Islington Arts & Media School

“I don’t remember doing creative writing at school. For reasons I can’t quite fathom, creativity and education have always made uneasy bedfellows, both then and now. If someone had offered me the opportunity when I was fifteen to write stories, simply for fun, with no grades attached, I hope I would have said yes. But the truth is I’m not sure I would have dared. I didn’t begin to write stories until much later, and even then writing from my imagination required an enormous leap that years of formal education nearly prevented me from making.”

Betsy Tobin, First Story Writer-in-Residence at Islington Arts & Media School

It was her. I’m absolutely certain it was her. Maybe she was just doing this to make me angry. I told her to stop following me when I’m with Elizabeth, and now I think Elizabeth is upset with me because I was paying no attention to her. I know for certain she was mocking me up there with that poorly dressed soldier, Bartholomew. Whenever I’m away from her ropes, she always has a way of pulling me back in. Does she want me to be caught? Is that what she wants?

An extract from “A Fatal Decision” by Ibrahim, a student at Islington Arts & Media School

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