as at the Comp.

Its one saving grace was that she didn’t have to share a bedroom. Her little room on the second floor, with views over the extensive playing fields, became her haven. Every possible minute, she would scurry off there, close the door and block out the alien world behind it. Her walls were crammed with reminders of home – photos of her parents and friends, of happy times when she hadn’t a care in the world. The highlight of every day became the ritual crossing off of the date on the calendar. One day less at Briardene. One day nearer the school holidays and going home.

In fact, in the days before social media, Miranda’s only contact with her Jarrow friends was during the longed-for holidays. It soon became obvious, however, that she no longer belonged to that world either. Her attempt to modify her broad accent to fit in at her new school caused some consternation back home.

‘Listen to you. You’ve gone all posh,’ remarked Tina, when Miranda telephoned her during her first Easter holidays.

‘No, I haven’t,’ countered Miranda. ‘I’ve been away so long you’ve forgotten what I sound like, that’s all.’

A brief – and uncomfortable – hiatus followed.

‘Fancy going into town tomorrow afternoon?’ Miranda asked, desperate to rekindle the close relationship the two of them had always enjoyed. ‘Or we could go to the cinema.’

‘I, um, can’t,’ replied Tina. ‘Got to go to some, er, family thing. Sorry. Look, I’ll give you a call later in the week, okay?’

And before Miranda could reply, she hung up.

‘I thought you were going out with Tina today,’ her mum commented the following day.

‘She’s busy,’ muttered Miranda miserably.

‘Well, why don’t we go into town, then?’ her mum suggested. ‘We could do a spot of shopping. Have our lunch out.’

In the absence of any better offers, Miranda agreed.

Having mooched around the shops for a couple of hours, they were deliberating where to go for lunch when they spotted Tina over the other side of the road. Arm-in-arm with another girl from school.

‘Oh, look,’ said her mum. ‘There’s …’

Miranda felt as though someone had plunged a knife into her innards. Tears burning her eyes, she spun around and marched along the street in the opposite direction.

Back home, her mum did her best to cheer her up. ‘Don’t worry about Tina, sweetheart. Girls are fickle. They change best friends more often than they change their underwear. What about your new pals at Briardene? You’re always welcome to invite them here over the holidays, you know.’

Miranda gawped at her mother. She didn’t have any ‘pals’ at Briardene. And even if she had, how could she possibly invite anyone from there to a council house in Jarrow? The bathrooms in their stately homes would be bigger than the entire semi. And have bidets. Her mum didn’t have a clue.

‘Look, Mum,’ she pleaded, for what must’ve been the two-hundredth time. ‘I really hate Briardene. Why can’t I go back to the Comp? Then you and Dad can use all the money you’ll save to buy a nice new house or something.’

But for what must also have been the two-hundredth time, her mum shook her head. ‘I’m sorry, sweetheart, but we’ve made up our minds. I know it’s not easy settling into a new school. Especially at your age. But it’ll pay dividends in the end. Just you wait and see.’

Miranda didn’t want to wait and see. She didn’t care about dividends. She wanted her old life back. The life she’d loved so much – when she’d been happy and popular and carefree. In a world she’d belonged to.

Now she didn’t belong anywhere.

She was like a flailing fish out of water, desperately grabbling for air.

And it was all her parents’ fault.

And so passed the next three years, Miranda’s resentfulness towards her parents burgeoning with every one of them. After the first summer she’d given up begging to return to the Comp. Despite all her tears, reasoning and misery, her parents continued to insist that it was for her own good, and attributed the ensuing surliness to teenage years.

At sixteen Miranda announced she would be leaving Briardene.