Girlhood

“We have to keep digging!” shouted Martha in a feeble attempt to be heard over the unrelenting rain slicing through the trees. Martha turned to face the two girls standing either side of her, stoic in the sinking mud, their faces barely visible in the daylight that was slowly disappearing behind smoke-coloured clouds.

“I don’t like this guys, I have a really bad feeling about this” Jen muttered to the group as she choked back tears that threatened to spill. The rain was unforgiving, pooling in the mud under the girl’s now-ruined shoes, their patent shine caked in clumps of earth and scuffed from the desperate hike through lifeless twigs and leaves that lay unmoving on the uneven ground. Martha extended a shaking arm to Sara, her skin erupting in goose bumps as she offered her a shovel, the rain pelting down on the white sleeve of her school shirt that now clung to her skin. Sara’s brow furrowed at the sight of the girl who she had only ever encountered in the long corridors of their school, the school that had become the backdrop to the storm-shrouded woods where they now stood. Sara accepted the shovel hesitantly and pierced it in the mud, leaning on the wooden handle as she sighed heavily; her breath visible in the cold, damp air, “you owe me big time.” Martha smiled thinly at Sara in agreement and decided that she would find a way to pay her back somehow, although she knew deep down that there was nothing that could settle this debt. A crack of thunder splintered the silence that had settled upon the group, the inky sky blanketed in white light for just a second, illuminating the three girls and exposing the worried features that weighed heavily on their youthful faces.

The rain was getting angrier; all cymbals and drums in percussion, the heavy droplets falling faster, faster, faster. Martha’s gaze snapped suddenly to Jen who had picked up her shovel and started to dig once more, her eyes fixed on the growing hole in the forest floor, blinking against the cold drops of rain hanging from her brow, her copper hair sticking to her flushed cheeks. Jen was small for a sixteen-year-old girl and had the kind of face that made babies stare, her mother would tell her with wine-stained teeth, you don’t have to be smart because you’re pretty, people will respect you for that. She wasn’t the sort of girl who would be caught in a storm in the middle of February with two other girls she hardly knew, but this was no ordinary day, and her pretty couldn’t fix this mess.

Martha and Sara joined in, their muscles aching from the synchronised plunge and pull of the shovels, the mud easy enough to shift in its slick state but the repetitive movement caused their arms to shake and their grips to loosen. No one spoke of the gruesome reality of their meeting, about how they’d only learned each other’s names just hours before, about how their lives would be forever entwined and united by one decision that would take root in their being and grow with them like a tattoo on skin: tightening and stretching through the years.

Sara was the first to break the silence as she shouted over the orchestra of sounds, “it’s going to be too dark soon, we need to hurry before people notice that we’re gone”. Sara dug harder, reaching deeper into the hole and almost losing her footing, Martha caught her elbow as she stepped over the ledge to catch her, her feet sliding with the slick mud. “Thanks” said Sara breathlessly, glancing up at her. The girls pulled back and made their way out, stepping back to observe their progress. Jen rested her shovel against a tree and joined them. As the girls stood there in the clearing of the forest, their wet hair hanging limp down their backs, their lips mottled with a purple-blue sheen from the biting cold, they stared vacantly at the hole that would keep their girlhood and think to themselves I wish we had more time together. But time wasn’t on their side that day, and as they picked their shovels up one last time, they covered up their girlhood with the familiar mud, throwing it down as hard as they could to be sure it would never be found. And the wind whipped through the skeletal trees, carrying the secrets that belonged to the forest now, loyal to the girls whose shovels squelched in the mud as they worked to bury their anguish, along with the body of a boy who had the cruellest intentions and the gross audacity to take what was not his.

“He had it coming”, Sara’s voice was barely above a whisper, her brown eyes darkened as the last of the mud hit the plastic tarp, her rage potent in the thick mist rising off the rain-soaked forest. The storm eased and the mist settled, and the sun disappeared behind the pointy trees. The girls looked up then and noticed the moon had swapped places with the sun and they admired the silvery glow that glistened off their pale skin.

Martha thought of the boy then, about his wandering hands and his pig-tongue poking out of his lips and the way his dark hair stuck to the side of his sweaty neck as he hung over her, his knees pinching the inside of her thighs, his shrimp eyes flicking up and down. Martha squeezed her eyes shut and longed for the girl she was that very morning before that boy followed her into the woods. Sara recognised the expression on Martha’s face, how her fair lashes sunk into her wrinkled eyelids and the freckles that dusted her nose became lost in the scrunch of her skin, and she reached out and placed her hand on Martha’s shoulder, for she too missed who she was before she ran to the sound of Martha’s screams echoing through the dense forest. Martha leaned into Sara’s touch, taking the hand from her shoulder and holding it against her chest, she did the same on her other side, grasping Jen’s small hand in hers and bringing it up to meet Sara’s, accepting the heavy guilt that sat on her back as she thought of who Jen was that morning, walking through the thicket with her earphones in, Martha wondered what she was listening to when she found the boy pulling Sara to the ground as the sky turned grey and the rain began to fall. The girls stood there like that, holding each other’s blistered hands until Martha’s voice cut through the stillness, “let’s never speak of this day again”.

10 years later

“Have you seen my white blouse?! The one with the collar and the bows!” Martha’s voice carried through the golden sun-lit hallway in a third-storey apartment in Acton.

“No I ha-“

“Never mind – got it!” Martha interrupted, grinning widely at the tall blonde man splayed out on their king-sized bed, one arm draped over a sleeping bundle of furry limbs, Martha’s beloved Bear who was smitten with her new boyfriend, Dean, who was on dog-sitting duty tonight. Tripping over her long legs, Martha raced out of her apartment and down the steps to begin the short walk to the pub while the sun was going down, casting a faint glow on the pavement, the warm air felt close the way long nights in July do in central London. Rounding the corner, Martha saw her friends sitting under the awning of their local pub, copper hair spilling in waves down sun-kissed shoulders, and dark brown hair hanging high in a tight ponytail; the women turned then, seeing Martha striding toward them and smiled. Martha sat across from them at the picnic style bench and gathered their hands in hers, as she always did, holding them tight in the space between them.

“I missed you both” Martha exclaimed.

“It’s only been a week M” Sara reassured her.

Jen chuckled, looking between her two closest friends, sisters really, and said “a week too long”.

The women laughed together and poured over details of the week that had gone by, and when the rain began to fall softly around them, pattering on the awning above their heads, their girlish features sang in harmony in the soft glow of the setting sun.

Their girlhood never was buried in that forest behind the school on that cold February afternoon, it was inside all of them, held closely in their hands that sparked when they touched.