Heavenward

Chapter 2

Chapter 1

I can’t breathe.

My lungs are shrivelled inside my constricted chest, unable to draw a single breath. It’s as if I’m buried alive under tonnes of heavy wet soil and the weight of it is pressing on my chest, breaking my ribs, filling my lungs with its black wetness, leaving no space for air.

I want to scream, but I can’t even do that. Not a sound escapes me.

I sit up in my sweat-drenched bed, my pyjamas sticking to my back, as I stare with my unseeing eyes into the charcoal darkness of the night. My heart is pounding somewhere in my throat. Its echo is booming in my ears, blocking out the sleepy world around me.

With a shaky hand, I reach out to my nightstand and the nightlight wakes up with a dry click next to me. Its small orange circle is flaccid and weak and doesn’t illuminate the room but it is strong enough to disperse my nightmare and remind me how to breathe.

I exhale and fall back.

I know I won’t get back to sleep again tonight, so I lay here, watching the ceiling above me coming awaken with the weak light of an English morning in the North.

A loud knock on the door startles me.

“Ariel! School time! Come on, time to get up!” Fat Paula’s voice booms through the door. She doesn’t wait for my answer, proceeding down the hall, knocking on all the other doors, calling the rest of the girls up for school.

I push myself to get up and get ready.

The glum, feeble sunlight trickles slowly through the net curtains, throwing a dim light over my messy room and my school uniform folded over the back of a chair.

I never have the energy for make-up, so I just get dressed and brush my hair and teeth, but even that’s an uphill struggle every morning, with so little sleep the night before.

And, again, I’m running late.

The school bus’s horn blares sharply like a wounded goat as I grab my backpack and run down the stairs, hitting my knee on the heavy wooden banister as I turn the last step.

“Ariel, breakfast!” But I’m out of the door before Paula has the chance to remind me that I haven’t had my meds this morning either. I hate taking them – they make me feel drowsy, powerless, and I can’t stand the feeling of being drugged up. Not again. Not after everything that’s happened. But nobody listens to me. The staff keep feeding me them as if they’re working towards a volume distribution bonus for a pharmaceutical company or something.

The cold English morning greets me with the usual fog and drizzle. I stop to take in the cold salty air, craning my head up to the sky. I love looking at the sky. It always gives me a feeling of peace and belonging somehow, although, most of the time, all I see is thick and grey clouds above me.

The old school bus, with its nauseating diesel stench, is still empty, with only a few younger children, like scared small birds perched on a branch, sitting at the front. I head towards my usual seat at the back, stretching my legs across the worn, once blue, seats nearby.

With a heavy sigh, the bus closes its door and chugs along its usual route, collecting pupils and providing me with a daily detour of the depressing place I now call home.

The town is an alternative apocalyptic vision of poverty and despair. I haven’t been here long, but I already feel ready to crawl into a grave and wait for death to come.

Most of the dilapidated buildings around the town centre are boarded-up, no longer occupied by people or businesses, and it feels as if propping each other up is the only reason the buildings are still standing.  The single short shopping street runs through the heart of this once busy, but now godforsaken seaside town, desperately flaunting its small and pathetic stores, which only sell the crap no one wants or needs.

The desolate streets are ghostly quiet this morning. Only an old man shuffles down the road with his back bent as if burdened by the sins of the world.

The crumbling old parish church with its caved-in roof hides behind a broken church fence and a neglected graveyard, now overrun by weeds and invading ivy.

After a compulsory thirty-minute excursion through the fourth circle of Hell, the bus slowly pulls to a stop outside my school.

The grey, washed-out three-storey building is surrounded by a tall metal fence. I swear this building was an HRM prison before someone gave it to the council to be used as a school as surely no one would build this atrocity as a school on purpose.

Heavy off-road vehicles and even a few tractors are parked outside the school, bringing in the local farmers’ children. The boys jump out of their Rovers and Defenders with exaggerated athleticism and swagger, and walk towards the building where the different cliques are already calling to their members and followers.

The girls slip out of their cars slower as if to give everyone time to appreciate the effort they put into getting ready for school this morning. Mind you, with skirts that short, you have to take care while climbing out of a car.

Everyone’s face is familiar. Everyone knows everyone in a school that small. Friendship groups form and dissolve but, ultimately, there are no secrets and gossip is booming. The only way for me to survive in here is to keep clear of them all.

Once out of the bus, I suck in all my “lady lumps and bumps” as I try to slide between the bodies of the popular kids littering the lawn in front of the school, but my attempts fail, as I get dirty glares from a few princesses when my pauper clothes brush over their Topshop bags.

It’s a good thing I’m holding my breath, as I might’ve passed out from the heavy cloud of perfumes and aftershaves lingering amongst the bodies. I pick up the pace, desperate to get out of this stew of drama before I draw any more attention to myself.

Carefully keeping my eyes down, I ram full speed into something solid and warm. With the momentum still pulling my feet forward, I trip and am about to land backwards on my arse when two big hands shoot out, grabbing me by my shoulders. With my arms behind me and my feet ahead of my body, I look like a water-skier, pulled forward by an invisible cord.

