Birdy

ii

Annie Cartridge's parents were poor. 

Compared to her classmates' families, that was. 

She was bi-racial too - her mother Hispanic, her father English. 

Most people said she wasn't as beautiful as her mother, that she'd be just like her father. 

He's a mess now, they say. Half-crazed. 

Psycho. 

It was fast, her death. 

Her parents had just won the lottery, or something, according to the students. 

Most of them liked to believe that they'd stolen, or if the lottery rumour was to be believed, cheated in some way. 

They're most likely jealous. That's what her father told her, on the morning she died.

Nobody knew who did it, just that there was a murderer. A murderer in the school. 

Or, like the newcomers later said, a murderer in the village. 

Choking. 

Spluttering. 

Strands of mousy hair splayed out on the table. 

Eyes a dead green, no longer vivid and witchy. 

Poor old week Annie, the teachers thought, probably having a nervous fit. 

Stupid Birdy, the students said, gathering round to watch the occasion, probably got food poisoning. 

I wish. 

Fat chance.

Just one last splutter, then nothing. 

For a while. 

Tongue parched and cracked. 

Some of the teachers called 999, others looked around sceptically. 

Students prodded at her skin. Do you think she's dead? 

Oh my God, she's dead. 

Shut up, of course, she isn't. 

Tell that to Birdy, look, she's not breathing. 

A whir of light, a flash of vision, a splutter of breath like an engine kick-starting back to life. 

The ambulances should come in 20 minutes, they had said. 

Forty had passed. 

Blood, choking, sudden heartbeats, stretchers. 

A humdrum of noise. 

A room full of voices. 

Will she be alright?

Paramedics. 

Medicine. 

Last-minute CPR. 

Testing. 

Interviews. 

When they said that she died of an overdose - drugs, or food poisoning perhaps - a couple of them scoffed. 

Joked about.

Poor, weedy little Birdy, the crack addict. 

Fly little Birdy, fly. 

Some of them cried. 

Some of them peered down at her and shook her by the shoulders in alarm. 

One of them shut her eyes for her. 

Heard her last breaths choke out of her lungs. 

The teachers' pets sobbed, the 'rebels' made crude remarks and insulted her. 

To hide their concern, perhaps. 

Because they didn't want the world to know that they cared about Annie Cartridge. 

Or perhaps it was because they were the rough kids, who bunked off school to build dens and smoke cigarettes. 

They didn't think about Birdy. 

The nickname lasted Annie her whole lifetime. 

They hadn't thought of that, didn't think at all. 

Not in the moment. 

Her last words rang in their ears as they grew up. 

Perhaps it was their dead-end jobs or their council houses that did it. 

Perhaps they realised how fragile, how fickle the system is.

Perhaps, they grew up. 

I'd rather die now than grow up like this. 

⁂⁂⁂

The schoolchildren say she can pass through them when they go outside and cross the road. 

When they wait, bodies squashed together as the rain 

Slowly 

Drips.

The teachers scold them. 

It's just your imagination. 

What did I tell you? 

They see her often enough. 

Every day. 

They tell the teachers she's sixteen. 

You're mistaking her for Annie, they reply. 

Choking out the name. 

They watch her now, the school children, peering at her across the road. 

A hood pressed up against her eyes. 

A shroud, perhaps. 

Makes them think of Egyptian mummies. 

Some of the primary school kids get scared and run off. 

Off to the safety of their cars. 

One kid comes up to her.

Looks about fifteen. 

Sturdy frame. 

Someone the teachers would call a strapping young lad. 

He touches her. 

It's on the shoulder he does it, tries to press crooked fingernails into smooth skin. 

He can't... 

What's happening? 

She's not transparent 

Says the kid. 

He pokes again, fingers struggling to get a grip. 

He stumbles on the wet Tarmac. 

It's like... jelly... 

Shut up, Jake, it's raining... it's the end of the day, you're tired. 

She's a girl, not a dessert for God's sake. 

He's pulled through the road, onto the pavement opposite her. 

His brow furrows as she flickers - for just a second - under the streetlight.

And then he turns and runs off with the group.  

Tries to forget all his suspicions.