Bedford, England

May 4th, 1949

"Ms. Annefriede Harlowe's Academy for Professional Young Ladies does not tolerate this kind of behavior. Mucking about, sleeves rolled up, barreled up fists...well," Ms. Brackley's old pruned face sharpens for a second. I can see the fine wisps of hair that flank her temples, usually combed tightly back in order begin to unhinge themselves and stand on end. I can feel it, like she's about to unleash the fury of an animal--the sort that's been pent up since she found herself on the doorstep of the academy nearly forty years ago.

She takes a deep breath, filling her ample bosom till its tucked high under chin and smoothes her hair back into place.

"Well, this isn't Temple's Boy School and I will not have these halls filled with savage...," she's become flustered again, her haggard cheeks flush an unnatural shade of crimson. "disobedient, disreputable ....thoughtless....amazons!" She finally manages to thunder out as much as her shrill voice can carry.

She gulps, remembering herself and readjusts the thin glasses resting on her bridge, the small set of spectacles she's been using to inspect our every manner and means of dress for the past three years.

Brackley directs beady blue eyes upon me now. "Miss O'Connell, you'll do well to check yourself next time you feel the least bit...aroused...to cause trouble for your classmates."

I try my hardest not to roll my eyes and instead put on a guilty face and nod wordlessly.

"And Miss Shachar," Brackley finally turns her attention towards the girl to my right and I am glad to have her pernicious gaze removed from me at last. "You'll do well to remember your place here," her voice drops but I can still hear her, "and how easily it can be taken away." Brackley rears her head back, ramrod straight and less forgiving than a battle axe as she glares at her. She's devoid of real emotion, deadpanned as she dismisses us, but I can read the slight purse in her lips, the flicker of heat in her dead eyes and recognize it--it's disgust. Bitter and cold, like a wet blanket in a snow storm.

Sarah Shachar arrived at Harlowe's two years ago when her parents fled the political disruption in Jerusalem. Mr. Shachar, a stout jewish man with intelligent eyes was a government official crusading for the independent Israeli state when we drove in 1922 and set up camp. The British Mandate had been a slap in the face, at least that's what mum always called it--and while it brought more turmoil for the quiet government worker it also brought Sarah's mother. They had been living contentedly for the most part till the Mandate began to expire and disgruntled patriots began taking death threats out on Lillian and her mixed daughter.

Outsiders were not welcome here at Harlowe's, as much as the pomp and circumstance of good manners would have supposed it, and the gentle-voiced, jewish, refugee girl was easily ousted into the fray to be lost and forgotten.

It would only make sense that Sarah and I would become fast friends--while my family's name was well known and respectable among the Oxford Academic crowd--here, I was just a 'khaki' pretender, bearing an Irish name...and if it could get any worse, an American in lineage.

The truth of it was, I couldn't care less what the girls thought. What they perceived as a hindrance was in fact my greatest gift. A childhood spent amongst the sand, Alex and I racing across the campgrounds on our stinky urdus, sending Izzy into a wild rage.

But this morning when I awoke to a crying Sarah and pulled back the partition between our beds to find swastikas and little anti-Semitic gems like "jew bitch" and "kike" scrolled all over the walls in red lipstick---well, dammit, I had to give Frances Crawley and Rosemary Eavesbourne a piece of my mind.

The trouble was, a piece turned into an insult, which turned into a spit in the hair, which turned into a slap, which eventually culminated in the gaping hole in Frances' shirt and Rosemary's black-eye.

"Hope old Brackley didn't go too easy on you." Frances says as we exit Brackley's office and make our way down the hall to our dormitories, its the itching sort of voice whose irritation makes one stop and want to shed their skin.

I turn around to face her.

"I'm going home--I hope you're satisfied." I spat back, still the picture of calm.

"Maybe next time you'll simply not come back." She said rubbing her pinched nose before setting her wiry lips into a sickening kind of smile. Because the Eavesbournes had made their fortune in the war making man-o-wars and Frances' father was an Honorable member of Parliament since the 20's--both Frances and Rosemary had been found devoid of guilt and were not reprimanded for their hatefulness. Her grin was so smug I could just punch her teeth in.

I grinned back and vaguely hoped my expression was enough to make her soul recoil. "Doubt it."

Rosemary sat beside her, leaning back on the stone wall, her eyes turned away from us--her black eye would heal in a few days--it was more of a lucky shot than anything, her pride however--well, we'd have to see if it was renewed when we all started again in September.

"And if little jewish princess keeps her act up, I bet its safe to say she'll be shipped off to Agrabah or wherever in God's name she's from by August." Frances laughes, twirling her finger around a sandy blonde curl.

"Oh yeah, and I wonder how much your Daddy will pay to make that happen--must not be nearly as much as the amount he's paying Brackley to ignore your failed marks and wipe your bum every night." I hissed but stop when Sarah's thin hands hold me back.

Frances says nothing. She's too busy catching flies with her open, shocked, gaping mouth.

"Let's go." I say instead and we make our way back. Its only till we've rounded the corner that Sarah allows the tears to spill over her eyes and wet her cheeks.

