The Final Day

The following is a piece of writing which I produced around 10 years ago when dabbling with writing for competitions etc. It is based on things that happened to me during my primary school years. I have edited it a little to put on here!

This was it. The end of four years of hurting.

She never thought this day would come. Collecting her things and walking down those stairs for the last time. The stairs with the sharpest metal edges you could imagine, the very same metal edges that caught her toe nail on and caused it to bleed.

Of course, she hadn't let her Mum take her to the doctors to get it looked at. she was too scared. Instead, she picked at it and picked at it like a scab, leaving permanent damage and a constant reminder of that place. But then, telling people about her experiences was never easy. She was way too frightened that nobody would ever believe her.

Back when it first began, her teacher had scrawled on her school report that she "bought playground squabbles into the classroom". She hadn't brought them in, they had just followed her! Everything she touched had to be "sprayed". The boys had told everyone that she had a disease, meaning that sitting next to her was strictly off limits and if you touched the table she had sat at, or sat on the same chair, you were instantly infected. 

After months of this narrative, she began to wonder if they were in fact right, maybe she was diseased. It might have explained why nobody uttered a word to her, or that she found herself crying uncontrollably so often. These boys....well, they did these unspeakable things and had so many friends. Perhaps she should start taking a leaf out of their book and act out a little, then she could make friends too!

She found a pencil. She poked one of the boys on the back of then neck. Not hard, just enough to be noticed. The teacher, a Polish woman with a stern disposition with a long complicated name, punished her in the worst way possible. She smacked her in front of the whole class and then made her stand at the front of the room as an example, sobbing her heart out and not understanding what she was meant to do to fit in. All she ever wanted was to be liked. Maybe she should try a different way.......so she tried walking into someone with her arms out wide. Her own try at an embrace deep down? She didn't know, her head wasn't thinking straight anymore.

The result? Another smack.

She had to stand by the blackboard,  the long rolling board that had blank sides and sides with lines on for handwriting practice. As she stood there, those boys were allowed to come up and taunt her as her face became a disturbing mess. She never told her parents. She had obviously been really bad and she didn't want to be in trouble at home too. That was her only safe place.

She should have told them then. She could have stopped it then. She did try once, talking about the name calling. Mum said "You just say sticks and stones may break my bones, but words will never hurt me" So she did. How they mocked her! Laughing in her face, calling her whatever the latest insulting name they had discovered. Words did hurt. Mum was usually right, but not this time.

For a while, things did calm down. She made friends with the new girl and went to her house. She didn't know much English, her new friend, so she did not understand the nasty words. She had a new teacher too. A teacher who taught her the love of books. She was a memorable teacher, with long flowing skirts and even longer black hair. She read stories about children who were brave and eco-warriors. Books that made her feel grown up and part of new worlds.

It didn't last. The new friend soon realised it wasn't "cool" to be seen with her. Playtimes were lonely again. Sat in the corner of the playground under the shelter as they came up with their little pearls of wisdom on what she looked like and all the usual words to make her cry. She couldn't help but cry, even if it did spur them on.

She realised that she did have something to rely on. Books. They were her real friends. They wouldn't judge her or leave her outcast, they invited her in with new adventures and words she had never seen before. If she sat in the library every playtime, they wouldn't get her there. It was not a place they would even step into independently. So this became her everyday. Hiding from the awful words and immersing herself in the thousands of other worlds. She would put the books in the right order on the shelves or research an interesting topic. It felt like things would never get worse if she stayed in the sanctuary of the library.

But oh, she was wrong.

They found new ways of getting to her. They started to steal her lunch, leaving only half a sandwich for her to eat. They had taken her dignity, her playtime, her confidence and now her food. She sat in the library every day now lonely and hungry.

Then, that final thing happened. The one that changed it all.

Non-uniform day! A day to be individual and exciting! She wore the new cardigan her Mum had knitted her. It had tassels like a cowgirl and a horse on the back. Oh, how she loved that cardi! She hung it on her peg to get changed for PE. When she returned, it was still hung there, but the horse had been replaced by a hole. Someone had decided words were not merely enough and had picked a stitch from the middle of the beautiful woollen top and left a gaping hole. They had done it now. They had destroyed every part of her, right to her very soul.

Of course, now she couldn't hide from her parents as the evidence was physically there. She started to tell of her torment, how she was hungry, lonely and so very, very unhappy. They spoke to the headmaster, but he obviously did not say the right thing or offer any firm support because they now had reached the final day.

The day she walks down those stairs with her things and never return.

The day she left those people behind.

She left with the words in her head, spinning over and over and reminding her she wasn't good enough. It was going to take a very long time for her to realise that those words were not true and that words could be used for wonderful things.

Like writing.

And story telling.

For praise and admiration.

She will find out, one day.....and she will prosper.

Copyright C Maskell 2025