All together, the whole Year 8 class standing on the grey platform looked like a field ready to harvest. Since our uniforms were almost entirely green, comparisons to shrubbery were frequent. It's remarkable, how thirteen-year-old girls can manage to sound talkative and cheerful almost anywhere. I mean, it was 2°C, frost caked the granite platform of Southwark Tube Station, and my friend Sarah and I were the only two in jackets. Everyone else stood in a large group, yelling to each other. Sarah and I were chafing our hands, trying to regain feeling in our red, itchy, fingers, whilst discussing how remarkably like a large field of braying cattle the rest of our year group looked.
Look, we weren't always that crabby, Sarah and I, but that day, we'd spent the better part of 2 hours on a bus without any of our other friends, all of whom were in different groups than us. Almost all the other girls were in the same form as each other, and that left Sarah and I, trying to entertain ourselves on her old iPod once our conversation died out.
Initially, we'd been excited about a trip to the Globe theatre- we were both Shakespeare fans- but we hadn't anticipated the long, boring bus ride, and the idea of a trip on the London tube with the same people who'd driven us witless on the bus was less than appealing.
"What I don't get," muttered Sarah trying desperately to warm her face, which was even worse than mine, red and cracking from both cold as well as eczema, "is why we not only got separated from our friends, but got stuck with the worst chaperones ever- I mean, come on, we even got the Vulture!"
The "Vulture," by the way, was what we had dubbed our cranky, child-hating, Geography teacher. The nickname was a little unfair though- Vultures didn't have skin that leathery. "I'd get it if was just me," Sarah continued, "all figures of even the remotest authority hate me- but you? Oh, right, the Vulture must've requested you 'cause she likes you, and then me because she wants me under permanent surveillance."
"God, Sarah, shut up!" I shuffled my feet uncomfortably. Yeah, so I guess I'm a teacher's pet. I have the dubious honour of being the only student the Vulture's ever liked. Sarah, on the other hand, whilst undoubtedly intelligent and bright, is loathed by teachers for her outspokenness, tendency to be cheeky and talk back, the rarity with which her homework was turned in, and the incomprehensibly scruffy nature of her handwriting. Her relationship with the Vulture is almost as cordial as Hitler's was with Churchill.
"When will the flipping train arrive?" she sighed, exasperated.
"God in heaven only knows," I sighed, and pulled a book out of my bag, then stuffed it quickly back in, guilty about leaving Sarah to her own devices. "I just wish something marginally interesting would happen," I grumbled, then pulled my coat tighter around me. We stood, shivering, in silence, for about three minutes and seventeen seconds. Seriously, what did those other girls find to talk about? Actually, why couldn't we find something to talk about? Usually, Sarah and I could never shut up. Today, however, conversation was stifled, by what I don't know. Whatever it was, I just wished something interesting would happen and my boredom would cease.
After another agonisingly tedious minute, the screeching, banshee-wail sound of a train pulling into a platform sliced through the air. Our hair was blown back, at ninety degrees from our necks, and the train made it's infamous "cat-playing-bagpipes-under-torture" noise whilst grinding to a halt.
I turned to her in relief. "Come on," I hissed, "if we get on quickly, we might be able to snag the only seats not occupied by Blackberry-ogling businessmen!"
"Not likely," Sarah muttered, but she followed me on nonetheless.
In hindsight, it should have worried me. The emptiness of the carriage. I mean, I'm a Londoner, and I know that at nine o'clock in the morning, at a major Tube Station, you're lucky to get breathing room on a train. A seat may come if you are either famous, one of God's chosen, or have sold your soul to Satan. An empty compartment? If you think you have a chance of getting one, you're clearly a foreigner. But that day, I was just too bored, tired and relieved to think of this. Sarah and I lapsed into our usual, easy conversation, actually enjoying ourselves, until we heard the hiss of the doors shutting. And we were still alone in the compartment.
"Oh lord, no," Sarah cried, turning to me in panic, "what do we do?"
I felt nauseous with worry. "We're on the wrong train," I exclaimed.
"I realised that, Einstein!" She was hyperventilating now. "Come on, Emily, what do we do?"
I turned to the door we'd entered from, desperately punching the emergency open button. I felt slightly claustrophobic, despite the fact there was ample room in the carriage. Glancing through the window, I could see that nobody had noticed our absence. A loud hammering noise made me turn around abruptly. Sarah was banging on the other set of doors, using her overstuffed rucksack as a sort of battering ram.
"Sarah, no," I cried, "that's the wrong set of doors, they open to the-"
But before I could finish my sentence, the doors gave way, and a blinding flash of light appeared. Sarah teetered dangerously on the edge of doorway. For a second, I thought she would regain her balance, and I leaned forward to haul her back in. Then she slipped forwards, into the light, and I could see her no more.
Before I continue, I should explain something about the way the London Trains work. In each carriage there are sets of doors on either side, used depending on which way the train is going. One side opens to the actual platform, the other opens to thin, grey mini-platform that separates the different sets of tracks from each other. You're never meant to be able to get through those, but they aren't designed to withstand attacks by half-crazed schoolgirls, and it was through these doors that my friend had just disappeared.
This left me with two options: either go the correct way back to our class and tell someone, or follow Sarah. I thought about the latter. Would she do the same for me? Er, no. Is it safe? I glanced at the door. The blinding flash was now a large rectangle of pulsating yellow light that filled the doorway. No, not safe. I turned to leave through the other door, but the sight of our irritating classmates froze me. I asked myself a final question: Does cool logic and rational thinking outweigh your own sanity? One thing was certain- walk through the other door, and I was pretty certain I'd never complain about boredom again.
Sighing, already regretting my decision, but somehow unable to stop myself, I stepped into the light.