by Lisa Grant
It all started with, well, next to nothing really. But somehow things just seemed to escalate, until unbelievably... Hang on. Let me set the scene.
Eighteen-year-old Charlotte Hawksby was one of that lucky handful of people who seem to be blessed by having it all. She was from a wealthy family, lived in a nice house, and spoke the Queen's English impeccably. She was very bright, had great prospects and was reasonably sporty as well. On top of all that she was great looking. No! More than that. Charlotte Hawksby was beautiful. Quite tall, slender, but shapely where it counts, and with long elegant legs, which she enjoyed showing off in her rather-too-short school skirts.
Her propensity for keeping her uniform skirt a couple of inches shorter than regulations allowed was possibly Charlotte's only fault, but somehow nobody ever seemed to complain. She possessed delicate and symmetrical classically pretty facial features, including an ever so slightly turned up nose, which made her look very cute indeed. She had piercingly silver blue eyes and her wavy naturally blonde tresses cascaded over her shoulders. A classic English rose you might say. With all that going for her she could have been arrogant and ice-cold, but in fact Charlotte was bubbly, always smiling, keen to please, kind, friendly, bright and breezy, warm and gregarious. All her female contemporaries wanted to be her, and all her male contemporaries wanted to... well I'm sure you can guess what her male contemporaries wanted to do.
In fact her boyfriend of two months, one week and five days was three years older and was in his final year at university. Charlotte was in the Upper Sixth form at St Crispin's Academy, a traditionally all-boys private high school, which had been allowing girls to attend for the past seven years, so she had been one of the first girls admitted and had been there ever since, all through her senior school career in fact. Of course when it had come to choosing a Headgirl for that year there really hadn't been another candidate with a look-in. Charlotte wore her Headgirl badge with immense pride, and was exemplary in her duties.
It was Charlotte's keenness to please, or rather her unwillingness to disappoint, that created the minor ripple which then somehow escalated in a most unfortunate way. It was a sunny Monday afternoon, one week into her final term at St Crispin's. She'd had a lovely weekend with her boyfriend. Well it had been lovely until their goodnight kiss on her parents' doorstep. Simon had been a bit frosty towards her for cutting their evening short because of school the next day. He was still on Easter break. Charlotte hated feeling like a schoolgirl in front of him, and was worried he'd not stay the course and find somebody older. Anyway it was almost the end of the school day, just one more period to go, when Charlotte looked in her bag and realised she had left her copy of Jane Austen's Northanger Abbey in her locker. The pretty sixth former swore to herself, under her breath. It wasn't the end of the world, but she didn't want her favourite English teacher, Mr Palmer, to think she was not one hundred per cent on the ball, so she dashed off to the other end of the sprawling old school building to the girls' locker room. It would make her possibly a couple of minutes late for Mr Palmer's lesson, but she knew a polite apology and a flutter of her eyelashes and it would quickly be forgotten, whereas a missing essential-reading book would be much less easy for him to overlook.
The bell for the start of the last period sounded just as she approached her locker. Charlotte swore mildly again and quickly fumbled for her key. Cramming the missing book into her bag and just about to close the locker door she saw a blink of light from her phone, which of course had to be left in her locker and not taken into the classroom. The blinking light meant only one thing: there was a message. Another slightly stronger swear word was muttered. Charlotte really didn't have time to look at her phone, but she couldn't resist the temptation, suspecting it might be a message from Simon, and she didn't want him to perceive her as the feeble schoolgirl who isn't allowed a phone during the day. In fact there were five missed calls, two curt texts and, to Charlotte's distress, three increasingly fractious voicemail messages, all from Simon, who had been trying to talk to her since before lunch.
She cursed herself for not checking her phone at lunchtime, which she normally did. Charlotte's normal unflappable composure had slipped and she realised she was blushing hotly and breathing faster than normal at this upsetting situation. Her head darted from left to right as if looking for divine inspiration, but none came. There was nothing else for it. For the sake of another couple of minutes and a more sincere apology to Mr Palmer, she was going to have to make a quick phone call, or risk losing Simon altogether. She could always use that perennial female 'get-out-of-jail-free' card - a discreet mutter of 'women's problems' - and Mr Palmer would quickly turn his attention to anything other than her minor and unusual tardiness.
The escalation had begun.
Having locked herself into a toilet cubicle, with suddenly sweaty and slightly shaking hands, she pressed the smartphone screen to call Simon back. Her plan was to say she'd meet him after school to calm the situation and have a nice evening together. Unfortunately, the call didn't go too well. As a girl who was blessed by being naturally adept at most things, without any real effort, it had come as a bit of a shock to Charlotte to discover that relationships were quite tricky. Simon had been pretty off-hand with her on the phone and angry with her for not responding to his many messages at lunchtime. In the end when she said, "See you later?" he just answered curtly, "Whatever!" then when she asked, "What time?" he said. "Call me," and hung up.
