Lucy is a trained journalist and actress, with a BA in English Literature from the University of East Anglia, where she began to experiment with her own prose and poetry. Born in London with Polish & Lithuanian heritage, she has a particular fascination with how environments affect our behaviour, and would like to explore this further in her writing.
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Brown Hill
Her finger traces the oak branches outside, marking lines through the condensation on the window. It steams back over within minutes, leaving a faded view of stems trailing off a root. Louisa’s finger travels over the lines again, thickening the vertebrae. Sarah sweetens her breath, piling polos in her mouth as she rolls up her skirt before mass.
Ready Lou?
For what?
The memorial mass. The girl who died in the year above.
Can’t we sit in the toilets and wait for lunch?
The new gardener will be there too. His name’s Simon. Sexy Simone.
Fucking hell Sarah, he’s hardly been here.
Sarah clasps her arms around Louisa’s waist and wrenches her body off the bed, as their legs snake together landing on the rug below. An eight-limbed spider squirming with laughter as threads from their skirts trail off. They both scramble to their feet making sure their reflections are as accurate as they can be when passing the stained mirror on the way down. Dust unsettles as more girls descend from the dorms, the stairs croaking old. Louisa follows where the light hits the wallpaper pattern with her finger before she’s met with noticeboards. The pins often go missing, leaving timetables skidding the floors.
The mass is boring; they never knew Grace Britt well. Her parents have been invited, and sit in the pews away from the girls. Sarah’s neck stretches above the row in front, trying to weave her eyes through limp bodies to catch a glimpse of the grieving parents. She whispers that she wants to see if the mother is beautiful enough, like Grace was. There’s no sign of the gardener either. Louisa tells Sarah to watch Mabel and Julie instead, the altar servers for today, taking alternate sips of the wine when the nuns aren’t looking their way. The blood of Christ, swilling around in bloated bellies, to be joined by soapy lasagne in thirty minutes’ time.
The refectory refracts sound off the windows and jaundice walls. Yellow paint cracking into holes while fingers pick shapes into mystic wheels. The room is streamline, fifteen tables or so, ten girls on each. Voices forge into one choral pitch, the southern estuary drawl inflecting the ends of sentences to express the importance of personal intuition. Louisa sometimes just gets a sandwich and eats outside, but Sarah insists, finding room with a trough of their dorm to see if anyone has heard more news about the dead girl in the year above.
Well I heard it was leukaemia, that’s what someone said from her year.
I thought she was found hanging in Upper 5th’s dorm?
It can’t be leukaemia; she was never bald.
I think she was ill for a long time, couldn’t you see how thin she had been.
I’m thin, it doesn’t mean I’m going to die.
You’re not thin Sarah, you’re slim.
Mabel can you pass the carrots please.
Maybe she just stopped eating.
Maybe you should too Mabel, leave some roasted veg for the rest of us.
Maybe if you played sports, you’d understand the constraint my energy levels are under.
Fuck off Mabel, you’re a reserve in the Netball team.
And you’re what? Library Prefect?
You should stop by sometime, learn how to read.
After lunch, Sarah and Louisa ramble the perimeter of the school field, trying to guess which death most suits Grace Britt. Louisa is aware the path they are on will lead them to the rose garden where the new gardener will be. She knows that’s why Sarah insists on going this way. They watch the younger girls slip down the damp hill their school sits on with plastic bags. They both prefer it when they trip, tiny pale sticks go up into the air. Dirty socks for the rest of the week. Louisa spots him as the rose garden flickers into view, legs full of hair shadowed with thick calf muscles, taut with tendons seizing from the ankles. Louisa feels Sarah let go of her arm, to stroke her skirt pleats into place and let her hair down. She walks ahead with a steady crunch in the gravel so he knows she’s there.
Hello, you’re new.
He stands up straight, still with the clippers in his hands as he smirks through deep dimples. He’s far taller than they thought, with wide shoulders and reddish brown hair that has got dirt hanging from the tips sweated onto his forehead. He gives them both a wave, nodding to Louisa behind. He then bends back over, unperturbed by the sudden drops of rain. Sarah stands and waits, but he softly turns his back on her to pick up his tools and clean the blade of a three-pronged fork as he walks to another bed. The rain gets heavier as the clouds darken to a charcoal grey. Louisa has to walk forward to grab Sarah’s arm and drag it slightly back.
