It feels like I was only at this school a matter of months ago but, as we drive up now, it already looks different; there are fancy glass extensions to the foyer, new windows and what look like solar panels on the languages block. Some things still feel the same. The field to the front where we’d haul our asses round for the 1500m in the summer, the red brick of the main building where you can peek into the science labs. A skeleton stands at the window who some lab tech has kept there for the longest time, all dressed up. He had a name. Spud. You’re still here. I mean, you weren’t going anywhere, but still.
‘If you do a doughnut on the field, I’ll give you a tenner,’ I tell Emma as she drives through the school gates.
‘I have new tyres on,’ she says, edging her car into the most sacred of spaces, the staff car park. ‘Shall we park in the deputy head’s space instead?’
I laugh and don’t discourage her. Through our whole schooling career, there was a deputy head called Mrs Willett who carried an incredible dislike for all us Callaghan girls because when Meg started school there, was bullied and had her lunch money taken in the first week, Mum stormed in (a teacher herself with many years’ experience) and called her an ‘absolute amateur’. After that, our name was like mud to her.
‘I haven’t been back here for years,’ Emma says, peering out the car window. ‘How does it feel? To see it? To be back?’
‘It’s had a facelift.’
‘Oh, someone tried to burn it down a few years back so it was necessary. I say someone. They blamed an electrical fault but the rumour was it was arson. Mum actually double-checked where you were that night…’ I widen my eyes at the revelation. ‘You were in Edinburgh, touring with a show, don’t worry…’
‘How doyoufeel to be back?’ I ask her.
Emma shrugs. ‘My memories are mixed. It was a high-pressure, high-achieving place but I don’t think they looked after us very well.’
It’s strange to hear Emma talk like that about a place where I’d always assumed she’d thrived. She opens the car door and I follow, linking arms with her, walking around the car park, gazing into windows of empty classrooms. Is this trespassing? Perhaps but it’s a thrill to be doing it with the goody-two-shoes sister. Emma pushes against a front door that seems to swing open. She stares at it, knowing we can’t go in, but hey, she’s with me. I walk straight in and pull her hand.
‘Lucy…’
‘Emma, live a little,’ I reply, winking.
The foyer is as I remember. I sat here a lot on the blue polyester chairs by the office, usually waiting while they rang our mother for crimes I may or may not have committed. There still remains a bronze bust of King Charles that sits on a pedestal and I go over and study his gormless expression and take out my phone.
‘Here, let’s take a photo of us and Charlie, we’ll send it to the sisters.’
Emma’s eyes dart in five thousand different directions for fear of being caught. I push her into position and work out my phone camera, styling out the photo so I’ve got my tongue out trying to lick old Charlie’s cheek. I take the shot and cackle at Emma’s panicked face.
‘We shouldn’t be here…’ she whispers.
‘Why? It’s not like we’re going to steal anything. There are no kids about. Chill.’
‘I don’t chill. What if an alarm goes off? The police show up?’
‘Then we will run from the police and move to the south of Spain and change our names. You never got into any trouble here, did you?’
She shakes her head at me. ‘You made up for that though.’
‘It wasn’t just me. Beth got caught smoking by the long-jump pitch once. I’m pretty sure Grace has told me she gave a handy to one of the German exchange lads in the art rooms too.’
Emma rolls her eyes for all of our misdemeanours and peers into the school hall that opens up from the foyer, the parquet floor still glaringly bright. She pushes the door of the hall and it squeaks eerily.
‘Weren’t you forcibly removed from an assembly?’ Emma asks me as we walk in.
‘I was – it was a thing of legend. You can’t sit there and preach about God. It was very disrespectful to the other religions and beliefs that make up the school and I took a stand.’
‘The way Grace tells that story, you flashed the school.’
‘Because the teacher who manhandled me off the stage picked me up and showed everyone my knickers.’
I take her hand and try to spin her under my arm. Look at all the space we have, Ems. We used to be squashed in here like sardines, all suffering the collective indignity of having to sit on the floor and belt out the school song like we meant it.
‘Audete Magnus and forever more…’ I belt out at the top of my lungs, a hand reaching to the ceiling.
Emma spins around immediately. ‘Shush yourself! It’s like you want to be caught.’
‘It’s the school song. Come on, be game, join in…’ I jest.
