Oops! I Have Four Mates

Expelled

SORREN

The office chair is the same one I sat in last October.

I know because the left armrest still has that thin crack running down the side. I pick at it with my thumbnail while Principal Reeves talks. His voice has the same tired cadence it always does when he reaches the part about “repeated behavioral issues” and “final warning.” The difference this time is that he does not bother with the warning. He skips straight to the end.

“You are expelled, Miss Ashwood. Effective immediately.”

I stop picking at the crack. “He grabbed me first.”

“That does not give you the right to put him through a wall.”

“I did not mean to put him through a wall.”

Reeves looks at me like he has heard every version of that sentence already. Maybe he has. Maybe every kid who ends up in this chair says something similar. The difference is that most of them do not leave actual structural damage behind.

He slides a form across the desk. “Your parents are on their way. You will wait here until they arrive.”

I sign the form without reading it. The pen feels too light in my hand. My knuckles are still faintly red from the morning. I keep them hidden under the edge of the desk.

The wait is long enough for the school nurse to check on Brandon twice and for two different teachers to walk past the open door, glance in, and keep walking faster. No one asks if I am all right. No one ever does after the second suspension. By the fifth they stop pretending the concern is mutual.

When the outer office door opens I know the sound of my father’s footsteps before I see him. Heavy. Controlled. The kind of walk that says he is holding something back. My mother is right behind him. She does not look at me at first. She looks at Reeves, then at the form on the desk, then at the empty space where a wall used to be visible through the hallway window.

Darius closes the door behind them with more care than necessary.

“Mr. and Mrs. Ashwood,” Reeves begins. “I am sorry to have to call you in again under these circumstances.”

“Save it,” Darius says. His voice is low. “Just tell us what happens now.”

Reeves explains the expulsion in the same flat tone he used with me. Darius listens without interrupting. Elena stands slightly behind him, arms folded, eyes fixed on a point somewhere past Reeves’s shoulder. She has the look she gets when she is calculating how many more times this can happen before something permanent breaks.

I speak before either of them can.

“He started it. He put his hands on me. I pushed him back. That is all.”

Darius turns his head just enough to look at me. “You put him through a wall, Sorren.”

“I did not mean to.”

“You never mean to.”

The words land harder than they should. I feel my jaw tighten. “So I was supposed to let him keep shoving me? Keep talking about how you are finally done with me? That is the part that bothers you?”

Elena’s eyes flick to mine for the first time. There is something tired and sharp in them at the same time. “Do not twist this into us versus him. This is about you losing control again.”

“I lose control because people will not leave me alone.”

“People leave you alone when you stop giving them a reason to watch,” Darius says. “You have been suspended six times in three years. Six. Do you understand how that looks?”

I do. I have always understood. It looks like the problem child who cannot be fixed. It looks like the girl teachers discuss in staff meetings with that particular tone that means they are tired of trying. It looks like the reason my parents get those quiet, embarrassed phone calls at work.

“I know how it looks,” I say. “I also know he grabbed me first. I also know the wall should not have broken that easily. Something was wrong with it.”

Reeves clears his throat. “The structural report will take time. Regardless of the wall, the physical assault is enough.”

Darius does not look at him. He keeps his attention on me. “We are past the point of arguing about who started it. We are past the point of another suspension and another promise that it will not happen again.”

Elena finally moves. She steps closer to the desk, rests one hand on the edge, and looks at Reeves. “Is there any chance of reconsideration if she completes counseling or some kind of program?”

Reeves shakes his head once. “Not after this. The board has already been informed. The decision is final.”

Elena’s fingers tighten on the desk. Just for a second. Then she lets go and straightens. “All right.”

That is when I know something is different.

My mother does not usually accept final decisions this quickly. She argues. She negotiates. She finds the angle that keeps me in school even when everyone else has given up. This time she just says “all right” like she has already moved three steps ahead of the conversation.

Darius looks at her. Something passes between them that I cannot read. It is not new. They have always had those silent exchanges when they think I am not paying attention. Today it feels heavier.

Reeves stands. “I will give you a moment.”