I convince myself for the better part of three hours when I finish packing, that things will all go smoothly for me this summer. I plan to take the earliest available train into London and simply neglect to tell my parents the real reason for my early arrival--after all, Harlowe's officially lets out Friday morning, only two days from now. I place my bag by the door. The room I share with Sarah is empty--despite today's trials, I manage to convince Sarah to go to dinner in the main hall and show the other girls that she's not to be trifled with. When I praise her with the crass words I picked up from our American cousin, Eddy, "tough bitch"--she laughs and for a moment I am relieved of any worry I had earlier about leaving her alone here for two days.

Funnily enough, I could not be persuaded to go--I simply couldn't stomach to see their faces again. I open up the window instead and reach into the vine trellis to pull out the rope I have coiled up and hidden in the vines. Its secured to the iron rigging of the trellis and I give it a good tug to make sure its stayed that way. Never-minding my skirt, I pop over the threshold of the window and attempt to sail down the rope till I reach the grassy floor, four floors beneath.

Harlowe's is situated on Elstow Estate and Grounds, previously belonging to a prestigious family with an old, benevolent and childless benefactor who turned over his estate to his lawyer's wife, Annefriede Harlowe in 1803. The place is a large, gothic structure completely built of stone, prone to drafts and daft tales of ghosts and other such gobbly-gook. The grounds are extensive and green, backing up onto Wilshamstead where Harlowe's brother school, George Herring Temple's Boy School is located. More impressive, and admittedly better funded, any one who was anyone sent their son to Temple's. At present nearly all fatherly M.P's had at least one son there.

I follow the stream brushing down by the woods, my eyes kept on the distant light of Temple's straight ahead and make my way past stables, a rugby field and a groundskeeper cabin till I finally see the rock formation bridging the border between the two schools.

Its only a hop, a skip and a jump and I'm sprawled out on open grounds staring up at the stars. Its getting dark and they picture best in this place of all.

"You're the strangest girl ever seen."

I jump up. "Freddie--you half scared me out of my skin." I say calmly though my heart is still struggling to settle back down.

"What're you doing out here--its nearly nighttime."

"Funny," I say and dust off my skirt--apparently alone time is out of the question today. "I could ask you the same question, I suppose."

Freddie leans casually on one of the large landed boulders, his blue eyes are hardly distinct in this lighting as they gaze back at me. "As it were--I was off to visit you."

I laughed. I can't imagine why he would.

I could hear the smile in his voice, "The boys over at Temple heard about what happened at Harlowe's. Heard you kicked in Frances and Rosemary's head in."

"Could've just been a rumor." I say feeling a bit irritated that no one will let me forget today's incident.

"Which is precisely, my dove, why I had to see you." He said.

I roll my eyes at his little pet name for which I never gave him permission to use.

"Well you've seen me Frederick, now run off to Temple's and brag about your new found celebrity." I say and turn to go back to my empty room. Before I can go, my hand is seized with such force that I'm whipped back around and facing him.

Freddie's hands are softer than my own--well kept and gentle, they explore the surface of my hand, he hums a little bit beneath his breathe as he inspects me.

"You done?" I ask finally.

He grins. "You hit like a girl--next time you should leave the beat-ups to us Temple men."

I honestly believe its Frederick Halton's sole mission in life to aggravate and infuriate me. I withdraw my hand like a backlash to a whip.

"Men? Now don't we have delusions of grandeur."

"Let me walk you back." He says hurriedly.

"I'm perfectly capable of walking--besides, if Letchworth catches you and I here, we're both in for a beating."

"I'm walking you back." He says anyways and proceeds to lead me up the creek and back to the desolate, austere little academy before us.

"Come on Freddie--don't you have someone else to bother, someone who isn't two years your junior. I'm sure Mary Wilcomb would simply adore your attentions, and she's just turned eighteen."

"If you didn't protest so much," he says, "it wouldn't be half as fun." And proceeds to spend the better part of five minutes laughing at himself and all of his comical genius.

Thank God I leave tomorrow. I think absentmindedly.

A silence pervades us for a moment, we stroll past the woods and up to the back of the building and around to where the trellis begins.

"I really wish you'd let me take you out sometime." Freddie says and I hope he's still joking. But the way he cradles my hands and looks at me makes me think differently.

Suddenly my reserve has seemed to desert me entirely.

"Freddie--its just not a good idea. We've had fun at the communal dances and all, but you won't be able to take me around your friends or your family. You simply wouldn't."

He bends down to kiss me and I withdraw enough for him to settle upon kissing my cheek.

"And I also wish you'd not spoil your hands over such insignificant matters." He says and draws closer to me.

"Racial slurs are not insignificant and shall never be." I say, finding the fire within me renewed.

"They weren't racial." He says and smiles. "Why are you so wound up?"

"Is it because she's jewish? Or is it because she's Israeli?" Maybe that'll give him something to chew on. I drop his hands and grab onto the rope. "Good night Frederick." I say coldly and tuck the back end of my skirt forward and into my belt, making makeshift pants as I shimmy up the rope.

"Amelia!" I ignore it.

When I climb into the window and look back down. His figure is merely a black shadow staring up at me.

I don't bother to smile. Only slam the window shut. I will not watch him go or give him any indication of interest. Any foolish sort of fancy that he may have thought I had ends tonight.

I climb into bed and wrap the covers tight around my neck.

Good riddance. Good riddance to the lot of it.