Small Town Matters

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Alexandra Sayer 5L

Small Town Matters

As I stared out of the window, intently watching a small leaf being motionless, a quiet ‘Psst’ was the only noise to interrupt the monotonous drone of my teacher’s voice. It was Carol Brisko, the girl who sat next to me in almost all my classes. As my name was Bracher and hers Brisko it seemed inevitable that we should sit next to each other as our teachers had a penchant for children sitting in alphabetical order. She handed me a small note ripped out of an exercise book. I ignored the Spanish grammar on the one side and read the large scrawled note on the other. Anyone who might have been watching me at that point must have seen my face turn ashen, for I was truly shocked. The subject written was not something we talked about frequently at Catholic school, and the nuns also told us never to put anything like that into writing. The note quite bluntly said, ‘Have you had sex?’ I quickly rubbed out the note (luckily it was written in pencil) and wrote a large ‘NO!’ back and swiftly handed it back to her. Nothing could have prepared me for what she wrote back in reply. I almost fell out of my chair in shock when I saw those horrific words, ‘I have, with my brother.’ I dropped the note on the floor and didn’t reply; I was too repulsed. I had heard of this before, there was a name for it so it must be quite common. I, myself have three brothers, and the thought of the note made me feel quite ill. I flashed my eyes at her and she gave me a pathetic smile. I honestly had no idea why she had told me this, for I wasn’t a good friend of hers. If she had told me then who else had she told? I leapt out of my chair the moment the bell rang, nearly falling over myself in my rush to get out of the door. I thought over the matter for a moment. I wouldn’t tell anyone, apart from perhaps Jeanine, in order to save Carol’s reputation. Besides that it was extremely rude to spread gossip of that nature around and very unladylike. I must behave as my grandmother would, for she was the perfect lady, she even sent me to a young ladies finishing school. Trying very hard to stop thinking of Carol and her brother I stumbled into the light of the playground.

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 Later that day, at lunch, I found Jeanine and told her the news. She was almost as shocked as I was at first, but then she took a sick fascination in the whole thing. I told her not to tell anyone and she swore, but somehow I knew that meant nothing. By tomorrow everyone would know. I had made a big mistake. I crawled home from school that day pondering over telling my parents or not, and decided not to. They would merely make a scene and do something drastic. Carol wasn’t my friend but I felt like she had ...

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