Free Worlds Apart by Azi Ahmed

what the woman on the phone had told me.
    ‘But I’ve travelled three hours on the train.’ I persisted. ‘Can they not spare ten minutes, please?’
    He could see the desperation on my face. He went quiet for a moment then asked me to wait there and disappeared through one of the doors.
    I stood still and gathered my thoughts, not quitebelieving I was here. Only yesterday I was feeling ecstatic about Mum letting me go to Bristol. A part of me waited for the doubt to kick in, but it didn’t. This was where I wanted to be and I wasn’t leaving until I gave it my best shot.
    The man suddenly came out of a different door and waved me in. I followed him inside where three tutors were sat having a drink. They were probably in the middle of enjoying their end-of-year get-together and I was disturbing them, I thought guiltily.
    Quickly, I opened my portfolio and ran through my work. (I had a two o’clock train to catch, which would get me back in time to open the shop.) The interview was mainly made up of questions on why I’d come here today. I told them the truth: from the moment that I’d heard Saint Martins being mentioned just twenty-four hours ago in my college canteen, to getting on the train this morning and being here. They flicked through my pieces of work then said I would get a letter from them in the morning.
    I nodded my head, my only concern now being catching the train back to Manchester.
    That night I tossed and turned in bed at the day’s events, then rose early and hovered around the front door of the house, waiting for the postman. Yesterday’s events felt surreal now. Only the letter would tell me if it had really happened.
    The post eventually fell on the mat.
    I stared at the white envelope addressed to me with a Central Saint Martins stamp on the front.
    I opened it and smiled uncontrollably as I read the words: Accepted at the college this September.

CHAPTER THREE
THE BIG CITY
    I LEFT HOME with two carrier bags and a set of tasbih prayer beads. Perhaps it was out of habit or the ritual I was brought up with from my mosque days, but somehow my day didn’t feel right without repeating a line from the Koran over each of the hundred beads and saying a prayer.
    Waking up for the first time in the Tooting Broadway halls of residence felt strange. I’d never been away from home before, not even on sleepovers as a kid. I couldn’t hear my mum calling from the kitchen; I didn’t have to think about cutting the salad before the shop opened, or cooking Dad’s dinner.
    Judging from the corridor noise of students on their way to college, I knew I had overslept.
    I decided to wear a pink flowery top, velvet jacket, and maroon lipstick, with a range of bright eyeshadow colours making my eyes look like butterflies on my first day of college. Most of my clothes were bright and silky with bold flowers. I still wore my gold bangles that weighed heavy, made marks on my wrist and jingled all the time. I also wore a gold necklace with red and green stones and dangly Indian-style earrings.
    The first thing that struck me as I walked down Tooting High Street was the number of Afro-Caribbeans. I’d never seen so many in my life.
    The train station was crowded by my standards, and after talking to the ticket officer I bought a weekly travel pass and headed down the escalator for the train.
    People on the train didn’t speak and the whole carriage was silent – very strange. I sat next to a woman and started talking. She looked down at her bags, making sure they were still there, and then got off at the next stop. How weird, I thought, thinking back to my bus journeys in Manchester where everyone talked. Never mind, once they see me on the train a few times we will get chatting. For some reason, I assumed I would see the same people on the train in the same carriage the next day, as I did on the bus in Manchester.
    When I arrived at college I got another surprise: the students didn’t look at all as I expected.