Thyla - Kate Gordon [29]
Before, they had been flat to my skin, but now they made ridges down my back, like tree roots pushing up through the dirt. The feeling made me gasp, and my eyes prickled with tears. It felt as though my body was rebelling against me. First, the ‘period’, and now this.
Even though the rooms of Cascade Falls seemed to swelter with an excess of heating, I put on both my uniform shirt and my thick woollen blazer. I was scared that my scars might be seen if I wore only my shirt.
I wanted to call and tell you, Connolly. It felt like you were the only person I could tell. But it was nearly breakfast time, and Rhiannah was expecting me. Today she was introducing me to ‘muesli’.
And besides, I knew you were busy. I knew you had bigger worries than some misbehaving scars. Even if you did say to call any time. I would wait. I would wait until I had bigger news before I bothered you.
As I sat in Mr Beagle’s history class, not listening as he droned on about convicts and washing rooms and George Arthur and The Rules and Regulations for the Management of the House of Correction for Females (all subjects about which I felt I had heard many times before – probably in other history classes before my accident), all I could think about was how hot I was in my itchy jacket and how my scars must look beneath it. I wondered if they were growing still, or if they had shrunk back down again.
Perhaps it was only the hot water that had irritated them, or the lemon peel soap.
Then Mr Beagle said something that made my brain snap to attention. I don’t know which word it was that dragged me back from the depths of my mind and into the history classroom.
Perhaps it was the date, ‘1851’, or maybe the name, ‘Sir Edward Chassebury’. Or maybe it was the last word he said, the word that I understood and yet did not; the word I felt I had heard before and yet sounded like a foreign language.
‘Ipecacuanha’.
I opened my mouth to ask him, ‘What is that, Mr Beagle? What is ipecacuanha?’
The bell rang out, loud and jarring, from the black box on the wall. It made me jump, and I felt Rhiannah’s hand rush to my arm.
‘You okay?’ she whispered.
I nodded, though my heart felt as if it would beat its way out of my chest.
At the front of the classroom, Mr Beagle said, ‘Well, that’s enough for today, girls. Tomorrow, we will be talking about the founding of The Mercury newspaper.’
When we got out of the classroom, Rhiannah grabbed my hand and said, ‘You look really shaken up, Tessa. Are you sure you’re okay?’
A loud voice interrupted us. ‘Yo, Rin!’ echoed down the hallway.
I turned around to see Harriet sprinting towards us, tall and lithe and speedy as a brumby horse. The sun that streamed through the stained glass windows bounced off the gilded streaks in her hair.
Sara followed, pushing her glasses up her nose with her finger.
‘You ready for tonight?’ asked Harriet, punching Rhiannah on the arm. ‘You’re not too freaked out, are you? I mean after what Perrin –’
Behind her, Sara hissed the shortest sentence I had ever heard spring from her lips. ‘Harriet … not now … Tessa!’
I looked quickly at Rhiannah, who was already staring back at me, her face paler than ever. ‘I told them you wanted to come,’ she said, her voice smooth, contrasting with her nervous dark eyes. ‘I told them I said that it would be too dangerous. Right, Harry?’
Harriet nodded quickly. ‘Yeah, sorry, Tess. It’s just, night-time walks can be pretty full on.’
‘Was it a night-time walk when Cat went missing?’ I asked.
Harriet’s eyes widened. Behind her, I heard Sara make a little gasping-choking noise.
‘You told her about that?’ asked Harriet.
Rhiannah shrugged. ‘I thought I should. She would have found out anyway, and I thought it was probably better to hear it from me. Besides, she knows Cat’s mum, so …’
‘So, was it?’ I asked again. ‘Was it one of the dangerous night-time walks? Was that why Cat went missing?’
Rhiannah shook her head. ‘No, Tess. It wasn’t. Cat went on a night-time walk the week before, but the day she went missing, it was just an ordinary day walk. A pretty