Sarah come on, it’s starting to rain.
They run back in around the chapel to the corridor by the geography room, Sarah blushing with embarrassment and rage. Louisa untangles her hair with her fingers as Sarah continues to say how he could have said hello, he could have been polite. He’s not too much older than us, you know. Louisa can hear Sarah beginning to question the gardener’s purpose in their lives.
Hang on, what day did he start?
End of last month.
He must have overlapped with that Grace girl for a bit.
Don’t Sarah, we both know she was ill.
That night Louisa continues to draw on the window pane, the cold hardening her fingertip to make her sketch of a rose sharper. She breathes in and out of the conversation Sarah is having with the other girls on her bed, the guessing game of Grace’s fate. The room she was found in isn’t far, a couple of dorms down where the older girls are.
I wouldn’t like to sleep in there.
Nor would I.
I think like, something must have gone on between her and the gardener guy.
Louisa’s finger strikes a scar through the rose. Sarah knows rumours crumble on the wood of this place, waiting for whispers to knead them into words spread in dorms.
Honestly, I’ve had a hunch.
Apparently he started a week before she died, they spoke quite a few times.
Really?
No!
Sarah that’s an absolute lie!
I’m not saying he did it! I’m just saying he might know how she died.
What, if it was suicide?
I think she was just interested in plants.
She was always outside.
I think we should stop talking about her, it’s not fair.
Calm down Louisa.
Guys she was found dead in the dorm.
Still, you never know.
Louisa opens the window and lights a cigarette, waiting for Sarah as she usually does to clamber over and join. They smoke in silence for two or three puffs, Sarah picking between her teeth with her thumb.
Just because he didn’t say hello to you.
No, Alice from the year above told me. They knew each other before.
And?
Well it’s strange don’t you think?
Why?
Tell me the last man you saw, our age, incest aside.
Louisa arches her back and mimes stubbing her cigarette out on Sarah’s hand. Their laughter lessens to a sigh, cold breath dissolving down the hill the window reaches out onto. There are woods that cover the horizon after the field. They are fifteen, and only one girl in their year has lost her virginity. Kirsty is asked countless questions of did it hurt, how big, do you bleed, does it rip you open, do you walk differently? Sarah isn’t the only girl eyeing up the gardener to break them in, crusting their knickers with fresh debris.
Do you fancy him too Lou?
No. He’s tawny.
Tawny?
Dirty hair.
Everywhere.
They slide their forearms back down the windowsill waiting for another conversation to start. Louisa reaches back up to close the window, the sky a dark red above as lights from London still absorb into the clouds this far out. She picks up a notepad and starts to draw long curled lines which could be leaves, stretching over last night’s French vocabulary.
I wasn’t going to tell you Lou, but I think I should.
Sarah. What?
I spoke again to Alice from the year above this afternoon.
And?
Apparently Grace wrote letters. Alice was given her belongings.
To who?
Back home.
Ok.
And in one of them she mentions the gardener.
Which means?
No but it means it’s him.
You’ve seen them?
No, but Alice has.
The same Alice who was born to a Native American tribe?
I believe her here.
Louisa lets Sarah think and stare, as she continues with her biro drawing over the French words. They both still fit comfortably on a single bed. They alternate each night between their separate beds, sitting on the pillows before lights-out to warm them up before the heating clocks off. Louisa once bled onto Sarah’s pillow one night, but Sarah handled it graciously and said she would always have it to remember her by.
As the other girls start to settle, Sarah and Louisa climb out of the window above Sarah’s bed, which leads to a flat roof where they usually smoke and share small spirit bottles they bring back from Christmas.
They weren’t love letters Lou, but they indicate he’s involved.
I know.
Apparently she was upset at school.
What did they say?
I haven’t read them properly; but she did mention the gardener in one.
Don’t lie.
Well we know his name is Simon.
Oh Simon, you man.
You stallion.
Thank you for keeping your dick safe for us.
Putting its night hat on.
Tucking it up.
Safe and warm.
Lubricated in holy water.
Essential night-time oils.
For an essential dick.
Scented with lavender.
Bathed in only the finest salts.