Once I finish fumbling with my legs and finally manage to find the ground, I crane my neck upwards to see who’s there, still holding me.

A boy. He is muscled and tall. I only come up to his armpit. His school blazer is too tight on his big frame, looking like it might burst at the seams on his large shoulders. His luscious, tousled, dark hair is cut short on the sides, falling onto his forehead, over his left eye. Vivid, light blue eyes shine under his wavy fringe, prominent on the backdrop of his dark hair and tanned skin. Perfect, straight Roman nose, high cheekbones and a defined jaw – this boy could easily look the part in Hollywood or at least earn a decent living as a model.

“Hi.” His voice is velvety soft as he smiles down at me.

His gorgeous, all-Hollywood, charming smile shows off his perfect white teeth and an adorable dimple on his cheek. The warmth from his hands seeps into my arms, spreading along my body like a fire, and suddenly I feel hot. My nose is tickled with the delicious smell of green moss and undergrowth, like the smell of the muddy earth floor after a long rain, when it’s surrounded by the wet bark of pine trees with a sharp bursts of pine needles, and without thinking I take another deep breath, inhaling the glorious scent.

At the back of my mind, I sluggishly wonder how pathetic I must look to him – clumsy, spread like a beach-stranded starfish who all but melts in his hands, so with the last ounce of sense left in my head, I fight myself from closing my eyes when I inhale and stop a content sigh from escaping my lips on the exhale.

“Hi”, my voice is coarse and unsure, even for my ears.

Get a grip! I reprimand myself and shake my shoulders back out of his grasp. I know better than to get involved with a boy. I know only too well how bad that can end.

“Sorry, I didn’t see you there. Thanks for catching me though”, I cut, all business-like.

“No problem, always a pleasure. I’m Sam”, he offers, keeping his polite smile.

“Ariel”, I answer, outstretching my hand for a shake.

“Like The Little Mermaid?”

He grins at me and suppressed laughter rumbles in his chest.

I open my mouth in disbelief and slam it shut again, withdrawing my hand and with it the offer of a handshake and a friendship. Instead, I fold my arms over my chest, glaring at him.

“Yes, like a freaking mermaid. Do you have a problem with that?” I narrow my eyes at him.

“No, no. No problem”, he blinks at me with feigned innocence, raising his hands, although his bright mischievous smile betrays his sincerity.

“I need to get to my class”, I snap, “so if you don’t mind...” I trail off as I take a step around him, but the boy steps sideways as well, blocking me in.

“Sorry, I didn’t mean to upset you. I was just joking”, he tries for sincere, overacting with his ‘puppy eyes’.

“As I’m new here and haven’t met anyone else yet, I thought maybe we could be friends?”

What a cheek!

“Welcome to our school, Sam”, I cut him off, taking another step around him and this time he allows me to walk around him.

“I’ll see you later”, he calls after me, way too loud, and everyone turns their heads towards us, watching the closing moments of the scene as I stumble away, keeping my eyes to the ground under the gaze of speculative glances.

The warmth from his hands still tingles on my skin and contradicting my annoyance, a smile forms and spills over my face. Suddenly I want to giggle.

“Godsake! Get a grip!” I repeat as I push my slipping glasses up my nose, and marching down the hall.

My English class is empty and silent when I get in; only a lonely, trapped fly is buzzing and beating on the window, desperate to be free.

Over the next fifteen minutes, the room slowly fills with pupils.

But when the door creaks open once again, the morning chatter of the room subsidies to a hushed murmur, and as I raise my eyes from my notebook to see what had that effect on the class, I see him.

Sam.

He stands by the door. An arrogant half smile plays on his full, perfectly curved lips, flaunting an irresistible dimple on his right cheek as he inspects the room. With a barely audible sigh, a few girls melt in their chairs, stupid smiles pulling at their lips as they eagerly eye Sam.

His eyes meet mine and he gives me a wink, and a brighter smile blossoms on his face as he makes his way towards the end the room, past me, choosing the seat right behind me.

Shit!

“Hi Mermaid”, he whispers behind me, but I ignore him as I slide down in my chair, burying my face behind my notebook, away from the speculative glances directed behind me.

“Hi, you must be new”. Daisy, the popular girl, isn’t wasting any time on pretences or foreplays. She plonks her arse on his desk, engulfing me in a sickly sweet cloud of her perfume.

“I know everybody here and I’ve never seen you before. And I would’ve remembered you”, she murmurs behind me.

I make sure not to react to that conversation as I keep my back bend over my book and my eyes firmly on the page. At the end of the day, I really don’t care how successful her hunting will be, just as long as I’m left out of it.

“Hi. Yes, we just moved in. I’m Sam and you are?”

I can hear a smile in Sam’s velvety voice, and I want to turn to see his face when he looks at her, but instead I fold my hands, squeezing them tight between my thighs.

“Daisy”, she purrs in her sugar-sweet voice.

“Nice to meet you Daisy”, he replies.

It feels like this friendly exchange behind me should result in a handshake but I know better than to expect Daisy to shake hands with a boy.