He leaves the office. The door clicks shut. The three of us stay where we are. The crack in the armrest is still under my thumb.

Darius exhales through his nose. “We have talked about this.”

“About what?” I ask. “About how I am too much trouble? About how you are tired of getting called out of work?”

“About what happens when this school is no longer an option.”

Elena sits on the edge of the second visitor chair. She does not look at the form. She looks at me the way she used to when I was small and had done something dangerous without understanding why. There is affection in it. There is also fear. I have never been able to tell which one is stronger.

“You are going to boarding school,” she says.

The words do not land right away. I hear them. I understand the individual sounds. The meaning takes longer.

“No.”

“Yes,” Darius says. “It is already arranged.”

“You cannot just decide that.”

“We can. And we have.”

I stand up too fast. The chair scrapes. “So that is it? One fight and you ship me off?”

“It is not one fight,” Elena says. Her voice is quieter than my father’s but somehow cuts deeper. “It is years of fights. It is every time you come home with bruised knuckles and no explanation that makes sense. It is watching you get angrier and more isolated and not knowing how to stop it.”

“I am not isolated. People stay away from me because they are afraid of me. That is not the same thing.”

“It is close enough,” Darius says. “And we are done pretending the next school will be different if we keep doing the same thing.”

I look between them. My mother is still watching me with that careful expression. My father has his arms crossed, but his hands are tight against his sleeves like he is holding himself in place.

“Where?” I ask.

Elena answers. “A private academy. Remote. Structured. They have experience with students who need more than a regular high school can give.”

The way she says it is too smooth. Too prepared. Like she has practiced the sentence.

“What is it called?”

“Ravencourt.”

The name means nothing to me. I file it away anyway. “And you already enrolled me without telling me.”

“We started the process after the last suspension,” Darius says. “We hoped we would not need it. We were wrong.”

I laugh once. It comes out wrong. “So you have been planning to get rid of me for months.”

Elena flinches. It is small, but I catch it. “We are not getting rid of you.”

“That is exactly what this is. You are tired of dealing with me, so you are sending me somewhere else so someone else can deal with me instead.”

“That is not true.”

“Then why does it feel true?”

Neither of them answers right away. The silence stretches. Outside the office I can hear the normal sounds of a school day continuing without me. Someone laughs in the hallway. A locker closes. Life keeps moving for everyone who is not currently being discarded.

Darius uncrosses his arms. He steps closer, then stops like he is not sure if I will let him. “We are trying to keep you safe.”

The word sits strangely in the air.

Safe.

Not disciplined. Not corrected. Safe.

I look at him. Really look. There is something behind his eyes that does not match a normal parent who is simply fed up with another fight. The same thing is in Elena’s face when I turn to her. They are afraid of something larger than a broken wall and an expelled daughter.

I do not know what it is. I only know they will not tell me.

“Safe from what?” I ask.

Elena’s mouth opens. Closes. She glances at Darius. He gives the smallest shake of his head.

“From yourself,” she says finally. “From the pattern you are in. From whatever keeps making these situations worse instead of better.”

It is a careful answer. It is also incomplete. I can hear the missing pieces in the way she chooses each word.

I sit back down because standing suddenly feels like too much effort. “When?”

“Tomorrow,” Darius says. “We leave in the morning.”

Tomorrow.

No time to argue. No time to find a different solution. No time to pretend this is still a negotiation.

I stare at the crack in the armrest again. My thumbnail finds it without looking. “You are really doing this.”

Elena’s voice softens. “We love you. That has never changed. But we cannot keep watching this continue and calling it fine.”

Love. The word feels complicated in this room. I believe it and do not believe it at the same time. They love me enough to be exhausted by me. They love me enough to send me away. Both things can be true. That does not make either of them easier to carry.

I nod once because there is nothing left to say that will change the outcome. Reeves will come back. Papers will be signed. My parents will walk me out of the building for the last time. Tomorrow they will put me in a car and drive me toward a place called Ravencourt that they will not fully explain.

They are not just punishing me.

They are moving me for a reason they are choosing not to share.

I do not know which part hurts more.