Charlotte sat there with her phone in her hand, crying for a couple of minutes, feeling very sorry for herself, and thinking the whole world had come crashing down on her head. Her thoughts were so wrapped up in self-pity and teenage angst that she completely forgot the reality of what she was doing and where she should be. Suddenly she came to her senses, looked at her watch in a real panic and swore more strongly. She was now ten minutes late for Mr Palmer's English class. This was going to need more than a brief apology. A flutter of her eyelashes certainly wasn't going to suffice.
She dashed out of the cubicle to freshen herself up and took a look in the mirror. Charlotte gasped. Her face was flushed and blotchy and her eyes were red. It was totally obvious she had been crying, and she certainly didn't want to explain that to Mr Palmer. Realising it would take another five minutes at least before she would look presentable enough to appear in front of her whole class, Charlotte made the highly uncharacteristic and rash decision that it would be easier just to go home. She reasoned that she wasn't going to learn anything anyway as she certainly wasn't in the mood for the poetic romanticism of Jane Austen right at that moment. Teenage hormones seemed to get the better of reason altogether as she managed to convince herself that she wouldn't be missed and that turning up nearly half way through the class was going to cause a much bigger stir than not turning up at all.
You see what I mean about an escalation? And that wasn't an end to it.
The world seemed like a better place the next morning. Charlotte breezed into her form room for registration, all smiles. She had seen Simon the previous evening, and they had smoothed things over between them and had a fun romantic evening. The sun was shining and all seemed well with the world. That didn't last long, however, as she was stopped in her tracks by her form teacher, Mr Taylor, who informed her that the headmaster wanted to see her right away and that she should go to his office now, to avoid being late for first period. The pretty sixth former's heart skipped a beat and she realised her face was burning, obviously blushing bright red, so she quickly turned on her heels and left the form room before her classmates became too curious.
Nervously, she tapped on the heavy oak door of the headmaster's study. She had only been in the great man's office a few times, and it had always been a positive meeting in her capacity as Headgirl. Somehow she didn't think today was going to be quite like that.
She was right. Dr Perry looked more stern than she had ever seen him before. He had a reputation of being scary, but she'd never been able to see it. Now, though, she could. The headmaster looked very scary indeed. There was no smiling welcome or friendly invitation to sit and chat. Charlotte was standing in front of his desk, feeling very much like a naughty kid. It was a feeling she certainly wasn't accustomed to, and she was rapidly beginning to realise that it was a feeling she definitely didn't like. She had her hands clasped tightly together in front of her so that the Head couldn't see them shaking.
"I am very disappointed to be having this conversation with you, Charlotte."
The pretty sixth former tried to look the picture of innocence as she blinked wide-eyed at Dr Perry, as though she couldn't possibly imagine what he was talking about, but she could tell she was blushing right down to her neck. Suddenly she understood the expression 'feeling hot under the collar'.
"You were in school yesterday I understand?" he said, eyeing the pretty girl and sensing her extreme discomfort.
"Yes Sir... I was Sir."
"And yet you didn't attend your last period of the day, Mr Palmer's English Literature class."
Charlotte didn't know where the words came from. She heard them for the first time as they came blurting out of her mouth: "Right. No Sir. That's right. I... I had a dentist's appointment, so I had to leave after sixth period."
Dr Perry eyed the girl again, his expression softening a little.
"Hmmm, I see. But you do know the rules about medical and dental appointments I take it? First and foremost you should make every effort to avoid appointments during school hours, but if it's completely unavoidable, then you must provide a note beforehand, signed by a parent, which should be presented to any teacher whose class is affected."
Charlotte blinked, not sure what to say.
"I asked you a question, Charlotte."
"I - I... Yes Sir. I understand the rules. I'm sorry Sir... I just forgot."
"Forgot the rules?"
"Er, no, forgot to show the note to Mr Palmer, Sir."
"Ah, so there was a note."
Charlotte blushed as she realised what she had just said. She cursed herself for her stupidity, but there was no way back now. She had to brazen it out. "Er, yes Sir."
"Well, that's something at least. Do you have it in your bag there?"
"Oh, what? Oh no Sir. It's... it's in my locker."
The escalation had just moved up another notch.
"Very well. I don't want you late to your first period. At lunch time I want you to get that note and take it to Mr Palmer. You will show him the note and apologise for not doing so yesterday, and you will also apologise for missing his lesson. Is that clear?"
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