The Dreamer ✓

Letter 21

NO.21; A LETTER TO THE PERSON THAT GAVE YOU YOUR FAVOURITE MEMORY

MARCH 19th, 2014

Dear Ariel,

You're still so young, you only turned ten last month. Your innocence is so charming, it makes me ache for my childhood. When the world smelt of wild flowers and the days were long and everything was sunshine. The tragedy of growing up is that your innocence is eroded with each year until you're forced to see the world for what it actually is. Dark and lonely. Dark and lonely and not enough. The world is not enough. Never enough.

Sorry, I think I might be talking about myself there. Ariel, I'll make sure you don't grow up to be a body of walking chaos. There has to be someone in the world who sees its beauty, there has to be a light in the darkness and that's you. Too many cynics spoil the world. You have the remedy to make the world good again. You did that for me once. You made me feel something I had forgotten existed. Ariel, do you remember?

I do. I know the exact date. I know everything about that day.

Thursday, August 15th 2013.

It was the day I got my results for my AS Level exams and about a month before I went back to my second and final year in sixth form. I hadn't been able to sleep the night before because of nerves. I only got about four and a half hours of sleep since I woke up at six that morning. I groaned at the prospect of work in an hour (I worked as a receptionist for the local hairdressers) and the exam results. I showered, brushed my teeth and went downstairs to get breakfast. I find some comfort in the fact Evelyn would be getting her results as well that day. Whilst mine were for my first year, Evelyn's would be her final exams that determined if she would get into university. In the past couple of weeks she hadn't shown any sign of worry. She did what she always did, smirked like she could tear you down, go out with her friends and come back late into the night. Like her future wasn't dependent on how well she'd done in her exams.

Burbank School would be open from nine o'clock in the morning to four in the afternoon. I left work at one o'clock and went to meet up with Georgia and Laurel at the off licence on Drummond Road, since we'd agreed to walk to school together and get our results. Laurel was confident that she had at least passed Textiles and Georgia was sure she'd bombed practically every exam. I was as unsure as anyone and I just prayed I got decent enough grades. I never expected anything stellar from myself. Just as we entered the assembly hall, Evelyn bumped past me with a bleak expression.

Adeola had winced and said, "Don't think your sister did too well, M."

I frowned but I didn't say anything. When I finally opened my own envelope, my eyes instantly zeroed in on the grades. I did...Well. Better than I thought. I got Two B's in English Lit and Politics and two C's in Sociology and Biology. I was just chuffed not to have gotten a D in anything. After going bowling with Georgia, Laurel and Adeola to celebrate the end of our first year in sixth form, I walked home with the feeling a great weight had left my shoulders and as happy as I was about my results I knew I would have to work even harder next year if I wanted to get into a good university.

As I had suspected Evelyn hadn't done too well, she'd gotten a mix of C's and D's in final results and Dad had not been happy. Evelyn (and neither were Dad and Jasmin) wasn't too happy to find out she would have to resit the year if she wanted to get into Newcastle. I didn't see her for most of the day, so I assumed she had locked herself in her room.