Known Unknown

  “Name, age, grade.”

“Rosalie Lavigne, 17, 12th, senior.”

“Your room is room number 245, located on the east wing. Have a nice stay we look forward to seeing you again at the orientation located in the main ballroom at 6 pm,” the clerk handed me a small, rustic, golden key along with the most fabricated smile I had ever seen, and I trust me, I’ve seen many.

I walked up two flights of stairs, turned a right, then a left, and continued walking for about two minutes until I arrived at an ivory-colored door with a black sign labeled with the numbers ‘245’. The lock opened with ease and I walked into my new home for the year. Anything we wanted to bring in had to be checked thoroughly, I never understood why they were so cautious of our belongings but I always found it a bother to go through security, especially when I didn’t have anything valuable to bring. The staff at the school provided everything we needed from our clothing to meals.

I looked around the room, the walls were a light shade of grey, all completely blank of decorations, a small bathroom, hardwood flooring, and only one bed. I looked again, there was a single bed sitting against the middle of the farthest wall. Strange, I thought, all of the years I had been here before, I had always stayed with the same roommate, a girl named Zahava. We quickly became close friends and done practically everything together. The staff constantly would say that we made each other better people, but why wasn’t she here and why did I not have any roommate?

I stepped outside of my room, looking for someone to ask these questions to. Standing right outside of my room was a woman with a badge labeled ‘Saint Laurence,’ our school name. She briefly looked at me and started back down the halls. 

“Excuse me!” I shouted at her.

She looked back at me and shuffled her way up the halls to where I was standing again. “Can I help you, Rosalie?”

“Ah, yes, um, I was wondering why I had a single room this year and where Zahava is?”

She smiled at me with that same fabricated smile I saw everywhere I went, “Zahava went back home this year, she was let off.”

“Let off? As in suspended?”

“Rosalie darling, do you still not understand after all these years? Let off as in she proved herself to be able to be independent without our help. You should feel proud of her to have done it in merely three years and you should try harder so you can return home sooner.”

She gave me a quick nod and walked off back down the hall once again.

Most students here only stayed for a few years and then went back to wherever their home was located, Zahava was the only one I knew who was of my age and had stayed for three years. The school was an all-year-round school, starting in early July and ending in late June. There were three breaks in between that time, mid-autumn, winter, and spring break that had to be earned to receive them. I had no intention of seeing my parents back home, they were the ones who had left me here when I was 14 and hadn’t called nor came to visit me since. Since then I started forgetting how they looked, what their jobs were, and what my life was like before coming here. But all of that stopped mattering to me after a few years of realizing that boarding school would become my life. The staff here became my family in a way, at least the ones who had been working here from when I first came.

I went back inside my room and picked up a small envelope that was on my bedside table. The envelope contained a square-shaped piece of paper with small, blocked handwriting that I quickly recognized—it was Zahava’s.

To: Rosalie Lavigne

Hi, how are you doing? I’ve rewritten this letter too many times to count. Our least favorite class had always been English and now I’m starting to see it show through the letters I write. I’m guessing you must be upset that I left the school without telling you? I felt really bad too, in fact, last year when we were telling each other we’d see each other the next year after our short time off, I hadn’t known that they had already emailed my parents my letter of departure. My parents have not yet let me attend public school so I’ve been learning from home. The reason why I wanted to write this letter was not actually to tell you about my home life, so I guess I’ll get to the point. I wanted to tell you to try your best this year to come back home. I know it’s hard, letting go of the anger and the horrible thoughts that constantly go through your head but that’s the purpose of the school, isn’t it? Trust me, going back home is the best feeling ever and everything’s worth it once you feel what it’s like to be free again. 

From: Zahava Nilsson 

I put the letter down and never picked it up again.

At 5:50 I started walking with the others to what they called the ‘main ballroom.’ Sounds fancy right? Yeah, no, it looks like a larger version of our rooms, just replace our bed area with a few plastic chairs, expand it and call it good. At exactly 6 pm, the orientation started. The principle of the entire boarding school walked in front of us wearing a perfectly ironed out, black and white suit. We looked like prisoners compared to him, us wearing our bright orange jumpsuits while he wore his luxurious suite with a flashing silver watch that seemed to be timing every second that I was trapped here. He started with a quick introduction of his name and how great the staff here were and how we would be completely transformed by the end of our stay here except for the fact that all of that was a lie because this was going to be my 4th year here, my 4th stay, my 4th time to be “transformed.” He then went over all of the rules and expectations that took about twenty minutes to read through. I looked around and could tell that none of us were happy to be here.

