We’re delighted to publish the winners and runners-up from our 2022 short story competition for Irish teens, in association with Tertulia Books. This year our theme was “Belonging” and our guest judge was Claire Hennessy. Penelope by Wiktoria Willer (age 16) was a runner-up in our senior category.
Penelope
All Penelope could do was watch as the admissions officer at her elite independent school examined her scholarship application for yet another deplorable year at Dulwick College.
“These won’t do, Ms O’Louglin,” she said finally.
“Pardon me?”
“As of this year, only a candidate’s examination results for the preceding semester will be qualified for the scholarship.”
Penelope felt herself sinking into the chair, the Christmas exams.
“In this case, the forthcoming Christmas examinations.”
The goddamn Christmas exams.
“Please return to the office in January with the results and I will submit your application then.”
Penelope nodded, albeit shakily. This not only meant that she would have to study relentlessly in the short timeframe before the exams, it also made the effort she put into her previous tests completely futile. In her anger, she had an urge to discard the entire application process.
Instead she said, “Will that be all?”, and politely stalked out of the office.
However, her failed scholarship application attempt had only been the starter to a lousy, damp day. Quite literally, as it had been raining.
Next came study group with Jessica Bailey and her band of know-it-alls and teacher’s pets. There were only really three ways a girl could succeed at Dulwick: she could get stellar grades, excel at sport, or she could simply be good at talking, like Jessica Bailey. No one could describe what she thrived at in school, yet everyone hailed her as the paragon of a proper Dulwick student.
Jessica Bailey bared her sharp teeth at Penelope that evening, amidst the tall bookshelves and large table where, just minutes ago, their study group had assembled.
“There’s something you need to understand if you’re to stay here,” Jessica said.
Penelope’s hands were shaking, she hid them in her pockets.
“Yes, people found out you’re here on a scholarship. So what?”
“I don’t care about them knowing,” Penelope replied.
“You’re not listening.” Jessica’s teeth glinted as she sucked in a breath. “The kids here, they’ve never liked you. Tolerated you, maybe. But not liked. And it wasn’t because of some scholarship. It was all because of you. Who you are as a person.”
Penelope didn’t know what to say to that. She knew she was being humiliated, she should have been embarrassed or angry. But all she felt was an empty acknowledgement, as if Jessica had just affirmed what she had always suspected.
“You’re not one of us. Do you understand?”
“You’re totally wrong,” she bit back. “As always.”
But Jessica had just laughed at her. She swung her bag off the table, and turned around for one final punch.
“Believe whatever you want, Penny.”
When she was gone Penelope leaned against the mezzanine and watched the rest of the library, willing her head to stop spinning. Once the floor no longer felt like it would give way beneath her feet, she gulped down the rest of her cold coffee and moved her things to a smaller desk in the corner. She studied deep into the night.
“Even you have to agree! He’s cute! He is!” Emily was exclaiming, too loudly.
Claire laughed then coughed, tendrils of smoke leaving her lips.
Emily, Claire and their friends weren’t considered a valuable addition to the student body. They were neither gifted scholars nor athletes, and they didn’t suck up to the teachers. This, in Penelope’s eyes, made them some of the sanest people on the entire grounds.
Claire shifted to cross her ankles. She reclined on the white-tiled window sill, head half turned against the night breeze of a small window, a cigarette raised to her lips. Next to her, Emily perched with her dirty Mary Janes in the sink, cupping her head with one hand.
Claire looked down at Penelope with half-interested eyes. They were dull amber.
“What is your type, Nellie?” She asked.
“What?”
“Well, I’ve never seen you show an interest in anything other than studying.” She inhaled and turned to blow smoke into the night air.
Penelope shrugged. “I guess, I never really thought about… relationships.”
“Nooo, of course you haven’t,” Emily said, jokingly. “You’re much too concerned with that scholarship of yours. I, for one,” she gestured one hand as if giving a speech, “wouldn’t even be here if I had a choice. And if I had to study for it?” She made an outraged expression and shook her head.
