Patricia
I was ignoring my mother, as usual.
She was halfway through the behaviour monologue that adults drag out when they take you somewhere new. We were on our way to my to drop me off at secondary school for the first time, and it was a boarding school. I was eleven, and it would be my first term.
I could hardly wait to get there.
I glanced momentarily away from my window. My older brother, Jake, grinned at me in the rear-view mirror. I rolled my eyes in response, and his smile widened. His chestnut eyes were gleaming. Jake had just finished the school the previous term, and had agreed to take the day off from his busy schedule of sleeping and watching TV to see me off.
"… and just remember your manners, Patricia. First impressions are everything." My mother was saying as we drove along a small road that wound its way through the woods that bordered the school grounds.
"Yes, Mum." I replied, not bothering to mask my disinterest. Mum paused for a moment.
"Just keep your head down and work hard this year. It's important that you get the best start at this school." She told me sternly.
"Come on, Mum," Jake cut in. I felt a little wave of gratitude towards him. "She knows all this. You're just making her more nervous."
I narrowed my eyes at him. "I am not nervous!" The gratitude had evaporated. Jake laughed and shook his head.
"Ah, we're here." Mum said as she turned the car to the right, driving through massive wrought iron gates. I sat forward and looked out of the window, watching as we got closer and closer to the school building. I had been here before with Mum to collect Jake and take him home for holidays.
The main school building was an imposing structure made of red brick with a thick grey slate roof and large wooden doors and windows. The hedges and the sprawling green lawns were trimmed and healthy. Mum drove along the gravelled path that went around the back of the school and I saw Anubis House for the first time.
The first thought that entered my head was big, followed by old and then by cool. It was made of the same red brick and slate as the school. Ivy climbed up the walls, snaking around the tiny wooden veranda on the front of the house, the triple bay windows and the open front door. There were two chimneys, one at each end of the wide roof.
When the car halted, we all got out. I looked up at the place that was going to be my home – and from what I'd been told the home of up to seven other students – for the next seven years. I was about to sprint inside when I heard my mother's scolding voice behind me.
"Patricia, don't even think about leaving me and Jake to get your case!"
I sighed and turned back. Jake carefully lifted my suitcase out of the back of Mum's silver Volvo and set it down on the gravel.
"Now…" Mum said. "Let me have a look at you." She took a step back, giving me a quick once over with her eyes. I saw her lips purse. I knew what she saw. She saw her youngest child and her only daughter, the little Goth-Pixie. She saw a tall and slim girl with elfin features, a thick mane of dark red hair and grey-green eyes dressed in dark clothes and scuffed up biker boots. But most importantly, I knew that she saw the face of the man she had once loved in mine. My brothers, Jake and Simon, looked more like her with their chestnut eyes and hair. Sometimes I wondered if she wished that Dad had taken me with him after the divorce. It probably would have been easier on her.
I half expected her to frown in distaste, but instead she smiled. It was a faint smile, but a smile all the same.
"What am I going to do with you?" Mum said as she fiddled with the collar of my black leather jacket. Then she stepped back and watched as Jake gathered me up in a huge bear-hug.
"Good luck, sis." He said, ruffling my hair as we pulled out of the embrace. I slapped his hand away but grinned. I was going to miss him.
"Do you need us to help you get inside?" Mum asked.
"It's fine, Mum. I can manage by myself." I replied.
"That's what I'm afraid of…" Mum muttered. Then she sighed. "Go on then. I'll call you tomorrow night to see how you're getting on."
I smiled at them one last time before I turned and walked towards Anubis House. I didn't have to look back to know that they watched me until I disappeared from sight.
Fabian
"Uncle Ade? We're going to be late!" I called as I flipped the shop doorsign to CLOSED.
"Coming!" Uncle Ade replied from somewhere at the back of the dusty little antiques' shop cluttered with hundreds of interesting gadgets and furniture that he had acquired in his travels around the globe.
There was a muffled thump, then a crash. I didn't bother to ask why. Anybody who knew my eccentric uncle Ade well enough knew that he was a clumsy and accident-prone man.
"Oh, truffles!" He exclaimed a moment before he came into view, frowning over his little half-moon spectacles. My father's older brother was a short, balding man who dressed only in tweed suits and wore a silk cravat tucked into his shirt at all times. He looked down at the case at my side and frowned. I'd spent the last two weeks of the summer holidays with Uncle Ade, helping out in his shop.
"All ready, I see?" He said with a kind smile.
"Uncle Ade, I've been ready for an hour!" I wished I didn't sound so whingey.
"Well, let us not stand around." Uncle Ade said as he flipped the doorsign around without looking at it. Then he opened the door and bustled out into the crisp, morning air. I sighed and flipped the doorsign back before following him out. My new school was only at the other side of town, but it was a thirty-minute drive through backcountry roads to get there, unless we got stuck behind a tractor or a herd of cows.
The beaten-up sky blue truck that Uncle Ade had bought on a trip to America parked in front of the shop could have been sold as one of the antiques. I put my heavy case in the back seat and climbed into the front passenger seat beside Uncle Ade. The truck groaned in protest under our weight. The inside of the truck smelt of tobacco, coffee and Magic Tree.
