Until We're Gone

“Dad, you can’t just ignore me,” I muttered, crossing my arms over my chest as we drove home from school. I felt tears well in my eyes when he still did not respond; alcohol always made me emotional.

“I’m sorry, okay?”

“Savannah, you say you’re sorry every single time and I’m sick of it. You’ve just got yourself excluded from school permanently. Sorry does not cut it.” He spoke quietly and expressionlessly, without so much as glancing in my direction. His calm and collected manner scared me far more than a scolding ever could. He was sick of it. He wasn’t just saying it this time. He meant it.

“I…I’m going to…be changed,” I stammered, but my head was so all over the place I couldn’t get the words out right.

“I’m not talking to you when you’re drunk,” he said simply. We drove the rest of the way home in silence.

When I woke up the next morning, I instantly became aware of a pounding inside my head. Great, another hangover from hell. Sighing, I reached out onto the bedside table, feeling around for my phone, but I couldn’t seem to find it. Before I had the chance to look for it, I felt my stomach lurch and I knew I had to get to the bathroom. I pretty much flopped out of bed and crawled across the hall to the bathroom, just in time to spew up the contents of my stomach into the toilet. After a few seconds, the bathroom door opened to reveal my father standing in the hallway.

“You’re a disgrace, you know,” he snapped, holding back my hair as I threw up again. His words stung but I currently was in no position to argue. After I’d finished being sick, I collapsed onto the cold tiles of the bathroom floor. My father disappeared but returned a few minutes later with a glass of water and some aspirin.

“Thanks,” I murmured, quickly swallowing the tablets.

“Come downstairs when you’re ready. We need to talk,” he said, his voice still expressionless. I groaned, for this could not be good.

My father did not seem angry like he usually did, but more disappointed. That hurt. I blinked back tears and pulled myself together enough to go to my bedroom and get dressed. I changed into some sweat pants and a vest top before tying my blonde waves into a scruffy bun on top of my head. It’s not like I would be going out anywhere; knowing my father, I would be grounded until the end of the century.

When I got downstairs, my dad was sat at the kitchen counter, typing away on his laptop. I pulled out the stool opposite him and sat down.

“What’s up?” I asked. He looked up from his laptop, shutting it down and narrowing his eyes at me.

“Are you seriously asking me that?” he frowned, staring at me in disbelief. I shrugged. “This is the final straw Vanna. I have given you chance after chance and each time all you have done is throw it back in my face. Being drunk in school? Do you have any idea what it was like getting that call from your principal? Or should I say ex principal?”

“Dad I didn’t mean to get drunk. I just got carried away.”

“You shouldn’t be drinking in the first place. We’ve talked about this. Look, I didn’t want to have to do this, but you’ve given me no choice.”

“There’s no way I’m going to boarding school,” I said simply.

“What?” my dad questioned, staring at me blankly.

“If you’re thinking of sending me to boarding school, you can think again.”

“Why do you think I’m sending you to boarding school?”

“Well aren’t you?”

“Did you see the letter?”

“Dad, it’s early in the morning and I’m severely hung-over. This is hurting my brain.”

“I had a letter through yesterday from Jackson High. It’s a boarding school not too far from here and they’ve invited you to join.”

“Why would they invite me to join?”

“You read the letter the same as I did.”

“I haven’t seen any letter.”

I don’t know what exactly it is that allows me to know other people’s thoughts before they’ve said them out loud. I’ve been able to do it for as long as I can remember, not with intention; it just happens. To me it’s just natural because it’s all I’ve ever known. It’s not as though I can go up to any person and just read every thought floating around in their mind, it’s just certain, seemingly random thoughts of other people’s sometimes find their way into my head. I would explain it in more detail if I could, but the truth is I don’t understand it myself.

Hence why I was confused as fuck when I found myself on a train to a completely new town, far away from everything I knew, about to start the new school year at Jackson High Boarding School for the Talent Inclined. I was not aware I possessed any sort of talent. Particularly with my track record, I was utterly shocked a school as prestigious (dad’s words, not mine) as this one would so much as give me a second glance, let alone invite me to join them.

As the train pulled into the station, everyone began to hurry off. I sighed, pulling my headphones out of my ears and grabbing my bag. I followed the mass of people off the train and out of the station. Much to my relief, the school was only a two minute walk from the station. Upon seeing the school though, I was not impressed. To say my first impressions of the school were negative would be an understatement. I was immediately ushered along a corridor and into the head mistress’s office. Mrs. Manning was a petite middle aged woman, dressed in a black suit with her hair pulled back into a neat bun on top of her head.

“Miss Anderson, welcome to Jackson High,” she smiled, her voice monotonous and her grin far too wide to be anything other than false. I forced a smile.

“We are extremely honoured to have you here with us. Your father tells me you were not so keen on the idea of attending a boarding school but I assure you, you’ll have it a lot easier here than you will anywhere else. That being said, you must understand there are certain rules to which you must comply. Things we do not tolerate include rudeness, aggressive behaviour, truancy, and may I emphasise, specifically for your benefit, being intoxicated underage.” Following her rather negative lecture, I took an instant disliking to the woman. The second she gave me my timetable and my room key, I was out of the office and making my way down the hall. Apparently I would be sharing a room with two boys, which if anything was a relief. I’d always got on a lot better with boys than I had with bitchy two-faced girls. When I unlocked my door to reveal a boy already fast asleep on his bed, I wasn’t so sure. From the looks of things, I was in for two years of complete boredom.