They have to keep the others’ hand over their mouth to stop the laughing echo. The main road into London was the only sound each time a car roared by, unknowing of the lives it passed. As they climb back through the window, the others are starting to drift into sleep. Julie still has a reading light on to finish coursework for tomorrow. They both give her a nod as her smile shakes from the caffeine pills. She has only just started.
Over the next couple of days Louisa enjoys hearing Sarah’s embellished tales of how Grace died at the hands of the gardener Simon. No one just dies at these kinds of schools, she repeated whenever Louisa said it was a fluke. Louisa pretended like she knew too that the gardener had a hidden side, that he was here to swallow up young girls and their vacuous lives. Sarah spoke to Alice from the year above once more, who confirmed that Grace thought the gardener was fit and liked walking alone sometimes during break. Louisa and Sarah started to whisper more than usual, passing notes in History to fathom the meaning of Grace’s seclusion.
He wanted to bury her body with his love.
Grace must have been careful for us not to see.
It’s that shed behind the hockey pitch! Where the gardening things are stored!
That’s where they meet!
After lights out they’re back on the roof, discussing how the school’s history must have something to do with Grace’s murder. Before the Convent was built, it was a burial ground called Brown Hill – with deep forests and a small inn, where a famous highway man was hanged. Louisa knows Sarah believes the plot is larger than one gardener. She now thinks the school has agents prowling the grounds to give something back to the land.
Grace must have been enquiring into the history of the school. Simon would know, his job being the gardens and grounds.
Sarah, do you think that’s why he’s here? No one knows where he came from.
Do you think she was vulnerable? She thought he would save her?
I think she was sad, but there’s no proof.
She mentions him in a letter Lou!
Which we haven’t even seen.
Alice told me!
It’s nothing much.
It’s something to do with the school.
Even if it is, we’ll sound barmy as hell. Can I have the body spray so I don’t stink of fags please.
Sarah throws the spray onto Louisa’s lap, turning away to punish her friend for the lack of confidence. Louisa throws it back after the cold spritz of a smell, too sweet, clambers through the window and goes to the bathroom to wash her face. The hot water stops past ten, pricking her skin as she shoves waves up to her hairline.
***
Sarah grabs Louisa at the end of the week. Louisa can tell by the grip on her jumper that the letters are still operative in Sarah’s mind. They head off to the music corridor, spare rooms littered with instruments where the nuns used to sleep before the new wing was built.
It’s him. He killed Grace.
Crisp?
I’m serious.
What did you find?
Louisa stares at her as the sky turns black behind. The creaky window bangs against the pane, not quite knowing how to fit into the allotted space. Sarah leads with her head to the piano and tinkers with the high notes.
I knows how I sound, that this has only come about because Simon didn’t say hello to me. Maybe it is, maybe he likes you instead.
But how did he kill her?
He smothered her with mud.
Suffocated? But she was found in her dorm.
He placed her back after it was done.
Louisa fiddles with the music sheets on the windowsill, folding down corners and rippling her fingers through. She sees the despair in her friend’s eyes, the responsibility of having knowledge that matters. Louisa agrees, she believes it was strange that a girl dies the week a new gardener starts, and that they had been seen talking, but how can Sarah be so sure.
Even if it is, why do we care?
Why are you now questioning it?
It was fun, but now I don’t know.
Louisa. A girl is dead.
I know.
We have to confront him.
I don’t think we should.
We have to. This evening.
Night then.
What?
I’ve got a headache and I’m tired.
Louisa throws her crisp packet in the bin as she slices past Sarah to the door. Sarah grabs her arm, and then throws herself into a desperate hug around her shoulders.
I need you, just this. Nothing more.
The rain reflects on the thinly fingered grass, vacant of bone, as the earth saturates to a thick curd, sinking as they walk. Glimmers of the warmth they left behind pulsate through the windows, driving Louisa’s nails further into her palms. She squelches behind Sarah who charges ahead. She remembers the first time she met her. She was a porcelain doll with soft brown hair, with her jumper on back to front, sitting in the corner of the art room by the window. She was shy, but as soon as they settled Louisa became the quieter one under Sarah’s wing. She felt safe there. Sarah grew into a beauty who pined to be pretty, constantly checking her appearance, not realising the irony. Girls couldn’t help but stare at Sarah although she’s starting to recognise it now; it feels less safe Louisa being there, winged under the ego and stares.