It must be noted then that Emily, Claire, and their friends, all ticked the only other standard Dulwick set for its students: they were incredibly wealthy.
“So how are you supposed to find anyone attractive when you’re stuck with your head in a book all day? Ah—” She put up a finger to silence her. “Don’t lie to me, you were coming back from the library, from study group with awful Jessica Bailey—” She made a gagging noise.
“Jessica?” Claire said. “God, I hate Jessica.” Claire turned her full attention on Penelope, “I didn’t know you two were friends—”
“We’re not,” she replied.
Emily laughed. “Oh, I’m sure they’re not.”
Claire joined in.
Penelope managed a crooked smile and slid down onto the floor.
“I agree with Emily,” Claire said. “I don’t understand you at all. You need to go out, experience life.”
Thus Penelope’s remaining weeks at Dulwick revolved around studying, avoiding other students and occasionally attempting what Claire and Emily deemed as ‘experiencing life’, which usually meant meeting new people, music, and sneaking into dorms in the middle of the night. Not all of it was awful, but she could feel herself sleeping less, worrying more and feeling distinctly- faded and worn out, like a wrung-out cloth. As if every day when she woke up, there was simply less of her. And more often than before, she wasn’t where she was supposed to be. She watched herself from the outside, speaking, laughing, lyin, yet it wasn’t her.
Then— What came then?
She was in the library, hunched over another book. Its contents puzzling, her small lamp flickering. She was all alone.
She was walking home on a cold night, putting her collar up against the biting wind, wrapping her arms around the soft wool. She had bought the coat with the prize money from an essay competition. She’d written about modern interpretations of Icarus, of how he would have looked, a burning star in London’s sky. Icarus with his melting wings, falling and drowning in the Thames.
Claire’s eyes danced through amber glass, like dripping honey, the most beautiful thing she had ever seen. She remembered. Then, they heard footsteps coming from outside. The clicking of heels in an empty corridor. The window shut, Claire’s throne discarded for a cramped cubicle. Somehow the two of them were right beside each other.
No, she wasn’t there. She wasn’t in class, or at mass, or even sitting the damned Christmas exams themselves. She was swaying on the train platform after, the floor beneath her shoes buzzing, the air busy with the chatter of strangers. She looked around briefly, but she couldn’t think of who she was looking for.
Then, she was (or maybe wasn’t) blurred against the hazy countryside, and she’d been reading. Zooey had finally climbed out of the bathtub and explained to Franny the meaning of Seymour’s fat lady.
The girl that wasn’t stood before the doorstep of her home, Penelope thought, and once she crossed it, she was. She spoke to her mum like her old self again, the way she hadn’t been able to strain to talk to people at school anymore, every sentence a thinly veiled allusion to some expectation of success.
She awoke on the soft carpet of her living room. Beside her, Julia (Drusilla), her little sister, was watching cartoons.
“Hi, Dru,” she said weakly. “How’ve you been?”
“Eh,” Dru replied. Penelope smiled and sat up.
“You look tired,” Dru observed.
“I–I haven’t slept very well. I had to study a lot. It might have all been for nothing, though.”
“Why?” Dru asked.
“They might kick me out,” Penelope replied.
“Why?” Dru repeated, surprised.
“They claim I was caught doing something I didn’t do,” she said.
“That’s really unfair,” Dru said. “So you’re going to move?”
“What?” Penelope said. “No, they wouldn’t actually kick me out. I’m one of their best students.”
“So you like it there?” Dru asked. “The place where you lose sleep and they frame you for stuff?”
“I—” Penelope thought for a moment. “That’s the thing,” she said. “Everyone wants to know if my grades are good and what the facilities are like and how it’ll affect my future career… but not if I’m happy there. Or if I would change anything. I would change so much, Dru, given the chance.”
Dru rolled her eyes. “I’ll take that as a no,” she laughed. “You know you’ll have to tell Mum now.”
“Oh bollocks,” Penelope said, collapsing back onto the floor in resignation.
She closed her eyes and felt herself sinking into the carpet as the sounds around her swam in and out of focus. She slept.
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