“Alright, I think I’ve rambled on for long enough here. I want to give you one last announcement: I thought a lot about what I could do differently this year and what we, as a school could improve and I realized that it would be best if we started off the year with all of your parents visiting. Your parents are usually allowed to visit a maximum of three times throughout the year but this year they’ll get one extra visit. They’ll be arriving starting tomorrow morning and you will be called to our visiting hall in the west wing in groups of thirteen when your parents arrive. Again we hope you have a nice stay here, if you have any questions, our staff are always happy to help.”

I headed back to my room, the announcement didn’t matter to me because I knew my parents wouldn’t visit me anyways. I was wrong.

The next morning, after I had finished my breakfast, I was called into visiting the hall with twelve others whom I didn’t know. As we arrived, four adults followed us from behind, I could see that there were eight more in the room we were going into, all of them had the same badge as the lady from yesterday but wore police uniforms instead of the staff attire.

As I walked into the room, two adults kept staring at me, smiling, a smile even more fabricated than all the staff if that was even possible. The way they looked at me scared the crap out of me. I looked over to the other adults, each pair staring at one of the other twelve kids the same way the two adults stared at me. All the other kids either awkwardly smiled back or nodded back at them. I was the only one who just stood there. The two adults came over to me, the women spoke first.

“Rosalie, it’s been so long! You still remember us don’t you?” she said in a teasing tone. I just stared back at her, not uttering a word. 

The man spoke next, “Rosalie, darling, it’s been three years, hasn’t it? I’m sorry we’ve been so busy we haven’t gotten a chance to visit you since you were admitted here. Do you know how glad your mom and I are to hear that you’ve been getting better? We always knew your incident wasn’t the real you.”

That’s when it all hit me. All the memories flowed back into my brain at once. The reason why I was stuck at this boarding school. Why I hadn’t been let out. Why people constantly told me to get better. The incident. 

It was the middle of March, that awkward time of the year where it’s too warm to wear a coat but too cold to wear a T-shirt. I had just came home from school when I walked into the house, my dad was standing in front of the doorway with my mom a step behind him.

“Hi?” I asked quietly.

“Your honors biology teacher just called me saying you cheated on four of your past tests. She said that you can be expelled from school and that it would also go on your permanent record if there is no logical reasoning behind it." He sighed, that "dad sigh" where you know there's no good way out of the problem. "Rosalie Clarity Lavigne, would you care to explain?” My dad just stood there as I stood back in shock. 

I had started Physics with a C-, my parents always expected me to get good grades, they expected me to get into an Ivy League once I graduated high school. I had always wanted to live up to their expectations, holding my 4.0 GPA throughout middle and high school. When I started getting bad grades in Biology, it scared me a lot, and because of that I took the worst choice and decided to cheat. It wasn’t very hard because I knew that my teacher kept all of the test answer keys in her desk drawer. Every day she would go to the teacher lounge room for lunch so one day during that time, I snuck into the room and quickly took a picture of each test sheet. I knew it was horrible but I felt like I had no other choice. I told myself that all of it would be worth it when I got into the college my parents wanted me to get into.

I felt suffocated, every day I was scared to death thinking someone would find out about it but after that, my grades were finally up to an A again. But now my parents, my teacher, they all found out, and all my efforts were a waste.

“Rosalie do you understand what type of circumstance we’re under?!” my dad screamed, “Rosalie Clarity do you know how much effort we put into you to make you become who you are today and now you throw it all away by cheating?”

I was scared. I didn’t know what to do but I guess my dad decided to make the first move. He took out a gun. 

I screamed and brought myself back to reality.

My dad and my mom were still standing right in front of me, now looking at me with shock instead of happiness. One of the Saint Laurence police officers was on my right ensuring their safety in case I were to lash out after screaming. I was too deep into thinking to do anything, yet. I understood why I was here now, because of my dad, he made me this way.

“You…” I started, “you brought me here! You tried to kill me! You tried to kill me!” I screamed, I screamed that over and over and over again until I could barely hear what I was saying. Three more police officers rushed over me, trying to stop me, trying to hold me back as the other parents and children watched in shock but all of it only made me more upset. In the corner of my eye, I saw a gun tucked into the police officer’s pocket. I reached for it and pointed it to my dad. Everyone froze.

I froze as well, not knowing what my next move was until I something pointed at me. A taser.

“Rosalie Lavigne please stay still and drop the gun.”

He was about to shoot when I realized that I was wrong. I wasn’t the victim, I was the attacker to myself. That time, my dad didn’t grab the gun, I did. I tried to shoot myself out of anger. I tried to destroy my own life and succeeded. I realized that when that police officer releases the taser on me, no one will be upset that I was tased, they would sigh in relief over my unconscious body. I was the problem here.

Everything went black.