Cassie

Cassandra's mother told her 'she had it all' often but Cass didn't feel like that. She felt crap most of the time especially around people. Introspecting herself was a ritualistic beginning to her day which continued as she interacted with her peers. She aimed to be normal but continually fell short. She had inherited her mother's long willowy frame and strong bone structure so she was naturally the person that peoples' eyes followed in a room, added to her genetic gifts she'd added a short spiky pink hairstyle and dramatic black eyeshadow and pillarbox red lipstick. 

This was her amour, kept her aloof by design. The pills helped too, AJ, her boyfriend supplied her with uppers to get through the day and then in the evenings they'd hook up in the abandoned warehouse where he lived and smoke spliffs till dawn. weekends were best, they experimented with tabs that AJ or Spencer procured with the help of the leaning tower of Todd. Last week the four of them had got stopped and searched, Spencer had the tabs but the local police didn't recognise them for what they were and laughed at him with mickey mouse paper. 

She thought back to her one bad trip, she had been so scared in a weird  existential kind of a way. She got chased by a giant rat with snakes coming out of its eyes. AJ held her, while she got through it and fed her sugar mice when she got hungry in the middle of the night.

Cassandra Teasdale lived with her mother, the local GP, and her older sisters, Veronica and Gertrude, although they were away at university most of the time. Cassie would be joining them at Edinburgh if the family had their way but she wanted to go to RADA, she wanted to be an actress. 

She could never tell them, she could not even tell AJ, she laughed at herself when she thought of it, her, the shy wallflower - an actress. One more year of school though and she would have to tell someone...