"Off we go!" Uncle Ade said as he turned the key in the ignition. The car sputtered for a few seconds before the engine came to life with a metallic coughing sound.
"Now," Uncle Ade began as we began the short journey to the school. "Have you got all your things in your suitcase?"
It was a little late for a checklist. "Yes, I've got everything I need." I replied.
"Good lad." Uncle Ade said. The clutch squeaked and he frowned, wobbling the stiff gear-stick. I looked out of the window and watched as field after field, tree after tree flashed past. The bovine traffic didn't seem too bad that day. As I watched the countryside fly by, my mind wandered far away.
I'd enjoyed the two weeks with Uncle Ade more than I ever enjoyed the capital with my parents. I loved the countryside, and I felt happy there. It was peaceful, and unlike in London, I could always find my own space to think, whether it was looking around Uncle Ade's shop or going for a walk in the woods. To me, feeling the summer breeze and the warmth of the sun on my back was all that I needed.
So starting at a boarding school in the middle of my perfect little country world sounded like heaven to me. However, I would miss Uncle Ade. For all his forgetful clumsiness, I could sit for hours and hours while he told me stories of the places he'd visited. He told about African safaris, the blizzards of Siberia and the delights of Indian marketplaces. Sometimes, I would close my eyes and I could almost hear the sounds and smell the scents he described to me.
I had often asked him if he would take me with him on his adventures, but he had simply smiled and told me, "Fabian my boy, when the time comes, you will have many adventures of your own."
Mara
I stared up at the dark, foreboding form of Anubis House as my stomach contracted with nerves.
I didn't want to go in, but I had to. I remember waking up on the first morning of the holidays thinking that two months was an eternity. But with every passing day, I had been getting closer and closer to the thing that I'd been dreading and anticipating on equal parts.
And now I was there. I was standing on the edge of the most important day of my life so far. I felt my father put a hand on my shoulder, and I turned to look up at him.
"All ready, Munchkin?" He asked with a smile.
On any other day, I'd have flushed in embarrassment and begged him not to use my nickname, but on that particular day I was grateful for it. I knew that there were children in the world who didn't have parents there to call them silly nicknames that they could get embarrassed over.
I just nodded. "Yeah,"
"Are you nervous?" Dad asked me.
I peered back up at Anubis House. "Very," I replied. He laughed.
"I'll help you get your luggage inside." He said, taking the handle of my suitcase out of my hand. I took a deep breath and walked towards the boarding house. Not just a boarding house, but my future. My heart was pounding so hard in my chest that I could feel every beat in my fingers and toes. We went up the three stone steps and crossed the little veranda to the open front door.
The inside of Anubis House was dark. There was a big staircase to the right that wound up onto the top floor. On the wall behind it was a stained glass window made up of thousands of little autumn-coloured diamonds. The soles of my shoes clicked on the black and white checkerboard tiles. There was a large mirror near the door, a huge grandfather clock and a sarcophagus sitting upright against the wooden panelled wall.
The smell of baking wafting through to us from the kitchen, but I was too nervous to think about eating.
We stopped in the middle of the hallway and looked around. There was total silence except for the hollow ticking of the grandfather clock.
"It looks like we're the first ones here, Munchkin." Dad's voice echoed and bounced back at us from the wooden panels.
A moment later, a tall man with thinning, greasy black hair and a trimmed beard strode into view above us on the landing.
He smiled, showing tobacco-yellowed teeth.
"Hello. A new boarder, I see?" He said as he began to walk down the stairs slowly. His walk reminded me of the documentaries I'd seen on the planet's greatest predators. Slow, deliberate strides meant to intimidate.
"Ah, yes," My father replied, giving my shoulder a light squeeze. "I'm Francis Jaffray, and this is my daughter Mara."
The tall man was at the bottom of the stairs now. I could see his eyes now. They were cold and black like obsidian, and they sent shivers up and down my spine.
They lit up when he looked down at me, and not in a kind way. The predator had spotted his prey. He gave me another flash of those yellowing teeth.
"My name is Victor. I am the school caretaker." I listened closely to his accent; it definitely wasn't English. His obsidian eyes flicked back to my father.
"Would you like a drink before you leave?" Victor asked.
Dad looked down at me. "Do you need me to stay for a while?"
I glanced up at Victor. He gave me the creeps, but it didn't matter. I was just being paranoid. I didn't want to make Dad think that I wouldn't like it there. I shook my head. "No, it's okay. I'll be fine."
Dad hugged me tightly to his chest. I put my arms around him and closed my eyes, breathing in his favourite aftershave. "I'll miss you." I mumbled into his chest.
"I'll miss you too, Munchkin." He replied, smiling into my midnight hair. When we broke apart, Dad punched my arm gently, the way he always did when he wanted me to be strong.
"I'll call you later when I'm unpacked." I told him, fighting back the sudden wave of tears dangerously close to spilling out.
He nodded. "No trouble this year, okay Munchkin?"
I rolled my eyes. I was a good student, and I rarely ever caused any trouble. "You know I won't, Dad."
Dad grinned. "Of course," Then, he turned towards the door and I watched him leave. I didn't turn away until the car's engine had grown too faint to hear.