Holly

We always used to spend hours playing at the well at the bottom of James Tadcaster’s garden, well, until Holly went and fell down it. She was always a selfish bitch.
         Her funeral wasn’t anything special, just the usual tripe; crying women, wailing children and middle aged men choosing to exercise their right to shove out their stiff upper lips. With all the media attention you would have thought that little blonde haired Holly was a religious martyr, not an 8 year old child who had the balance of a one legged, no tailed cat. Excuse me if I sound bitter, I really don’t mean to be, I guess I just never saw the need to waste my life mourning those who revelled in hindering rather than helping me. Let me try and explain a little further...
         At the time when Holly nose dived down the well my friends and I had all just started at the local comprehensive; it wasn’t a particularly outstanding school because we weren’t particularly outstanding kids. We all lived within a ten minute bike ride from each other and we all carried out the same little banal rituals day in, day out. Every weekday morning we’d meet outside “Jerry’s Little Shopper” and make our way to another 5 lessons of sub-standard teaching. I’d like to pretend that we were a bunch of wild and carefree kids, but that would make me a liar. In all honesty we spawned from a bunch of middle class parents who cared more about what was on sale at the shops and how they could get one up on the neighbours rather than how much homework we’d been set or what daily percentage of salt we were coating our processed meals in at lunch time. I don’t want you to think badly of them though, those were just the times, no parent in their right mind cared about their kids BMI or whether little Jimmy was reaching his full potential before he’d even sprouted a hair on his bollocks. As long as we were aesthetically healthy and happy, then the World could keep turning as far as our parents were concerned.
         If it wasn’t for Holly’s demise I wouldn’t even be able to remember any of my childhood friends. Once we reached sixteen we split off onto differing paths, some much more successful than others. Holly and I would probably have even ended up becoming polite acquaintances as we grew older, well, that’s if she had bothered to stay alive.
         It was a definitely a Saturday that day we were all at James’. I can say this with such unswerving clarity as I distinctly remember watching Tom and Jerry on channel 4 before I got dressed. Those were the times before it was thought of as dangerous to let your young child watch two animals beat the shit out of each other with an array of large and brightly coloured tools. Without attempting to sound overtly cliché, those were indeed “the days”.
         James and his parents were always thought of as snooty by the rest of my peers and their respective Mothers and (sometimes ever changing) Fathers. I never really understood this, just because his Mum refused to leave the house without any make up on did not make her a “stuck up cow” as my Mother often referred to her. In fact poor Mrs Tadcaster killed herself just five years after that day; turned out she’d been suffering from body dysmorphic disorder. Bless.
         You’ve got to understand that Holly was a genuinely horrible person. If I had any money to bet I’d put every last penny on the fact that there are paedophiles and rapists with more endearing personalities than hers. In fact it was her unrelentingly vile personality which killed her, so to speak.
         To this day I’m not sure why she even came around to the Tadcaster’s house. She wasn’t a friend of ours and she certainly never liked any of us. Part of me thinks fate had something to do with it; like she was meant to die. Then again that’s the same part of me which buys a lottery ticket every week...
         When the police questioned me about Holly’s tragic death I lied. I lied a lot. I lied about what good friends we were, I lied about how her falling down the well was an “accident”, I lied about trying to save her and I lied about how much I was going to miss her.  When I saw that she was standing on the edge of that well I knew that would be my only chance to get rid of her. I didn’t even shove her that hard and it isn’t my fault that she had no balance. I didn’t even hear her hit the bottom; I just heard her begging; her sweet little voice begging for help. The sad thing was that she realised it was all in vain. She only cried for a few minutes, I’ve found that realisation tends to silence people.          
         I visit her little grave now and again; I’ve put flowers there or more than one occasion. I don’t go because I feel any guilt or because I have a burning urge to confess. I go out of respect; it’s the same with all the people I’ve killed. I visit them all in turn and I take a few minutes out of my day to think about them, it’s the least I can do.