EXCLUSIVEShe mocked my teeth, said I stank and humiliated me. But my reaction when I confronted the bully who tormented me 33 years ago shocked me...
On a school reunion day, I saw her before she saw me. At first, I could not believe it was her.
Unremarkably middle-aged and a bit plump, she was wearing a floral summer dress with sandals, and I noticed her ankles had that tell-tale puffiness certain overweight women in their 40s get.
But that's just me being mean, still trying to find reasons, after all these years, to take her down. To take her power away.
I wouldn't have given her a second glance if we'd passed on the street. Yet this was the girl – all grown up now – who had made so much of my life at school a misery.
Shona Sibary (centre) at her boarding school in the 1980s
I'd spent 33 years rehearsing what I'd say if I ever saw her again. Now she was here... and I couldn't find the words. I didn't know if I could forgive her. Can anyone really forgive their bully?
We were at a convent school in Sussex together. I joined as a boarder in 1980 at the age of nine. Before that my family had been in Fiji for four years, where my father worked as a land developer, and the only schooling I'd known had been somewhat unconventional. There was no TV in Fiji in the late 1970s, so I devoured Enid Blyton books and dreamed of boarding school fun with midnight feasts and freezing dormitories.
And when we moved back to the UK following a catastrophic flood, my parents happily obliged.
I remember arriving on that first Sunday night and my mother unpacking my belongings into the cupboard by my single bed, tenderly placing my teddy on the pillow. 'Just hold back a bit,' she said, hugging me tightly. 'You'll need to find a way to fit in.'
She was right. Looking back, I can see I was blithely unaware that I had wandered into a world of unspoken rules and nuance. A world where, if the coolest girl in the school decided she didn't like the look of you, then that was it.
That first morning in the refectory, I innocently skipped in and was assigned a seat at a table with – let's call her Mandy. She was two years older, and clearly in charge.
Buttered white toast was brought round, piled high on plates. I took a hot slice from the top and Mandy's eyes narrowed. 'Put that back, new girl,' she ordered. 'You get the cold toast from the bottom.'
Shocked, I dropped my slice, knocking her glass of juice over the table and onto her skirt. She glared at me with such a look of disdain I shrivelled into my seat.
And that was it. My fate had been sealed in less than five minutes over a loaf of Mother's Pride. From that day forth, pretty much until the day she left, Mandy made it her mission in life to torment me. Her weapons of choice were words and ever-so-clever psychological toying.
Shona, pictured aged eight, was bullied by a girl two years older than her
If I'm honest, I made it easy for her. I was a quirky girl with no filter. I hadn't had siblings to knock that out of me and I assumed everyone would like me. They had so far, and this had given me the confidence — fatefully — to be myself.
'You're such a weirdo, aren't you?' Mandy would say every day at breakfast, announcing it like an unarguable fact. Of course, everybody agreed with her.
'Why don't you do something about your wonky teeth? And what's wrong with your eye?' (A birth mark as a baby had left me with a squint, as well as blind in one eye.)
It was a daily, relentless taking down. It was easier for the other girls to sit back, say nothing and allow Mandy her reign. Why would they stick their heads above the parapet for a slightly annoying new girl who'd never seen Tiswas?
A savvier girl would have cowered, made herself less visible. But I did the opposite, stupidly holding on to the belief that, if nothing else, I still had my spirit (as I said, I'd read a lot of Enid Blyton).
Mandy knew I wanted to be an actress. So one day she casually announced her father was the director of the new West End production of Annie, and he'd asked her to scout for orphans for the show.
I remember thinking: 'I'm sure your dad is in the Navy, but at the same time, I was so desperate for the opportunity I wilfully suspended disbelief. And anyway, all the other girls, eager for sport, confirmed it was, indeed, true.
Mandy corralled everyone into the gym where there was a stage. Looking back, I still cringe at how I stepped onto that platform, ignoring the warning voice in my head. I warbled through Tomorrow and then, for good measure, Its The Hard Knock Life. She pretended to make notes while everyone sniggered.
As I finished there was a moment of thrilled anticipation, a bit like when a roller coaster reaches the top of its climb before tipping towards the drop.
'You're rubbish,' Mandy announced. 'Don't call us, we'll call you.' And then everyone burst into hysterical laughter.
When I look back at that moment – possibly one of the most humiliating of my life – I wonder why I never spoke up or asked anyone for help. Much of it was to do with self-preservation.
As an adult, I feel furious for my younger self. I wasn't a bad kid, Shona writes (file image)
I didn't see my parents for weeks on end and the nuns were distant. We were expected to stand on our two feet and get on with it. But as an adult, I feel furious for my younger self. I wasn't a bad kid. Annoying, yes, but I didn't deserve Mandy's campaign of cruelty.
This thought was rankling in my mind 33 years later at our reunion, when there she suddenly was, standing in front of me holding her daughter's hand.
I hated myself for wishing I'd worn something more flattering. Then I noticed her roots needed doing. 'Stop it,' a voice in my head admonished. 'You're a grown woman. You don't need to do this.' Yet, still, I was aware of rearranging my face, feigning nonchalance – a force of habit as my survival instinct kicked in.
'How are you?' she asked. 'Long time.' I nodded, still unable to speak. We moved together down a corridor so familiar to both of us, passing a spot where she once shrieked, holding her nose, telling everyone I had bad BO.
'I'm glad you're here,' she said. 'I think I was a bit of a bitch to you at school and I'd hate to ever think of my daughter going through the same.'
The girl looked up at me and smiled. She looked nice. Not the kind of person who could ever tell a classmate their face resembled something Bugs Bunny had vomited all over.
I took a deep breath. I doubted Mandy had lost any sleep over the years for the way she treated me at school. She just wanted to be let off the hook. Maybe motherhood had softened her.
'Look Mandy,' I said. 'You really hurt me.' She looked immediately stricken, and still a people pleaser, I couldn't help wanting to take back the words.
'I'm so sorry,' she whispered. We were standing on the same spot we stood so many times before, aeons ago. I thought of all the girls in the future who will stand here, too — not quite women yet, feeling their way.
Mandy had just been a teenager, with a dad away in the military, probably struggling with a whole heap of problems of her own. I breathed out, realising only then that, finally, after years of agonising over what had happened, I no longer cared.
'It's OK,' I replied with a grin. 'Let's get a cup of tea.'
And, despite everything, it was OK. I had forgiven her. I think my 11-year-old self would be proud. She was more resilient than I give her credit for today.
