Imogen stumbled along the road leading from Truham to Higgs; although she was always happy to talk to Nick in the mornings, her parents' latest argument really got to her. The notion that everyone who was anyone said that it was never a child's fault if their parents got divorced was just the opposite of things in the Heaney household. In fact, her head was still pounding from all their shouting...

If her mother blamed her father for coming home late and being unable to help Imogen with her chemistry homework, as she was a beautician who was never good at that stuff, Imogen's father would turn around and say that he had a company to help run and a boss to impress, and couldn't she help Imogen with her history assignments, too?

Then, it would all come down to it being Imogen's fault for having so much homework in the first place...

Imogen didn't even like these heels that much, but her father had bought them for her as a Christmas present and she had to wear them. They were platforms that reflected light, and were black and chrome colored; decidedly not something she would wear. She didn't like stiletto heels either; she was more of a kitten heel girl, due to the wiggle prowess they afforded the wearer, and that Marilyn Monroe wore them, too. But those were very 1960s, and Bruce Heaney couldn't possibly have his daughter showcasing those out in public, now could he? According to Patricia Elizabeth Heaney, however (her mum always had to have her full name on display) they made her daughter look downright slutty.

"Not late this morning, Imogen?" Miss Greenwood asked, once Imogen had cleared the courtyard, a slightly surprised expression on her face.

Imogen fought hard not to stick her tongue out at the woman. "No, miss," she said, forcing a smile onto her lips and hurrying past to her first class of the day. She slipped off her heels as she did so, placing them into her bag, before putting on the uniform shoes as she hopped along the corridor, slipping slightly due to her tights.

"Immy, you're here!" Tara cried out, waving enthusiastically to her.

"I'm here," Imogen confirmed, smiling at Tara and waving to Darcy, who occupied the desk catty-corner to her own, which she shared with another friend of hers, Elle. "Elle still in the library talking to Tao?"

"Of course she is," Darcy confirmed, rolling her eyes. "Still in the honeymoon phase those two, it seems. Luckily they can be together openly now..."

"Hey," Tara said gently, clutching at Darcy's hand underneath their desk. "It's all okay. It's going to work out."

Imogen smiled; she truly had no issues with Tara and Darcy being together, but understood completely that the vast majority of society had issues with it, which truly disgusted her. She was also supportive of Elle, too, given that Elle was the first trans person she'd ever met; Elle had legally gotten her name changed, and had gone through gender reassignment surgery the summer after she'd turned sixteen, and looked incredible, if Imogen had anything to say about it. It had been difficult for Elle to get a new birth certificate issued, as well as a transfer from Truham to Higgs, but all had worked out in the end, and she was much happier as a result.

"Did you see Sahar this morning yet?" Darcy asked.

Imogen blinked, lowering her eyes. "No," she responded hotly; she'd been friends with Sahar for years, although things had been complicated between them since Halloween, when the pair had shared a drunken kiss at a party. She'd liked the kiss better than any of the snogs she'd shared with her Year 10 boyfriend, or with Ben the year before, which was very confusing for her, and she really didn't want to think about it. She had A-Levels to think about, plus which university she wanted to attend, not to mention what program she'd ultimately be going for. Imogen also had her parents' constant arguments to contend with; the last thing she needed was them potentially kicking her own because she more than likely had feelings for another girl—

"Hey," said Elle breezily as she entered their form, beaming with flushed cheeks.

"Oooh, someone was talking to their boyfriend," Tara declared in a sing-song voice.

Elle brushed that off; her fingers were various shades that morning, likely meaning that she was up half the night painting, although she didn't have any circles underneath her eyes. "What can I say? He inspires me," she responded.

"How's your latest piece going?" Darcy asked, knowing that Elle was hard at work on various paintings to showcase at various universities when she applied for art school.

"It's a self-portrait, and I really like it," Elle said. "I should be able to get it finished at the weekend, but I need more pink for the flowers."

"Have you finalized your list of where you're going to apply yet?" Tara wanted to know.

