Denial by Stephanie Wilson (best books to read for young adults txt) 📕

Chapter 5

My feet were dragging as I walked back to the Abbott’s and my shoulders ached from all of my newly acquired text books weighing down my bag. I had refused to leave any in my lockers, wanting to get a jump start on the homework for the week. But it wasn’t the homework that had my stomach in a knots but rather the events of the day. All though my intention right from the get go was to fly under the radar, be anonymous and float in that happy middle ground of highschool life where you are neither popular nor a misfit. But that was not how things had turned out.

                I couldn’t help but think of Henderson as I walked, wondering what he would have thought about the drama I had gotten myself into on my first day here.

When Henderson had first taken over my case load, I was thirteen. I wore too much eye makeup, was too thin and had too many piercings – and I hated everything and everyone, or at least wanted it to come across that I did.

Henderson had taken off his glasses, leant forward with his elbows on the desk and we had started to talk. Usually I attempted to remain as quiet and nonchalant about everything my social worker said, but for the first time in my life someone had asked how I wanted things to go.

The first things he had asked was if I still wanted to go to the psychologist. I informed him that I never had wanted to go in the first place. He made the compromise that I could go to a counsellor instead and only once a week rather than twice.

                ‘You understand though, if the counsellor is ever concerned about your welfare, or thinks you need different professional help – they will be required to contact me and I will make different arrangements right away, to what I see fit.’

                We agreed that counsellor and my doctor would work together and liase, and if either of them were concerned they would contact him and he would take those concern very seriously.

                I also told him my feelings on group homes. He told me that sometimes there are no other choices but group homes left – but if it came to that, he would make sure it was for as little time as possible. I had wanted a guarantee that I wouldn’t have to go back to a group home, but I still found the blunt honesty a welcome change.

                Then we got on to the topic of school and my failing grades.

                ‘All of your teachers say you are bright, just unwilling to do the work,’ he said, ‘why don’t you put in the work - is it because you don’t like the classes?’

                It wasn’t that. It was because I knew that I would more likely shift school before the year had finished – and would have to start all over again. The amounts of time I tried to cram a designated book in before the exam, or learn a different topic to learn. It got tiring. Exhausting – until I felt I no longer cared anymore. Also, I was accountable to anyone, no-one really gave a shit about my grades...and I had begun to feel the same.

                ‘I had your lawyer fax over what your inheritance is roughly worth,’ he said, and then pushed a piece of paper to me.

                The mythical inheritance that I knew of only in passing. To me, somehow who had never had any money over fifty dollars at a time, it seemed like I would be rich. But Henderson corrected me.

                ‘I know this seems like a lot, but in the grand scheme of things – it’s not.’

                He discussed with me what I could use it on. We talked of owning properties, of investing it. But then he talked about college.

                ‘It’s my understanding that both of your parents – ‘

I had flinched at that word, the familiar invisible hand clenching itself around my heart. My lips had automatically pressed into a hard line and my shoulders straightened and tensed. If he had noticed, which I have no doubt he did, he did not let on.

‘ - were college educated. Your father was an English professor, your mother taught music at the local high school. Don’t you think that something they would have wanted for their daughter is to be college educated too?’

I had refused to answer. This was a topic that was off limits to me.

‘Look,’ he said sitting back in his chair, ‘the fact of that matter is that going through college is, as cheesy as it sounds, investing in your future. You will always have the degree, you will always have higher appeal in the job market. You will be free from relying on anyone else ever again. Free to make your own decisions. Free to come and go as you see fit. And you will have far more options available to you.  Just think it over, if not for your parent’s memory – then at least for yourself.’

That was how the obsession started. That day I had resented Henderson for bringing it up, resented him for talking of my parents as if he could possibly know what they had wanted? Though certainly the parents card had struck a nerve. But the idea of being independent and secure started a small flame in the centre of my being, growing and morphing over a few months until suddenly it was all I could think about. I could picture the end, the time when I would no longer be a child of the state, but my own person.

Free.

