Colour Coded

“You can go in, you know,” Ms. Hayes said kindly to me. She walked off, her heels echoing loudly in the empty corridor.

I nodded, trying to muster a smile onto my face. I dithered outside the classroom door in front of me, wondering how many times I should knock. Oh, what the hell! I thought, opening the door. The classroom seemed so noisy it was probably impossible for anyone to hear me anyway. I could hear the teacher roaring at the class to be quiet.

As I opened the door, there was a sudden silence, so abrupt and shrill I could hear my own breathing. No one said a word, not even the teacher. I could feel eyes staring at me, fascinated. Loud whispers of “that’s the new girl” could be heard from a mile away.

I looked at my new form class, frowning slightly. There was something strange about this class. It looked kind of – sorted, or organised. I didn’t know what had given me that feeling about the class, but just by looking at the class, somehow, I thought it looked really structured. And it wasn’t because of the tables and chairs or anything,

“Hello,” I blurted out. My voice sounded loud in the hushed classroom. “I'm the new girl.” I silently cringed. “I’m the new girl”? What was that about?

“Ah!” the teacher said. He looked quite fat – you could see his belly flopping over his trousers, straining his shirt buttons. He had horrible, greasy brown hair. “This is – forgive me, how do you say your name?” He said it in a polite way, yet I could tell that he didn’t like me already.

“It’s Salsabeela,” I replied shortly.

“Oh, OK. Welcome to H9. You can sit –” he looked around for an empty chair, and found one next to a surly, thin girl with long blonde hair (which looked like it had seen a hair straightener way too many times) and unnaturally bright, electric blue eyes (I’m guessing that they were contact lenses) – “there, next to Ashley.”

Ashley’s desk was right at the back of the classroom, in the corner. She looked even more moody as she moved her bag from the chair next to her to the floor. I made my way over to her desk, and tried to pull the chair out. It didn’t budge. One of the legs was stuck between the legs of her chair.

“Um, sorry, could you move your chair a little bit, please?”
She looked me up and down, her eyes lingering on my scarf and then on the hem of my long skirt. She shot me a filthy look before reluctantly getting out of her chair and untangling it. Then Ashley plonked herself down again on her chair.

I got out my pencil case and the new diary that Ms. Hayes had just given me. I could feel eyes on me again. Dropping my bag on the floor, I sat up and stared at the board, ignoring all the curious looks of my new classmates. “So, class, the new topic is Citizenship. To start us off, I would like each of you to tell us the country your parents come from. And you may as well say your name so Sal – the new girl can get to know some of your names. Let’s start with Mary, shall we?” He nodded at the girl right at the front.

“My name’s Mary. My parents are from Jamaica.”

The girl next to her said: “I’m Natalie. My parents are from Congo.”
The girl in the desk behind her said, “I'm Theresa. Mine are from Barbados.”

“Rianna. Mine are from Mali.”

“Natasha. Uganda.”

“I'm Hope – mine are from Sierra Leone.”

“Abena – from Nigeria.”

“Francesca – Nigeria.” How come they're all from Africa or the West Indies? I thought. I shrugged. Maybe it’s just a coincidence.

“Aadila – Somalia.” 

“Halima. Somalia.”

“Amrita. India.”

“Afaf. India.” At last, I thought. At least we’re getting to the Asians now.

“Mehbooba. Afghanistan.”

“Taslima. Pakistan.”

“Eesha. India.”

“Fadeela. Bangladesh.”

“Alima. Pakistan.”

“I’m Sara – my mum’s Bangladeshi and my dad’s Pakistani.”

“Rabia – Bangladesh.”

“Naima – Bangladesh.” This was repeated another four times. Everyone laughed as the “Bangladesh” was repeated so many times.

“Alexandra. England.”

“Lucy. England.”

Finally it came to our desk. “Ashley. England and Israel,” Ashley said shortly. My mouth fell open. That girl looked totally English. She didn’t look Israeli at all!

“Salsabeela. Palestine,” I said, trying to sound nonchalant.

“You're not,” said Ashley, before she could stop herself.

“I am. I was born there.” I stared resolutely at her, silently daring her to say anything.