"The Royal College of Art, The Ruskin School of Art, and Edinburgh College of Art, are all my top UK choices," Elle told her, beaming, "but I've considered applying in places like France, Italy, Austria, Denmark, Germany... All over Europe, really. I think I could learn a lot if I expanded my horizons a bit."

"And you could create a whole new identity for yourself," Imogen said quietly, staring down at her hands, positioned primly atop her desk. "It could be a lot of fun, going somewhere where no one knows who you are..."

"Hey," Elle said, wrapping an arm around Imogen's shoulders, "has your parents' fighting gotten worse since the last time we talked?"

Imogen sighed. "Yeah, it has," she replied. "I've been looking into student housing when I go off to university which gives permission for pets. I don't want to leave Brooklyn alone, because god knows my parents won't look after him the right way..."

"Too bad there isn't a law in place to make sure that you can keep him with you," Darcy said softly, cocking her head to one side. "Like, if you'd be really emotionally distressed without him or something..."

Tara beamed at her girlfriend. "Wow, Darce. That's really beautiful."

"It is," Imogen said, straightening up with determination. "I've always been interested in the law and politics. Maybe I can help make that a reality once I get to university," she said, actually feeling hopeful for the first time in quite a while.

Miss Greenwood arrived punctually as always for form, checking in briefly with each student before attendance was taken. Imogen didn't mistake the look of disdain directed at her, due to her hasty change from her heels into her proper school shoes in the courtyard before class. After a few minutes, they were excused for their first classes, with Imogen heading to home economics and wondering why they concept of it was completely dated.

"They seriously haven't changed the bloody curriculum since the 1950s, and it shows," Sahar, a close friend of Imogen's, muttered from beside her.

Imogen turned slowly to regard her; they'd been best friends, once upon a time, but that had all changed once Imogen began dating her Year 10 boyfriend, and Sahar began playing guitar and singing lead in her band, Queer Intentions, which always seemed to cause quite a stir in their small English town. "How do you mean?" Imogen asked softly, although she knew very well what Sahar meant; she just wanted to hear her talk more, really.

Sahar fixed Imogen with a look, almost as if she was questioning whether or not she was telling the truth. "Well, the notion that virtually every lesson is a casserole dish, and the fact that, after each lesson, Mrs. Mayhew mentions us keeping up 'a timely manner, so that we don't upset our husbands when we get home'. What a load of nonsense," she muttered, pulling something out of her knapsack—her Walkman, which she clandestinely offered one of the newfangled earbud of her headphones to Imogen. "Want to listen? Mayhew won't be around for a few moments anyway, given that she needs her morning smoke..."

Imogen cautiously took ahold of the offered earbud. "You don't call them fags?" she asked innocently, Tina Turner's What's Love Got To Do With It? filling her ears and ensnaring her senses quite quickly.

Sahar made an angry expression, leading to her hands to tense slightly, leading Imogen to wonder if she was going to snatch back the earbud. "No," she responded hotly, "because of the alternative meaning that straight people have used for it."

Imogen blinked. "But, you're..."

"Not straight," Sahar responded, her tone still electrically charged. "I'm bisexual, actually, if you must know," she responded, before turning her head to stare at the wall.

"Sahar," Imogen said softly, regret in her voice, "I don't know..."

Imogen did her best to remain alert in Mrs. Mayhew's class, although the sausage they used in the sausage potato casserole was cheap and full of fat, not something she wanted to put into her body, so she failed a portion of the lesson for "refusal to taste". Rolling her eyes, she felt guilty for not knowing Sahar's sexuality, but her brain immediately caught up with her and chastised her thoughts on the matter...

You ditched her for your Year 10 boyfriend.

How was she supposed to react—just not figure out who she was while you ignored her for several months?

Sure, you used to be best friends and all—having sleepovers, sharing secrets about Daniel Day-Lewis or Roger Moore were absolutely gorgeous, and making the perfect Amaretto Sour whenever Imogen's parents or the Zahid's weren't looking...

You have no right to know about anything relating to Sahar's personal life, Imogen Heaney. You lost your chance when you chose snogging a virtual stranger over your best friend. Sorry.

