#1 of THE E L I T E Series
"No one ever said being apart of a powerful group of rich people was easy,"
*Warning, this is triggering and does include self harm, read at your own risk*
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I was numb. I couldn't move. I couldn't speak. I couldn't do a thing. My father was dead.
Harold Darlington Simmons was dead.
Veronica Simmons Darlington's husband was dead.
Samuel Darlington's father was dead.
My dad was dead.
"Take it down," I spat, storming into Headmaster Nixon's office, slamming the door behind me.
"Miss Darlington-"
"Take. It. Down. Take down that stupid memorial," I'd never been so angry before in my entire life.
The looks of pity and sorrow. The sound of condolences and tears. It pissed me off. A lot. It was humiliating, and it put me on the spot. It gave me attention. Authority. How deranged could you get to think that giving me more power would make me feel a lot better about my father dying. Even the Head Girl position was offered to me.
They fed my ego instead of feeding my need to be held. They gave me pills when I needed a hug. They gave me depression when I needed happiness. This has ruined me. Emotionally. Physically. Mentally. In every way possible. I'm slowly losing my mind and losing the will go live even quicker. I can't do this anymore.
I don't have the strength to.
"The students put it up, I'm not sure it'd be smart for me to take it down," he said, resting his forearms on his desk.
"Sorry sir. It didn't occur to me that he was their father too," I spat, hearing the sound of his office door opening and turning around.
"I'm so sorry. She'll be leaving," Harry panted, grabbing me by my wrist and pulling me out of his office, "Jesus, I was looking for you everywhere, then Mikayla told me she saw you run into here,"
I closed my eyes and sighed, "I just wanted it to be taken down,"
"And it will be. If it makes you uncomfortable I'll do everything possible to make it disappear," he smiled, pulling me into a hug and rubbing my back.
Harry was the only one who was properly there for me. The Elite were too scared to say anything, my mum wouldn't leave her room and Sam had practically gone mute. No one knew what to do but him. From what I'd known about Harry it seemed he'd never been a situation like this, yet he was handling it better than anyone in the town was. He held me back whenever I wanted to run to the bathroom and slit my wrists, he bandaged my knuckles after I'd stupidly punched a wall. He even gave my mum advice on how to cope with her pain. Harry was everything. Not just to me. But to my family also.
"I think you should go home and relax. You shouldn't be in school right now," he suggested, pulling away from me and walking me out of the main office.
"No," I swallowed, "I can't bear to be at home. Not right now,"
"You can't be here eith-"
"I'm staying. I'll be fine," I said, trying to sound as firm as possible but I knew he heard my voice break. He shrugged it off and walked me to my next lesson, giving me a few words of wisdom before walking off to his own.
*** At lunch we spoke casually, no one dared to bring up the subject of my dead father, nor did they bother to bring up how terrible I looked today. And I appreciated them for it. I did. Albeit, Holly seemed irritated. Like something was bothering her.
"Denise's father texted mine last night. Talking about some special church service they're having this week and how he wants us to come," Mikayla said, spooning her yoghurt into her mouth.
Tyler snorted, "He must be joking. I'm never stepping foot in that place again. Not that I have to anyways,"
I cleared my throat, "You will actually. For the funeral,"
He nodded and bowed his head, staring at his coke bottle. Holly rolled her eyes and scoffed, sticking finger down her throat and pretending to vomit.
"Oh boo hoo, Daddy Darlington is dead," she chuckled. She was drunk, and had clearly just come from snorting a serious amount of cocaine.
"Come again?" I folded my arms and waited for a response. How dare she be so disrespectful. Clearly the rules of a lady book my mum gave to her as a gift remained untouched in that filthy, drug contaminated room of hers.
"You heard what I said. There's no need for repetition," Holly spoke, looking at me. Her eyes were bloodshot and her nose was red. Her hair looked as if it hadn't been combed in years, and don't get me started on how she'd worn her uniform that day.
"Holly, her dad is dead-"
"Blah, blah, blah. All we hear these days is the sound of crying and depression. Because of you and that family. Harry and I are sick of it," she shrugged. Everyone was watching at this point, whispering and gossiping about the amount of disrespect Holly was spewing at me. And how weak I looked sitting there, taking it like I was some mug.
"What the fuck?" Harry spat, slamming his hands onto the table and standing up, "Holly you need to leave,"
"You're high aren't you?" Cassandra scoffed.
"Go on then. Leave," Archie scowled, gesturing for her to go. She rolled her eyes and stood up to leave, flipping us all off as she left the lunch hall, leaving us and the everyone in the room stunned.
Then, all at once, everyone was surrounding me, spitting their condolences at me, showering me with pity and sorrow and I was grateful for it. I was. And what I did next was probably because of what Holly said. Or because of how pissed I was that morning, but something inside me switched and I was gone. Something made me go absolutely mad. Maybe it was the constant staring, or the claustrophobic feeling of everyone surrounding me, but at that point, I was done. With everything. It was all going to stop. And I was going to start with that stupid memorial.
I ran out of the lunch hall and towards the main entrance, where my father's memorial stood. I looked at the picture of my father when he was young, his eyes just staring at me. Almost as if he was trying to communicate with me. Fuck, I'm going crazy.
I was even crazier when I took the picture and threw it into the bin. And also when I grabbed the flowers, letters and blown out candles and threw them at the wall. And also when I fell to my knees and screaming and crying. And especially when I did all of that, with the whole school watching me.
My whole school just watched me break into a million pieces.
Daddy Darlington would be so proud wouldn't he?
*** Thank you so much for reading.
I'm so sorry the update took so long, school has been stressing me out so much.
