Rowan by Flo (book recommendations website TXT) 📖

out the corner of my eye that the door to the basement was chained up, with a ‘NO ENTRY’ sign on it. It looked a little out of place in a hospital, but I was too tired to use up any brainpower thinking about it.
We had to walk for half an hour to get to Gandalf’s car, as it seemed he made a habit of parking in distant lands, and I fell asleep the moment I leant back in the seat, neglecting even my seatbelt. Come to think of it, he must have strapped me in, because it was on when I woke up. Awkward.
“I’ll drive you in tomorrow. But you need a lie in, at least.” he said, unlocking the front door.
“Morning break is at ten thirty, could you take me then?” I asked, hoping to get in early enough to pretend I overslept.
“When does it end?” he looked thoughtful.
“Eleven.”
“I’ll try and get you there for ten to, then. If you hurry to bed you should be able to get in a good four or five hours sleep. Don’t worry about setting an alarm, I’ll wake you up.”
“Thanks. I’m gonna have a shower first though.” I said.
“Sure. If you need anything, feel free to wake me up. I think I might just crash on the sofa, I can’t be bothered to go all the way upstairs.” he yawned, which set me off.
“Night.” I started the journey to my room, which seemed so much longer than it had the night before.
“Night.”

“And just where have you been, young woman?”
“Huh?” I wheeled around to see Mr Toadstone striding towards me.
Balls.
“It is nearly eleven o’ clock!” he roared, emphasising each individual syllable. “Did you think you could simply sneak into school unseen after wantonly skipping my history lesson?” Spit flew from his mouth, forcing me to walk backwards as he came towards me to avoid being showered. He sped up so that he was almost chasing me.
“I slept in. My alarm clock broke.” I backed into a wall, trapped.
His face literally turned purple with rage. “Right. Headmaster’s office. Now.” he growled, his face half a foot from mine.
“Sir, you can’t make me go for my first offence.”
“Gah…maybe not. But the next time you so much as slip up...” he turned away, leaving the threat hanging as we both walked swiftly away in opposing directions. As soon as I turned the corner I burst out laughing, incapable of holding it in any longer.
“Alwyn!” his voice roared, and I heard running footsteps.
“Crap.” I sprinted past a bewildered girl whose face I vaguely recognised from my class, looking for a suitable hiding place.
Girls’ toilets. Not the most original hiding place, but I doubted he would be brave enough to venture inside, male as he was.
I backed away from the door as it slammed shut, thinking that maybe it was just a little too obvious a move. Sure enough, fists began hammering on the door.
“Rowan Alwyn! I know you’re in there! Get out here NOW.” he screamed. I looked around, and realised I was getting some serious WTF stares from the students around me, but I felt a rush of relief as I caught sight of Adrien.
“Is there another way out of here or something?” I whispered pleadingly to her.
“Window. There’s a fire exit a hundred feet to your left once you get out there- it’s always open, that’s how you’ll get back in. I’ll take care of Toady.” she grinned, as I suspected having clearly been in this situation herself many times before. I nodded my thanks, vaulting over the sinks and through the beckoning window.
“Calm down, there’s a whole bunch of year sevens in there who are losing bladder control because of you.” I heard her informing Toadstone as I lingered momentarily beneath the sill, keeping low as I spanned the distance to the fire escape, my many days spent in Skyrim making me an accomplished sneak.