Imogen did her best to push the intrusive thoughts out of her mind; after home economics, she had maths, then geography, then English. She did her best to pay attention, but the topic in maths was regression, a part of statistics, which seemed to be attacking her personally. In geography, their teacher, Mr. Harper, talked about the benefits of disbanding the Soviet Union, as well as tearing down the Berlin Wall, which Imogen could see happening, although it exhausted her to no end.

She left geography, trudging down the school's hallway, only to come to a stop in front of the events bulletin board. There was an off-campus dance that weekend, to be held for both the Truham boys and Higgs girls, with Queer Intentions headlining. Imogen's jaw dropped—front and center of the poster was Sahar, with thick, coal-black eye makeup, shimmering smokey-colored eyeshadow, and purple lips. The photograph taken of her was ostensibly from another gig, and she was mid-song as the photo had been snapped—her head was tilted upwards slightly, lips directly opposite the microphone, and singing her heart out as if her life depended on it—

"Imogen!"

Imogen turned, spotting Sherry Greene, whose twin brother, Harry, attended Truham with Nick, whom Nick didn't like all too much these days. Imogen, meanwhile, had hung out with Sherry, as well as Joanne Lange, the daughter of one of Truham's teachers, after her fallout with Sahar, and her newfound friendships with Elle, Tara, and Darcy. "Hi, Sherry," she responded; damn her and her politeness, but also knowing that, given that Sherry and Harry's father was disgustingly rich, it would, inevitably, get back to him if someone dared be mean to his children.

"What are you looking at?" Sherry asked; in some circles, her tone was bold, but, in this case, Imogen believed it sounded demanding, pompous, as if Sherry believed she was entitled to know anyone's information she wanted.

Imogen shrugged. "Nothing, I was just—"

"Wait a minute," Sherry said, her blue eyes flashing slightly as she pushed herself closer, and caught a good look at the poster. "Oh," she said, and wrinkled her nose, almost as if she had smelled something foul. "That's the girl you used to be friends with, right?" she demanded, her tone accusing.

Imogen crossed her arms. "I never stopped being friends with Sahar. What's the problem with that?" she demanded, glaring at Sherry.

Sherry huffed, rolling her eyes. "It's not as if you can't be friends with whomever you like, Imogen," she said, shaking her head. She fluffed up her already-fluffed bangs for a moment, while her pinned up, blonde curls, meanwhile, remained firmly on the back of her head. "What I don't understand is why you want to be friends with someone like her."

Imogen blinked. "I don't understand. Is something wrong with Sahar?" she asked; it wasn't what she was really asking—she was really saying, Say something bad about her. Go on and try it; I dare you.

"No," Sherry said, giggling; she had this awful habit of grinning and laughing like some mad rabbit, something that she and Harry had in common, and Imogen wondered which of the Greene parents Harry and Sherry had inherited it from. "No, of course nothing's wrong with her. It's just that... Well, she's not like us," she said, whispering the final word.

Imogen was practically shaking as she stared at Sherry. "What?" she whispered.

"Well, you have a good standing here at Higgs," Sherry responded with a light shrug. "I just don't see why you'd want to willingly associate with her. You wouldn't want anyone to get the wrong idea—"

"Now, you're giving me the wrong idea," Imogen stated, talking over Sherry. "Besides, it's not as if I'm homophobic. I'm an ally."

Sherry made a sound which sounded like a combination of a laugh and a scoff. "Whatever helps you sleep at night, Immy, darling," she responded, looking up at the bulletin board again. "I just don't think this is appropriate for a school setting... Hmmm," she mused, half to herself, before she shook her head and wandered off in the other direction.

Finally, in English, they were released into their reading groups and made to discuss The Handmaid's Tale, a newly published novel by Margaret Atwood, which frightened Imogen the more she read it.

"Imogen," Mrs. Wagner, their English teacher, cut into her thoughts, "why do you think Offred doesn't run? Why does she stay in an increasingly stifling atmosphere?"

Imogen gritted her teeth; if this wasn't turning into an allegory about her, she didn't know what was going on anymore. "I don't know," she answered plainly, and everyone's eyes turned to look over at her. "They already took her daughter away from her, had her enslaved, raped, forcibly pregnant... She literally didn't have anything to live for, other than the vague hope of resistance, so why, really, she doesn't give up, I have no idea."

