DESCRIPTION
Thirteen year-old Eleanor struggles to fit in and make sense of the world around her, while choosing self- mutilation as a coping method. [1,229 words]
AUTHOR'S OTHER TITLES (2) Draw Me Peace (Songs) Can you drwa me peace. [67 words] Forget (Songs) Forget. [117 words] [Romance]
Eleanor's Journey, Chapter 1 E P
“Get the hell away from me! I don’t ever want to see your ugly faces here again!”. Those were the first words out of Eleanor Evans mouth, Saturday morning. She glared at her ex-friends, as they turned and left. They seemed to have gotten the message. How dare they come by again? She had told them yesterday that they were over, and she didn’t ever want to see their sick faces ever again. They still came to her house in the morning, thinking that she would be glad to see them and that she’d apologize for what she said. Hell, no! They wouldn’t be by this house again, though, she would make sure of it.
Her family’s house was a mansion, full of secret places. It was just outside Gold Lake, a small town in the North of Ontario. For such a small place, it was remarkable the number of tourists it attracted during the summer. They came mainly for the fishing; it was the biggest business in Gold Lake.
Eleanor and her father used to go out on fishing trips when she was younger, but they hadn’t done one in nearly three years. Really, the fact that they didn’t do things like that anymore didn’t bother Eleanor, because they weren’t on the best terms with each other. Lately, they had been arguing constantly and he and her mother were always telling her what to do.
Since the beginning of the year, in fact, they had been convinced that she should go to counseling. They had also gotten other absurd ideas into their heads, like making Eleanor go to the church youth group, telling her that it would be a ‘good opportunity to find some nice friends’. Thankfully, there were some other kids there whose parents had made them go, too, and she hung around with them and they moped together.
This year, her grade eight year, Eleanor had lost all reason to be enthusiastic about life. She had lost all reason to live at all. Her friends were awful, her parents were trying to control her and school just plain sucked.
Her school was a Catholic French school. There were two sides; the girls’ side and the boys’ side. Since it was a small school, each class on the girls’ side had three grades in it, and each class on the boys’ had two. The teacher for the girls’ side last year, Mlle Blanchette, had been amazing. She had been inspiring and a wonderful influence. She had moved away that summer, unfortunately, and been replaced by a gentleman by the name of Monsieur Lakoire. M Lakoire seemed to do everything within his power to ensure that the girls were miserable, and he succeeded daily. The girls would come home with their ears sore and heads pounding because M Lakoire yelled so much and carrying piles of homework about things which they hadn’t been taught. Half the parents complained, but no one seemed to take them seriously. Thus, Eleanor was stuck in that class for the rest of the year.
She and her friends (ex-friends, now) had made many plans to run away from school and rebel, but they never carried through with them; they chickened out at the last minute every time.
Thank goodness there was only a day left of that torture. Summer vacation started in one day! Just thinking about the prospect of being free made Eleanor’s fingers tingle with excitement. Hopefully life would liven up a bit during the holidays.
“Eleanor, breakfast!” Her mother called. Eleanor sat on her bed, motionless, considering whether she should go down or not.
“Eleanor!” Eleanor made no move to go downstairs, and she could hear her mother stomping up the stairs.
“Eleanor Chelsea Evans! Get your lazy behind down to the table!” Her mother was fed up with the way she had been being treated the past weeks. She was going to get some sense knocked into this child yet.
“Chill, mom, I was just making my way down. God, stop freaking out on me!” Eleanor got up and dragged herself down to the eating table. She hadn’t expected that kind of reaction from her mom. She usually just rolled her eyes and left Eleanor to do her own thing. Eleanor ate her pancakes more quietly than usual, not wanting to make her mother madder than she was already.
After breakfast, Eleanor went upstairs and lay on her bed. She looked down at her wrists and pursed her lips. It had been exactly two months since she had made the first cut. She remembered it so vividly she could replay ever moment of it in her head. She had come home feeling depressed and there was nothing out of the ordinary about that, but this time she had acted on it. She had gone into her washroom and taken out the razor she used to shave. She had examined it to see whether it looked sharp enough, and then she’d brought it down to her wrists. As if in slow motion, it had sliced through the skin and left her with a little red blotchy patch. There was a surprisingly little amount of blood the first time, but it was enough for Eleanor.
That night had been the night of the class play, and she had had to put on cover up on so that the marks wouldn’t be visible on stage. She had been terrified that someone would see the red spots on her arm. Of course, no one had, and all the worry had been for nothing.
As the weeks went by, the other girls in her class had started to notice the cuts on Eleanor’s arm, and one of them had even walked in on her cutting in the washroom. They had started talking about her more than usual, and giving her weird looks. Eleanor had gotten used to them being kind of mean, but last night they had gone too far. They had finally pushed her off the edge. Eleanor may not have made the best choices, but she would not take their crap. She would never be hanging out with those sluts again.
The bad times with them were over, though, and Eleanor was going to find herself a new crowd. They would be more like her, and more understanding of her situation.
Her first step towards new friends was going partying. Today was the last day of school, and there was no way that she would be back with the jerks from her school. No, she would go hang out at some of the places where the people who skipped school go.
“Eleanor, I don’t want to see you late for school again. It’s the last day, for Christ sake!” Eleanor’s mom yelled up at her. Wow, she thought, mom was really cranky this morning. In some sick way, it pleased her to think that she was the reason for her mom’s unhappiness. It was almost like a giddy feeling, someone was making a fuss over her!
Trying to shake the unwanted feeling of happiness, Eleanor descended the stairs and put her shoes on. She opened the front door to feel a whoosh of refreshing air on her face as the cool breeze surrounded her. She stepped through the doorway and into the morning, hearing the familiar click of the shutting door.
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