- About us
- About colleges
-
Corporate services
- Corporate services
- Mental health and wellbeing
- Data Protection/GDPR
-
Employment Services - college workforce
- Employment Services - college workforce
- Employment: How we support members
- Introduction & Employment Helpline
- Absence & Sickness Management
- Contracts and T&Cs
- Disciplinary, Capability & Grievance
- Employment Briefings Library
- Equality, Diversity & Inclusion
- General Employee Relations & HR Issues
- Holiday/annual leave related
- Industrial Relations
- ONS reclassification related guidance
- Pay & Pensions
- Recruitment
- Redundancy, Restructuring & TUPE
- Safeguarding/Prevent
- Workforce Benchmarking, Surveys & Research
- Governance
-
Projects
- Projects
- Get Involved!
- Projects: How we support members
- Resources
- The 5Rs Approach to GCSE Maths Resits
- Apprenticeship Workforce Development (AWD) Programme
- Creating a Greener London – Sustainable Construction Skills
- Erasmus+ EXPECT Project
- Digital Roles Across Non-digital Industries
- T Level and T Level Foundation Year Provider Support Programme
- The Valuing Enrichment Project
- Higher and Extended Project Qualifications
- OfS - Higher Education Social Prescribing Project
- Pears Foundation Youth Social Action Programme: Phase 2
- T Level Professional Development (TLPD) Offer
- T Level Curriculum Macro-Sequencing
- Contact the Projects Team
- DfE Multiply Capability Support Programme
- Creative Arts in FE 2024 – developing student voice through creativity
- Resources/Guidance
- Sustainability & Climate Action Hub
- Partnerships
- Honours Nomination
- Brexit
- Recruitment and consultancy
-
Events and training
- Events and training
- Events
- T Level & T Level Foundation Year Events
- Events and training: How we support members
- Network Meetings
- Annual Conference & Exhibition 2023 Resources
- Previous Events & Webinars
- In-House Training
- Senior Leadership Development Programme
- Introducing AoC's Early Career and Experienced Middle Managers Programme
- Sponsorship & Exhibition Opportunities
- Funding and finance
-
Policy
- Policy
- Meet the Policy Team
- Policy: How we support members
- Policy Areas
- Policy Briefings
- Submissions
- Policy Papers & Reports
- AoC Strategy Groups
-
AoC Reference Groups
- AoC Reference Groups
- 14-16 Reference Group
- 16-18 Reference Group
- Adults (inc. ESOL) Reference Group
- Apprenticeship Reference Group
- EDI Reference Group
- HE Reference Group
- HR Reference Group
- Mental Health Reference Group
- SEND Reference Group
- Sustainability & Climate Change Reference Group
- Technology Reference Group
- WorldSkills Reference Group
- Opportunity England
- Research unit
-
News, campaigns and parliament
- News, campaigns and parliament
- General election hub
- General and mayoral election resources
- Comms advice and resources for colleges
- AoC Newsroom
- AoC Blogs
- Work in Parliament
- AoC Campaigns
- Briefings
- Contact the Communications, Media, Marketing and Research Team
- Communications, media, marketing and research: How we support members
-
Equality, diversity and inclusion
- Equality, diversity and inclusion
- Equality, diversity and inclusion blogs
- AoC’s Equity, Diversity and Inclusion Charter
- AoC’s Equity, Diversity and Inclusion Charter for further education sector organisations
- AoC’s Equity, Diversity and Inclusion Charter signatories
- Diversity in Leadership
- Black FE Leadership Group and AoC partnership agreement
- AoC's Equity Exchange
- Equality, diversity and inclusion: how we support members
- Equality, diversity and inclusion case studies
- Home
- Corporate services
- Projects
- Creative Arts in FE 2024 – developing student voice through creativity
- Creative Writing in FE Anthology 2021/2022
- Fiction
- Horse in the lake by Ross Cavan, Long Road Sixth Form College
Horse in the lake by Ross Cavan, Long Road Sixth Form College
February 2022
A lads night coming to an end, I decided to walk home by myself, eventually walking past the gloomy lake that I've always feared. Now passing the lake I noticed a transparent figure moving around but I couldn’t see it clearly. As I slowly shuffled forward, the foggy figure became more visible.
Shining from the moon the long reflections, the steed hovered above the glistening water. The galloping echoed throughout the dark skies along with the chains eternally attached to the horse.
Seeing this made me feel like an imp losing sanity, surely this cannot be real? One too many? Nope I made sure I didn’t exceed my limit. Lifting my phone up in fear to message the group chat in hope of rescue, I noticed I had no service bars. A classic problem which I never thought would happen to me.
Now on my own, I back up to see the transparent steed halt almost instantly like someone pressed the pause button. Spooked, I noticed vaguely the horse’s head pointing almost directly at me. Silence, it felt like the steed was staring right through me like I was doing to it. Staring at me like it wanted a reaction like I was in its world not the other way round. Rearing gaudily, I could see the breath coming out of the flared nostrils you could spot from a mile away. Obviously spooked by another form of life. Or another dead form of life.
Noticing this I saw the stallion gallop away and go at blistering speed towards the motionless pier. I expected a crashing sound or something similar. I couldn’t bare to witness it again. The horse went straight through the pier and into the earth it returned leaving silence around the lake. The chains no longer making a sound.
I realised that it was running away and whatever it ran away from is still here.