“Stop looking so worried, Olivia dear…I have already talked to your Auntie Sheila…and I will talk to Miss Cooper, when I drop you off with her…no one is going to tell you off about yesterday, I promise?” Caroline said as she zipped up my school coat to my throat, doing just about everything for me. Not that I felt capable of doing much for myself, but she had not given me the chance.
“I ruined everyone’s day…everyone will hate me…and they all know about my accident?” I pointed out, feeling rather sorry for myself, genuinely nervous about going to Deepdene. I was starting to feel more comfortable about my predicament, after a long talk with Caroline, during which I had learned a lot more about Olivia and her life, but actually going to school as Olivia felt so daunting that I wanted to burst into tears, all over again. And actually, saying I felt more comfortable was relative. I had just about managed to stop freaking out, and tears were never that far away. But I was trying really hard to hold myself together, because my episodes, as she called them, upset everyone, especially the twins, and me. I knew it was blind panic, but they did not, and I really wanted to move on, so that I could work out what I was going to do to get my own life back. Because I just had to do something. No one else was going to help me, so I clearly had to help myself, and I could not do that if I kept freaking out all the time.
“We will come and find you at break and lunch, we promise.” Chloe assured me, taking hold of my hand, sensing my nerves. “And we’ll remind you to go to the loo?”
“If you want us too…you usually don’t like it?” Grace added, uncertainly.
“Thanks.” I mumbled, meaning it. The twins were so sweet, even if I hardly knew them, and I appreciated their support, more than I could ever say. “I do want you to help?”
“It’s a fresh start, girls…for all of us…Olivia knows that the best way of not having to use her pull-ups is to go to the toilet every chance she gets…and she will go to Auntie Sheila if she is wet, won’t you, Olivia?”
“Yes, Mummy.” I promised, looking up at her.
“Because then, no one will have to check you, or change you, which is what upsets you most of all…isn’t it, darling?” She persisted, fussing over the hood of my heavy coat, and my school hat, and the dreaded chinstrap. She had come up with a plan for me, to make me feel better. It seemed that Olivia had been fighting her bladder problems, or trying to ignore them, with rather embarrassing and disastrous results. But it was my body all of a sudden, my bladder, and I did not want to keep wetting myself. So, the fresh start idea was Caroline’s way of forgetting how uncooperative Olivia had been, and starting again, which I was going along with, obviously enough, for my own reasons. But I really was not looking forward to going to school as Olivia and she had noticed, so she had gone into overdrive to try and alleviate what she thought were my main concerns.
“Yes, Mummy.”
“And I have already asked Sheila to deal with any potential comments…about your accident yesterday…no one is going to say anything nasty to you, I promise pickle…” She said, before guiding us all out of the house to the car. Bundled up in the school uniform again, we were all strapped into our car seats, and Caroline got into her seat and drove off. I had not really taken much notice of the journey home the day before, or the house itself, really, but that morning I was taking slightly more interest, because as I had not turned back into a pumpkin at midnight as the magic wore off, which had occurred to me as a possibility at one stage, I was facing up to the simple fact that I was stuck as Olivia. So, I needed to get some sort of control of her life or everything would just keep spiraling out of control. It was my life, all of a sudden, hopefully temporarily, but I needed some control to allow me to think straight. It was a big house, and a big car, and there was a long drive, with electric gates. Caroline turned left onto what looked like a country lane, still talking away to us, jollying me along more than anything, I think, and I wondered where we actually were. I had no real idea where Deepdene was, and no idea where the Montague’s lived, other than the fairly basic information that it was about a ninety-minute coach journey away from the Victoria and Albert Museum in central London, I suppose. That could be anywhere, in a vast circle around the capital, and that gave me my first pang of worry about my old life, about Kelly’s life.
I had not been thinking much about my old life, because the frightening nightmare I had been dropped into as Olivia had been too overwhelming. But after a decent sleep, I was feeling a bit better, despite my nerves, and other things were starting to pop into my head, such as mum and Martin, and Gemma, who had an impostor in their lives. I missed my mum, but it was weird to think that she might not be missing me, because she had me right there. And I could be miles and miles away from her, right over on the other side of London, because I had never heard of Deepdene before. So, I kept my eyes on the road, looking for any signs. Knowing my location would help, I told myself, although I was not quite sure how. But I had a feeling that I needed to come up with a plan of action, to do something to help myself, and if I did not know where I was, I did not see how I could really plan anything. I was actually quite pleased about how I had managed my little talk with Caroline the night before. I had managed to get quite a lot of information out of her, one way or the other, and although she had not taken my comments about the Dream Stone seriously at all, I had got it into her head that something about the Stone had upset me. I did not know what good that would do me, because I had no clue what I was going to do about my bizarre predicament, but I was happier making some sort of progress to help myself. And then, as Caroline braked for a tee junction, I saw a road sign, and nearly wet myself in surprise. We were turning left, towards Leatherhead according to the sign, which was eight miles away according to the number beside the word, but if she had turned right, the sign said that Redhill was only six miles away.
I had heard of Leatherhead, but never actually been there. I knew it was near to junction nine on the M25 motorway, because Reigate and Redhill were near to junction eight, so whenever I saw that name on the road signs, I always knew we were nearly home. And I knew all of the schools in Reigate and Redhill, and a few others nearby, because the Redstone boys played them at football, or the girls played them at netball or hockey. But other than that, I had no idea about other schools in the area, and especially private ones. And I had never heard of Deepdene before, but it turned out that it was in-between Dorking and Leatherhead, whilst the Montagues lived in a village just outside the town of Dorking, which was just six miles from Redhill, where Olivia would be waking up in my cosy little bed and my body, and presumably preparing to go to Redstone in my place. No distance at all, half an hour on the bus.
“Olivia…you are miles away…do you feel all right?” Caroline said, dragging me back to the present as we all got out of the car.
“Yes, Mummy…are you going to talk to Miss Cooper?” I asked, chewing my lip.
“Yes, darling…you stay with your sisters until the bell…and I will see you all this afternoon when I pick you all up, okay?” She reminded me, before hugging and kissing me. Then, Grace and Chloe, taking one hand each, led me out onto a playground, surrounded on three sides by what looked like an old mansion, where several hundred girls in dark blue coats and dark blue felt hats were greeting friends and waiting for the call to go inside. It was quite a sight, for me at least, because at Redstone, although everyone wore the same uniform, they wore their own version of it, and their own coats, and all looked slightly different. But at Deepdene, everyone looked exactly the same. It was quite a powerful image.
“So…we will see you at break?” Grace checked, as I spotted Miss Cooper and guessed that I had to go that way as someone started to ring an old hand bell.
“Yes…please?” I said, before hugging them goodbye. It was ridiculous, really. I felt so small and vulnerable, because Olivia was small, the size of an eight-year-old Caroline had said, and everyone queuing for the year seven classroom was a lot bigger than me. But Kelly was used to Redstone, which was a much bigger school, with over a thousand pupils, most of whom were much more intimidating than a bunch of private school girls in hats and hooded coats. Several of the girls heading for the same door as me stared, or glared, but I just looked down, shuffling closer to my next challenge, my stomach churning with real terror.