In my mind, once I turned eighteen, everything would instantly be better and happier. There would be possibilities and a future and a life that was worth living.

Henderson and I came up with the plan. He helped me open up my own bank account and helped me to get my first ‘official’ after school job by pulling a few connections (and by official, I mean actually have contracts and Not being payed under the table at below minimum rates). He even found someone to tutor me for free in my worst subjects (science), at least until I had to move to a different town – but by then I didn’t need a tutor.

Gradually my grades improved, and when I got my first ‘A’ in English Henderson brought me an iPod out of his own money to celebrate. He told me not to tell anyone because it would be frowned upon.

‘If people ask, just say you stole it.’

I had laughed at this.

I began to count down the days and spent all my time focusing on two things. My job and my grades. Everything else was by the by.

So when I woke up this morning, ready for my first day at Sunny Haven, I wasn’t concerned about making friends or being an outcast – though I appreciated the efforts that Hayley went to in order to make me feel more comfortable (her words) on my first day, I suppose. Really my mind was only concerned with the classes, how the teachers marked, and what texts they would prescribe. I knew that coming in during the second term meant that I would have to be playing catch up.

My Abbot had dropped me off that morning. Though I had wanted to walk, that was firmly denied. But he would still be at work when school finished so I was allowed the luxury of making my own way home then. Though he warned me, very sternly, that if I was not back by 4:15 at the latest, Mrs Abbot would call him and there would be hell to pay – of course he didn’t say that (he would never talk about hell in such a blasé way, I’m sure), but it was implied. I had clenched my teeth and swallowed my retorts, simply nodded like a good little girl and went on my way.

I had ducked my way through a crowd of students sitting by the school steps, making myself invisible amongst all the other teenagers. Schools always sound the same. A bubbling brook of different voices, high pitch giggles, swear words scattered throughout, the dull thrum of iPods turned up way to loud and the clack-clack of nails on phones.

It was easy enough to go by unnoticed in high schools. Don’t meet anyone’s eyes, don’t speak up in class too often. Be careful you don’t dress too ostentatiously, but not too conservative either.

                I would have to be careful about the conservative side at Sunny Haven. I had left the house in a cardigan over my top and jeans. When I knew Mr Abbott had safely left, I had undone the cardigan buttons to reveal a basic v neck top that wasn’t high necked and obscenely baggy.

                Still, I definitely didn’t look trendy – though at least I didn’t stick out in my pseudo Amish gear.

                I had made my way first to the reception, where the receptionist immediately knew who I was (I immediately thought that this school must be small for her to realize she didn’t recognize me immediately). She went into a bit of a fluster as she hurriedly went about gathering all of my different papers and bits of paper. She then exclaimed that she would find another student to show my around – but I wasn’t about to allow that.

                ‘It doesn’t look like a big school, I think I’ll be fine by myself,’ I had informed her, taking the papers quickly before she had a chance to insist. I walked aimlessly down the corridor, my footsteps echoing back at me on the linoleum floor. There was an odd student here and there and although I got a few curious looks, no one seemed overly concerned with me. That was exactly how I wanted it to be.

It was when I was flipping through my bits of papers when I made my first mistake of the day. It had come in the form of as a soft melody played on a guitar plugged into an amp. I recognized the tune almost immediately, like a lost friend, but in my mind the twang of the guitar morphed into the smoothness of the violin. I couldn’t place the title of the song.

My feet began moving as if by their own will towards the music. I went down a corridor and heard the music coming out of an open doorway. I hadn’t even hesitated in entering that classroom and it was only when I saw what’s-his-name from the book store (Lawrence? Larry? Leyton  - yes that’s it!) was the source of the music did I snap out of my psudo trance.

He was hunched over, eyebrows narrowed, playing out the notes off a few scrap pieces of paper laying on the floor in front of him. Bobbing his head slowly to the tune, a look of deep concentration on his face but somehow also seemed to be very peaceful. I felt envious of that expression.

As soon as I entered he looked up at me and stopped playing.