Once off the field, they have to walk the length of the hockey field on the outside path to reach the cabin where Sarah has determined he’ll be. The flood lights crash into their eyes. They always flicker, never fully powered. Louisa can see a light in the shed further on. It’s him. She doesn’t know what to say. What Sarah will say eventually, to his face. When they get to the door Louisa turns and leans on the side with no window. Hurry the fuck up, she tilts with her head.
Louisa watches Sarah’s hesitant nudge of the door, widening it as a pair of soaked wellies come into view. She stays outside, and spies through the half open door in the shadow of the roof. His back is facing them, sat down. There’s a kettle boiling and a candle on. There are cobwebs above, cocooning the lightbulb flickering alone. Sarah gets closer, silently rounding her foot, heel to toe. He lifts his head and jerks to his feet. Sarah forgets windows also reflect back in. He turns around and stares at her. She stares at him.
What the hell are you doing in here.
I have to ask you about Grace.
About who?
She wrote letters about you.
Grace?
Yes.
Who is Grace?
The girl who died.
Ah fuck, yeah.
Yes. Grace.
Letter you said?
Yes.
Do you also have brownies to sell?
Um, no.
Sarah starts to burn against her wet uniform. Louisa can tell she’s embarrassed as her shoulders hunch up to her ears. He makes his tea calmly, then sits on the desk, feet on the chair. Sarah scuffs one foot, to and fro, against the floor. She turns her head back to Louisa beckoning her in with her curling left hand, before the noise of his chair jerks Sarah back to her target.
You helped kill Grace. We know you did. You’re here to kill us all by helping the land become a burial ground once again. Because that is what you want, for us all to disappear.
He stays sat on the desk but his head almost drops off his neck as it leans forward in confusion. Simon delicately places his mug next to him, before clasping his hands together in prayer under his chin. He waits for more from her, but eventually concludes she has nothing left to spare. He knows a girl died last week. The nuns had asked him to clean up the room once the body had been taken away. There was blood all over the sheets, sharp edges it must have been. The memory of her blood stops him from laughing at the girl in front.
Then in marches another, who looks like she’s embattled a sewage tunnel. So this is the ‘we’. The pair. He’s seen them before, marching around the field, whispering behind trees. The one who has just entered seems to follow the first one about, not out of need but more out of a laziness to lead. They’re both pretty, skinny, already drowned.
Sarah! Let’s go.
Leave me alone.
One tugs at the others’ sleeve, and they end up having a silent conversation through gestures and the most active eyebrow expressions Simon has ever seen. He watches as they slowly see their tales are not fit for reality. He won’t laugh at them, but he can ask them to find their way out. Then she goes off again, accusing him of killing Grace. Wanting to bury her underground, suffocate her. Help her die. She nervously launches a full verbal attack on him, as the other stands by the door watching his hands.
Maybe you two should go to bed now. I really can’t help you.
But you killed her.
No I didn’t.
He straightens and turns back round to his desk, still standing. He will protect the girl’s privacy; he won’t tell them how it happened. Hopefully they will go now. He watches them in the window. The one who came in first crosses her arms, as her friend tries to negotiate with her, pulling her arm to the door. They stand underneath the bulb, their eye sockets ghostly hollow reflecting back at him.
He turns back around and tells them its best if they talk to the nuns. Their faces have drained of colour as their eyes dart around the shed.
So you don’t know about Brown Hill then?
Brown what?
This history of the school.
I don’t, I’m sorry.
Well you should, if this is your job.
The first girl starts to tear up as her face tightens. She shrinks in size, her lips folded in. He walks around their rooted stance to hold the door open. There is something off about them, too ambitious to realise this has never been real. The first one walks out, followed by number two. They walk slowly away in the rain, as he comes to lean on the door frame, watching the defeated parade. He shouts after them that they need to shower as soon as they’re in. Their tattered jumpers sink further from their shoulders, hair like rope. The Earth gobbles at their ankles, drenched in tired dirt.
Simon sits back at his desk. He stares through the window until his heart rate slows, yet to realise his tea has gone cold.