Imogen could barely stomach the rest of English, with the rest of her classmates, as well as Mrs. Wagner, giving her varying looks—pity, concern, annoyance—she wasn't altogether sure. When the bell signaled that class was over, and that lunch was due to begin, she couldn't stomach the idea of sitting with Elle, Tara, and Darcy—they were all happy, and she was now a separate entity from all of them.

She needed to get outside, first and foremost, that was for sure. As she walked in the general direction of a back exit, which she knew wasn't patrolled at any time of day, she passed Sahar in the hallway, a pink slip in her hand—a pink slip was practically the same as a scarlet letter, telling anyone who saw it that the student in question who held it was being summoned to the headmistress' office. Imogen slowed up, trying to catch Sahar's eye, but was unable to do so, which doused her in another bit of discouragement.

She hurried down the rest of the corridor and out of the deserted exit, making her way down the street and off Higgs grounds to get to a high street where she could catch a bus. Her plan was to get to a mall—she had plenty of pocket money accumulated, and she could use some retail therapy. Anything to get out of mandatory lunch with happy people, no matter if they were her friends, as well as her later classes of the day—history, chemistry, and art. She caught the bus, changing out of her shoes and into her heels, and taking off her school jumper and tie, making do with a second jumper she had in her belongings.

Once off the bus, she headed into the shopping center and headed straight for Tammy Girl, her favorite shop, and perused all the racks. No one called attention to her, which was an altogether pleasant surprise, until she caught sight of a familiar face at one of the mall's restaurants. It was an Italian one, where, in happier times, her parents had taken her. Back then, there had been no arguments, her father wasn't stressed about work, and her mother actually seemed happy to have a daughter.

"Daddy," she whispered, the word popping out before she could stop it, falling from her lips, past the artificial plant life surrounding the tables, located at the top of the wall, dividing the dining space from the rest of the mall traffic.

Bruce Heaney immediately turned around, his blue eyes meeting the matching set his daughter had inherited from him, briefly ignoring his plate of beef manicotti, his confirmed favorite Italian dish. "Immy..." He said, looking quite like a deer in headlights.

The woman on the other side of the table looked a bit torn, staring for a moment at her own plate, which appeared to be a chicken Caesar salad, before she fully looked up at Imogen, and Imogen gaped—this was her aunt, Susan, whom her mother was always going on about what a bad person she was—untraditional, that was the word she'd used, because Susan was pushing thirty, hadn't gotten married, and had had the nerve to go to university and get a "man's job", a surgeon. Truth be told, her hands were immaculate, even Imogen could see that...

"Hello, Imogen," Susan said, her Southeastern accent not sounding haughty in the slightest; rather, it was gentle, as were the curls which were swept elegantly off her neck—the same curls and in the same shade that Imogen had, and that her mother would have, had she not insisted upon dying them that awful bottle blonde. "You've certainly grown up."

"I'm nearly seventeen," Imogen responded, doing her best to keep her voice from shaking; it was true, her birthday was in the spring. She straightened up, looking over at her father. "I thought that you and mum hat... Didn't like Aunt Susan," she said, stumbling briefly over her words; it was true, as her mother often said that her aunt would stop at nothing from outshining her, and it was a bloody wonder she'd even made it out of her childhood alive.

Bruce sighed, rolling his shoulders. "Well, it seems as if I've been caught out," he admitted, before he straightened up; the interrogation was, clearly, over, and he had to step back into his role as a father. "What are you doing here? I seem to recall that school ends in the mid-afternoon, and it's only gone lunchtime..."

"Bruce," Susan said gently, her tone considerate. "It's entirely possible that Imogen was having a difficult time, what with how things have been going at home..."

"Susan," Bruce interrupted, "I know you care, but this really isn't—"

"Bruce," Susan said, this time more firmly, "if Imogen was anything like how I was in school, I can assure you, wanting to get the hell out of there for a brief period is certainly the least of her worries at this point."

