Starling

They think I'm stupid. That I'm just a kid. I'm not. They say, oh she thinks she knows everything. Well, I know more than I did last week. I learn. Fast.

People don't notice the things you do until you stop. Like Ma. She used to knock on our doors in the morning. Open the curtains. Remind us to use the bathroom. We'd groan and try to hide under the covers and say five more minutes, because that's what you do.

Then I used to come down for breakfast, and there it was. Juices poured, eggs boiled. I'm not an idiot. I didn't think it appeared by magic or anything. It was just what she did.

When Isaiah moved in, I used to turn up at the table in the same camisole I slept in. I'd peek sideways to see if he was looking. Ma scowled and chased me back upstairs.

"We have a guest," she'd say. "Put some proper clothes on."

"He's not a guest," I spat back. "He lives here."

Ma would nag us all to take a bit of fruit. I don't like fruit much. It's boring. She'd spoon some yoghurt into a bowl and let me use her knife and drizzle the honey. It felt grown up to eat the fruit that way. Then Ma would braid my hair so tight it gave me a headache. "It's your armour," she'd say. I'd roll my eyes.

"There, that will stay good all day," she'd say. It would, too.

Now we have to get ourselves up. No one reminds us to wash, or checks our clothes are neat and clean. We go downstairs to an empty kitchen and a bare table. I'm dressed for school. Isaiah isn't often there, but when he is, he's all eyes. I'm not sure if I like that. That's another thing I learned. You can want something until you get it, and find out it's fools gold after all.

I make lunches for Ellison and me, and he burns some toast, scrapes off the black, and puts too much butter on it. He also drinks from the carton. I pull a face and sip on some water.

We have to be quick, because we need to make sure we have all our books and things. Ma used to make us do that the night before. I make it sound like she died. Maybe she did, in a way.

Before the bus comes, I go to her room, hairbrush in hand. She pushes herself up on one elbow, eyes bleary. I'm barely worth being awake for. She braids my hair loosely, and she's nearly asleep before I've left the room.

I miss her. I think. But I'm angry at her, too.

My hair is escaping the fastenings before lunchtime. I feel like I'm coming apart the same way. I grit my teeth to hold myself together. By the time I get home, I'm very conscious of it. Isaiah's eyes rake over me, almost enough to comb out the tangles.

I miss Loretta. We all do. It's hard to be angry at her. She was just a kid who couldn't ride. They should have put her on a slow, plodding sort of pony. One of those that's like a hairy table, who barely feels being kicked, and needs nagging to take another step. Surely they have those in every riding school?

It hurts to think about that, so I make myself think of something else.

I miss Da, too, but not really, because he was hardly ever here anyway. I don't like it when Isaiah sits in his chair. It makes my heart thud. Da wants me to go and live with him, but I can't. Leave here? Leave the school? All my friends? If we go, what will Ma do?

And I don't want to go, anyway, not until I figure out how I feel about Isaiah's eyes.

I brush out the tangles, and make sections. The girl in the mirror looks determined.

I miss all of us. I miss being a kid properly. I liked playing at being grown up, but I see now I didn't want to actually be one. I'd have been good with practicing a bit longer.

My arms are aching, but I don't stint. I pull tighter. Almost welcoming the vice settling around my forehead.

I miss when the biggest worry I had was whether Isaiah looked at me at breakfast.

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