The rest of the day held less excitement, at least until lunch break. I ran into Shawn and Allie in the lunch hall, and they invited me to sit with them. I thought it would be awkward, and I was correct, but it was better than having to sit on my own.
“Are you gonna eat your cake?” Shawn asked his girlfriend at some point.
“That’s it!” she shouted, and everyone in the lunch hall turned around with wide eyes just in time to see her slap him across each cheek. It was totally worth having to sit there listening to them flirt for the last twenty minutes, just to see the look on his face, and hear the fragments of his shattered dignity chiming as they dropped to the floor.
“What the hell, Allie?” he gasped incredulously.
“I may not have the perfect body but that doesn’t mean you need to start controlling my diet!” she shouted, tears pouring down her face.
“I didn’t say-”
“We’re over, Shawn. I hope you’re happy.” She stormed off, leaving everyone at our table crying with laughter, and Shawn speechless.
“Don’t worry, she was totally insane. It was never going to last.” I comforted him briefly, patting his shoulder before taking my leave. I dumped my tray on the rack and headed to my form room, where we were about to have PSHE.
“Oh, Rowan. You’re here.” Miss Farrow stated as I entered the room, feigning surprise. “Where were you this morning?” she asked.
“Slept in. Won’t happen again, probably.” I answered distractedly, for a ginger was in my seat. Not Maxwell, this one was a girl, and she was talking to Lydia, who looked less like a zombie now that the swelling around her eye had gone down a little. I dumped my bag as close to my desk as I could get it and retreated to the other side of the room, choosing a desk at the back which I knew wasn’t taken by anyone. My lack of sleep was finally catching up, so I just put my head on my arms and napped.
“...freak.”
“I hope it’s not contagious.”
I opened my eyes, wondering if the voices were part of my dream or not.
“Piss off or I’ll rape you in the shower.”
Perhaps not.
I sat up.
Miss Farrow had left the room, and a group of five had Lydia pinned against the wall, which I thought was just to stop her running off until one of them, who I recognised to be Joanna, hit her in the stomach. She doubled over, coughing.
“Hey! Stop that.” I shouted, jumping over the desks and trying to look hardcore as I strode towards them, willing my Mohawk to stand tall and give me the extra four inches of height I so desperately needed. Joanna turned on me, her cronies dropping Lydia who sank to the floor clutching her stomach, still coughing.
The punch was clearly harder than it looked, and it was only as I realised this that I understood the full extent of my stupidity.
“Looks like we’ve found another queer.” sneered the smartest girl in the class.
“The problem being?” I asked, raising an eyebrow.
“We don’t like lesbians here.” She stuttered slightly on “don’t”, and I gained back enough of my courage to avoid soiling myself.
“I’m not a lesbian, I’m bisexual. And I doubt you have any valid arguments whatsoever for being a bigoted arse wipe, so why don’t you all just bugger off now and save me the effort of kicking the idiot out of you?” I spoke calmly, trying to conceal how intimidated I was.
“What’s going on here?” Miss Farrow had reappeared, coffee in hand. I would have said ‘nothing’, but I was standing alone in the middle of the classroom in a kickboxing stance, facing off five other girls who were standing in a uniform group, looking just as violent, with the twenty or so other people in the room all watching us apprehensively or, in some cases, with amusement, even excitement.
What can you pass that off as? I wracked my brains, or lack thereof.
“We were about to have a dance off.” was my answer. Not my finest excuse. Just about everybody giggled at my failage.
“Um...okay, well, save it for the school talent show, not my classroom, please. Take your seats.”
I realised Lydia was still on her hands and knees, so I offered her a hand up which, surprisingly, she took.
“You shouldn’t have stepped in.” she said under her breath.
“I had to live up to my Mohawk.” I explained. “Besides, what fun is school if you don’t have any enemies?”
She gazed at me with that super intense stare she kept shooting me, and ended the conversation with the warning: “Your Mohawk won’t survive this.” identifying what was both my hubris and the source of all my strength. I shrugged, pretending not to care, and Miss Farrow started talking about the dangers of the internet. I zoned out immediately, staring out of the window. A drunk guy was staggering along the street, moaning disconsolately. He grabbed at a passing policeman and leant in as if he was trying to kiss him, but the officer shrugged him off easily. The dude kept coming, and after a few minutes the policeman slammed him to the ground and handcuffed him. A bus stopped in front of them, and by the time it moved on they had disappeared somewhere.
“Rowan. Rowan. Rowan!”
Lydia elbowed me in the ribs and I turned away.
“What?” I grumbled.
“What was the last thing I said?” Miss Farrow asked angrily. I looked at the whiteboard for inspiration, but it was about as inspiring as Shawn’s love life.
“Um…you need to be careful on the internet or…paedophiles will get you?” I guessed, thinking back to the last internet safety talk I had endured.
“Almost,” she sighed, “Although I didn’t put it quite so bluntly. And at your age, they would be classified as rapists, not paedophiles.”
Well. You learn something new every day. I waited for her to turn away before returning my attention to the view outside the glass.

I was rather impressed with myself as I unlocked Gandalf’s front door, having managed to get through the entire school day without even thinking about the events of the previous day. Of course, that meant that the moment I was inside I started to break down. Fortunately Gandalf was out doing the shopping, so instead of hiding in my room, I ran into the kitchen and put the kettle on, trying to calm down and man up while it boiled. I pinched the bridge of my nose, taking steadying breaths. Breakdown averted. Dignity intact. My Mohawk was a little pissed off with me, but no lasting damage.
The water inside the kettle started jumping around, and I poured it over the coffee granules in the bottom of my mug, refusing it the chance to click off on its own. I carried the mug up to my room and sat at the desk, spinning in circles on my chair as I tried to decide what to do.
Then I heard a scream.
I jumped up immediately, creeping towards the window and leaning against the wall to the left of it so I was difficult to see from the street. A man was stumbling along the pavement, his arms stretched out in front of him like he needed a hug with weird, kind of depressed grunting noises issuing from his gaping mouth. Another drunkard. Not afraid of being seen now, I opened the window and poked my head out to see the screamer- a skinny blonde woman in high heels. From the back, she reminded me a bit of Miss Farrow, but when she turned her head around to look at the drunk guy I realized