[Explanatory Note: I feel like writing some fiction again, but not sure I want to commit to a full month of nothing but an improvised story at this time. Instead, I am officially inaugurating the Schoolyard Tales series, in which I will attempt to create some recurring characters and provide them with a series of self-contained stories for them to feature in. This may or may not spin out into something bigger over time — I haven’t decided yet.]

[Second Explanatory Note: I am English, and as such all the Schoolyard Tales will be set in an English school. This means any mention of “football” refers to soccer, people will use words like “wanker” and no-one has any idea what a “Glee Club” is.]

It was the first day after the holidays — a time for renewal, a time for changes. Today marked the day that some moved on to the next stage of their lives, while others began the part of their journey that would eventually lead to adulthood, and others still were stuck in the middle — drifters, wondering what their role in life was, where they’d end up and whether or not there was any point to it all.

It was 8 a.m., and the bus stop on St George’s Road had by now picked up a small collection of kids. The atmosphere was muted. The only sound was the distant sound of traffic, the wind rustling the nearby trees, and the tinny rasp of a mobile phone speakers playing “Power” by Kanye West, its appreciative audience of two halfheartedly dancing and occasionally attempting to sing along, while the remainder of the bus stop’s population occasionally gave disgruntled glares in their direction.

Erin Adams adjusted her tie, tightening the knot slightly and pulling it up to the collar of her blouse. She knew that most girls her age tended to wear their ties very short, tucking the longer narrow end into their blouses, but she preferred to be neat and tidy. It was a trait she’d picked up from her mother, who was a compulsive cleaner. The Adams house was always free of dust and looked immaculate — all apart from Erin’s room, of course, after an incident with a diary and the subsequent screaming match had taught Mrs Adams that interfering with her daughter’s personal space would be a very bad idea.

Erin sighed to herself. She was the new girl. It was all right for the little kids standing over there, wide eyed and curious, apart from the one with his head stuck in his iPhone — how the hell did he afford that? — they got to all be new together. But to join a new school in Year 9, when all the cliques have already formed, everyone is already friends with one another and no-one knows quite what to make of a new face?

She wasn’t relishing the prospect, but she knew it was an unavoidable one. Erin’s father had fled the family some months previously, leaving Erin and her mother in a house they couldn’t afford. Mrs Adams, who had always been rather strong-willed, spent a day of grieving for her failed marriage before waking up bright and early the next day to begin preparations for what she called “The Big Move”.

She’d done her best to make it seem like an exciting adventure, and Erin appreciated her mother’s efforts to remain upbeat. But Erin had always been something of a daddy’s girl, and she missed her father very much. His departure had been sudden, unannounced, inexplicable. He’d made no attempt to reconnect with the family — he’d just packed his bags and gone, and neither Erin nor her mother knew where to find him. Erin knew that she should probably resent him for forcing her into the role of the new girl this late in her school career, but she was more confused than anything else.

She blinked and looked around. No-one seemed to have noticed her presence, or if they had, they didn’t seem to care too much. Perhaps the school got a lot of new kids.

Her thoughts were interrupted by the arrival of the bus. It was a battered-looking old double decker that had seen better days. She joined the line of figures trudging up to the now-open door and fumbled in her trouser pocket for her purse, which contained the bus pass she’d been given.

“Pass please,” said the driver, a kindly-looking bald man with a salt-and-pepper goatee. Erin flashed her pass and he nodded, waving her through into the body of the bus.

She surveyed her surroundings. A few kids were scattered on the ground floor. There were a couple of tiny-looking Year 7s who looked as if they were friends from primary school, desperately sticking together in a hope they wouldn’t have to talk to anyone they didn’t know. There was a tough-looking kid sitting in the middle of the back seat, legs akimbo and arms resting on the backs of the seats around him. No-one was sitting anywhere near him. Erin made a mental note to give him a wide berth. Back-seat kids were generally trouble, in her experience.

She decided to ascend the stairs to the top deck. The bus gave a lurch as she was halfway up, and she nearly fell, but managed to grab hold of the handrail in time. The experience made her heart pound, and she realised that she was actually quite nervous about this whole experience. If a bus pulling away could feel like something frightening, then clearly she was on edge.

She emerged from the staircase on to the top deck, which was also sparsely populated. The number of kids catching this bus really didn’t warrant a double-decker, but Erin guessed that the elderly-looking bus would probably have been retired long ago were it not for the school run.

She looked around. A blonde girl with long, immaculate-looking hair. A bespectacled nerdy type in a puffer jacket. A sour-faced boy in a baseball cap. And a couple of giggling boys looking at something concealed by their bags.

Erin walked through the juddering bus and selected a seat that was out of the way of everyone else. She gazed out of the window as the vehicle passed through the streets of the town she’d had just a few weeks to learn to call home. Past what passed for its high street — a tiny collection of local shops, a Co-Op and a Smiths. Past that new-looking estate with the nice, clean-looking houses. Past that really old church. And into the traffic leading through the school gates.

Erin heard the bus driver growl something downstairs and sound the horn. Evidently someone was getting in the way. It had always been the case at her old school, too — tons of kids were driven to school by their parents, and it made the traffic hell. Erin had been able to walk to her old school, so she always watched the congestion with some amusement. Now she was stuck in it, she could see why people got frustrated.

She heard the “hiss” of the doors opening downstairs, and the driver call out “Everybody off! Might as well get out here, ’cause we’re not going anywhere and I ain’t making you late!”

The kids on the bus got up and trudged miserably downstairs. Erin waited until they’d all passed before following them and getting off the bus.

This was it, then. Time to be The New Girl.