"Immy? Like you?" Bruce breathed, his eyes widening.

"I'm sure I'm nothing like you," Imogen snapped, her effort to keep cool in vain. "I would never go after a married man, for one thing—"

"Imogen!" Bruce cried out.

"—and I certainly wouldn't continue to have arguments with my husband within earshot of my children!" she declared. "I'm miserable, thank you very much, but you're always going on about work to care, and Mum is... Well, she's Mum..."

Susan let out a dark chuckle at that. "Considering I was raised with her, alongside our own set of less-than-stellar parents, I agree with that assessment," she answered. She shook her head before she looked up at Imogen. "How much do you really know about me?"

Imogen swallowed. "Well, you attended University of Southampton's Faculty of Medicine, and became a surgeon at Hull Royal Infirmary... I can't even begin to imagine the traffic getting from Hull to here..."

Susan raised her eyebrows. "I'm not surprised that Patricia made it out that I attended the simplest medical school to get into, or the... Well, lacking hospital known as HRI," she answered softly, shaking her head. "In point of fact, Imogen, I attended Oxford's School of Medicine, and am now a child's heart surgeon at Great Ormond Street Hospital in London."

Imogen's eyes widened. "That's the hospital that Princess Diana is always going to," she whispered, trembling with excitement.

"Yes, there are rumors that she wants to take over as our president," Susan said, seemingly pleased with the idea. "Now, about that comment about me stealing married men, that could not be further from the truth. While I adore your father, very much, he is like Theo to me."

"Oh... Uncle Theo," Imogen said, lowering her eyes to the tiled floor of the ball, remembering her uncle, who had died of scarlet fever as a child. "Mum's mentioned him, but she doesn't like talking about him..."

"No, she never did," Susan said softly. "So, your father is like a brother to me. In point of fact, Imogen, I have a partner. Her name is Samantha, and she is a brain surgeon at Great Ormond. I met her in medical school, and we are very happy together. We can't really talk about our relationship, but it's commonly accepted around the hospital that we live together, as roommates, with our cats."

Imogen blinked; she was really off her rocker today, that was for sure. "Oh," she said, feeling her cheeks heating up. "I see."

"Is anything bothering you, sweetheart, other than your mum and I arguing in front of you? I promise we'll try to stop," Bruce put in.

"Well, it's Sahar," she admitted, trembling at the notion of what she was about to say. "I mean, we haven't really talked much since our falling out last year, and now—"

Bruce's pager went off then, and he immediately took it out of his pocket, shooting Imogen a look of sympathy as he did so. "Damn, it's Immy's school," he reported to Susan.

Susan nodded. "No problem," she said, and signaled for the waiter. "Could we get these boxed up for takeaway, please? And did you want anything, sweetheart?" she asked, turning to look over at Imogen.

Imogen shook her head. "Not hungry, thank you," she said, forcing a smile onto her lips.

Bruce and Susan boxed up their meals, with Susan promising to speak to Imogen later that night, once she was off school, once she learned that Imogen had a private phone line in her bedroom, one that Patricia didn't access. Bruce steered Imogen towards the car park, where he drove her directly to Higgs, where they both knew it was time to face the music.

"What did you want to talk about, kitten?" Bruce asked, the childhood nickname meant to comfort her, but all it did was devastate her further, reminding her of all they had lost.

Imogen sighed; she had put two and two together when it came to Susan—her mother's resentment had likely begun when Susan decided to become a surgeon, and, not only did so well, but thrived in that environment. Patricia Heaney had made no mistake about being homophobic towards people, although she did have a soft spot for gay men, as "nobody knows how to style quite like they do, honey". Imogen looked outside; rain had set in, and the streets were slick with the fallen water; she had no idea how she was supposed to tell her mother about how she was feeling towards Sahar, and, while she had an inkling that her father would accept it—

"Immy?"

Imogen turned and looked over at him. "Nothing, Dad," she said quickly. "Maybe we'll talk about it later, yeah?"

"Whenever you want, sweetheart," Bruce assured her.

Imogen sighed, realizing that she would likely have a pink slip in her future, given her actions of today...