gone ✧*｡ luke a.u.

42: october 13 2011

ELLIE

MONDAY, 13TH OCTOBER, 2011

Ellie was going to die. She was sure of it.

She didn't know what to say, what to do. She just wanted to run. She'd wanted to run ever since Mr Rudeigar had pulled her out of her English lesson right before the lunch bell rang and asked her to follow him to the faculty building.

She wrapped her arms tightly around herself, clutching her sides and staring at the ground as Mr Rudeigar spoke. He'd been speaking ceaselessly ever since they had started walking across the campus.

". . . you need to change your attitude," he was saying now, his face the perfect picture of stern. "You're going down the wrong path, Ella."

"Ellie," she mumbled -- but either he didn't hear, or he simply chose to ignore her, because he continued with an air of superiority, "I've met many kids like you, who think they're the best things God made until reality catches up to them. They graduate and realise they have nothing. Good grades aren't superficial, you understand? They matter. They manifest in your outside life. If you work hard in school, you'll be a better adult, a more reliable, more responsible, more organised--"

"What are you saying?" Ellie interrupted. She looked at him defiantly, daring him to continue. "That my life is a failure?"

Mr Rudeigar made an expression crossed between a wince and a scowl. It was clear he wanted to agree, but instead he simply said, "You have potential that you're wasting. You should show more remorse."

They neared the faculty building. Ms Ashford stood waiting for them, and sent a kind smile in Ellie's direction. Ellie turned her head away.

"This way," Ms Ashford said, and walked with Ellie and Mr Rudeigar into the office block. It was an old building, made of great stone slabs and foggy, paned windows, and on the inside it was dark and smelled musty. Ms Ashford led them right, down a short corridor, then left into a waiting room outside an office. They waited for perhaps ten minutes, listening to the muted sounds of a phone call through the wall, before a voice called "Come in!" and they entered.

It was an office, the biggest one Ellie had ever seen a teacher possess, with old bookshelves lining one wall and towering filing cabinets lining the other. In the middle of the room sat a man behind a desk, in a leather chair almost double his height, typing away on a computer. Piles of papers and files were stacked up on one side of the computer, which Ellie figured had been removed from the cabinets. Behind him was a tall, arched window, which spilled light over his frame and cast shadows across the rest of the room. The man looked up when they walked in, and attempted a smile. It came out as more of a grimace.

Ellie had seen him before, many times, at all the school's assemblies and official ceremonies. He was normally too busy to emerge on any other occasion. The plaque on his desk read Mr Bill Browning, Headmaster.

Her hands tightened at her sides.

"Sit, please," Mr Browning said, gesturing to the seats in front of his desk. There was only two, so Mr Rudeigar opted to stand, hovering behind Ellie's shoulder. She wanted him gone, hated the feeling of his eyes on her.

"Ellie Harrington," the headmaster mused, pulling out a file from a stack on his desk. It was hers; she could see her student identification photo stuck on the front. "Do you have any idea why you're here?"

"No, sir."

Mr Browning stared at her for a moment, scrutinising her, then looked back down at the file. It was thick -- five years' worth of information, accumulated during her time at the college. Most of it, she supposed, was good; she'd never really gotten in trouble much before, because she escaped the noticed of teachers. In everything except art, she was so quiet she went under the radar.