Friends and Their Adventures

Adventure awaits around every corner. That was definitely true when it came to the everyday comings and goings for myself and my best friend.

We lived across the road from each other and were in the same classes at school.

Speaking of school, we both hated it with a passion.

Those days were filled with nasty, horrid teachers and pupils.

We tried every trick in the book to dodge school.

Things came to a head in our fourth year when the headmistress took a very strong dislike to us both.

Every opportunity she picked on us.

We'd had enough so it was time for drastic action.

We pondered the possibilities.

Blowing up the school wasn't an option so we decided we'd go to London as Tricia's gran lived there.

I had a wee stash of money – Tricia only had a few pounds – but we were going no matter what.

We decided to wear our casual clothes under our uniform to curb suspicion.

We said bye to our mums but my sister who always walked to school with her own pals decided she was coming with us – she was always a tricky wee bugger.

Both of us thought, OMG! How will we dodge her?

No amount of convincing worked: it just made her more determined.

‘I'm not stupid, you are up to something and if you don't tell me I will go straight to Mum.’

Hit with this ultimatum we had to agree.

The problem now was cash flow as we had three trips to cover.

Tricia piped up that she’d acquired more money during the night.

I got a shock when she announced she'd taken her mum's electricity stamps and she'd cash them in at the post office.

Next thing we needed to do was ditch the uniforms.

I put mine in my bag but Tricia decided to throw hers in the burn.

‘That's a bit hasty,’ I said, imagining how mad her mum would be, between losing her stamps and now having to buy another uniform.

She was adamant that she didn't need it anymore as she had officially left school.

Janice was getting into the swing of things too.

The tie was off, flung over a fence and hanging from a tree.

I had to remind her that if she took anymore off she'd be left in her underwear.

At the station we found out we couldn't afford to go to London so we quickly decided on Invergordon instead.

We decided to travel in style and headed to first class.

When we arrived in Inverness we heard chatter about the train being searched so we grabbed our bags and, luckily, made it to the next train.

Our relief was short-lived as the police boarded and headed straight for us.

‘Names,’ they snapped.

We were marched off the train whilst we pleaded, ‘Can we not just go to visit our Aunt?’

‘No chance! You have caused enough trouble sending us on a wild goose chase.’

We were led to a waiting car and told we were going to a children's home.

We were dumbfounded.

‘Isn't that a bit severe? It's not as if we've committed murder. We only wanted a wee holiday.’

‘Don't panic, it's only for one night. You've missed the last train.’

We got introduced to another staff member who was very abrupt.

‘How much money do you have?’ she growled.

‘Fifteen pounds,’ I replied.

She then started searching us and found forty-five pounds in my pocket. She gave me an awful look.

‘You lied.’

‘I meant fifteen pounds each,’ I replied.

Janice and Tricia were in fits of laughter but that made her even angrier.

She shouted at me and separated me from the others.

I was whisked away to a separate block.

We had an early start the next day and I was unhappy when I found out my life savings had been used to purchase our tickets… skint again.

We were dreading facing our parents but we needn't have worried. They were just glad to have us back safe and well.

There was no respite, we were up for school the next day and marched to the headmistress.

She said we'd be heavily monitored.

The skidgers books were issued and we had to come to her office four times each day to get them signed.

It was a lovely wee red book but it didn't stop us from missing classes.