Halfway House

Lawrence has recently been taken out of foster care due to him turning 16 years of age, and has been residing in a residential housing scheme for the last five months. It’s a kind of ‘halfway house’ which helps youngsters make the transition between foster care and living by their own means. The halfway house […]

PA for a Day

WTF is going on? You may ask… Well… my mother works for herself and for no other reason than trying to impress one of her clients, she claimed that she had a Personal Assistant to help manage her diary, run errands, keep her topped up with coffee and so on. It was one of those […]

Ashford Academy: New Term, New Uniform

A group of Ashford boys are chatting in the school yard. “So what do you think about the new uniform?” Tom asked. The rest expressed their disapproval, most of whom were transferring to Central Comprehensive to avoid having to wear it. “Lucky buggers.” Tom gulped. “You’re not staying here are you?” John asked. Tom nodded […]

A Surrogate Sister

My brothers and I were all concerned about our mother. A few years ago she was a normal happy mother, full of the joys of spring, so to speak. But after the doctors told her that she could no longer have children, meaning she wouldn’t have the daughter she’d always longed for, she fell into […]

Double Trouble

Neither myself nor my brother could believe this was happening as our mother opened the double doors of our wardrobe to reveal a resplendent display of skirts, blouses and dresses. “You honestly don’t expect us to wear those do you?” Peter asked. “Well after you two have had a bath, you won’t have any choice […]

Growing up is hard to do

Peter’s childhood was relatively normal; he played army with his friends, climbed trees, had a train set and loads of action figures and liked nothing more than his trusty old jeans with a hole in the knee, a zip up hoodie and his thoroughly worn in trainers. His mother, Helen is an architect and his […]

Jenny’s Room: prologue

I never understood my sister… or girls in general. It seemed as long as something was pink, they liked it. Growing up, my toys were trains and tanks, aircraft and spaceships. Action man, Batman, Spiderman, guns and skateboards and remote control cars. My sister however had dolls, a dolls house, and yet more dolls. She […]

Abigail’s Party

“Peter!” shouted his mother from the foot of the stairs. “What?” Peter shouted from his bedroom. “I need to go into town to get some things for Abigail’s party on Saturday.” “OK.” he shouted back. A moment later his mum shouted, “Well come on then, I haven’t got all day.” “Can’t I stay here?” he […]

Mother’s Day

It was the Friday afternoon art class and as we all filtered in and took our seats, the teacher announced, “Now children I’m sure you’re all aware it’s Mother’s Day on Sunday… so today we’re all going to make Mother’s Day cards.” A few of the kids put their hands up and said they’d already […]