What You Become Read Online Free PDF Page A

without warning.
    He sat, writing in a notebook, behind a huge desk covered in curiosities, tribal-looking wood carvings of naked people and a sheep’s skull as well as a small glass dome encasing what looked like a stuffed mole. Ti thought it might be his power animal.
    ‘What can I do for you . . . ?’ He paused, confirming my suspicion that he didn’t know who I was.
    ‘Rosie. Rosie Bloom.’
    I had put on extra concealer because I sensed a day of heavy blushing, and though my voice was coming out at a duckling’s volume, at least I was here. My toes ached from clenching them so hard, but I hadn’t run. Yet.
    ‘Ah, yes,
Rosie
.’ He smiled, as if all of the heart-warming moments we had shared were coming back to him, and it was hard to tell whether he really knew who I was or not.
    I searched for my opener, but it was gone, evaporated in the impatience of Kes’s stare.
    ‘So . . . ?’
    ‘Um, you just expelled my best friend,’ I blurted out.
    ‘Ah, I see.’ Kes returned the lid to his pen, and sat back in his chair.
    ‘And I think it might have been unfair,’ I said, and the way he blinked at me, as though surprised, reminded me of my dad – slightly uncomfortable but eager to please – and it made me feel more confident.
    ‘It just seems like it’s one person’s word against another, and that maybe—’
    ‘Hold on!’ he said, and he was no longer my dad, he was the headmaster of my school, the person with the power to make me join Ti at The Bridge. He held his index finger out like a warning. ‘Hold it
right there
, Rosie Bloom. Your friend, Titania—’ (He pronounced it like Chase: Tih-tahn-yuh.)
    ‘Ti—’
    ‘Yes,
Titania
, has not contributed to the fabric of the school environment for the last three years. She’s been in and out of my office like it was a tuck shop. Good girl, but not academic. Not Fairfields material. I’ve spoken to her teachers, and they are in agreement. The Bridge will be a better fit; they’re less strict there, less demanding. She doesn’t contribute in lessons, she talks constantly, uninvited, and when she does answer a question it’s rarely an appropriate response.’
    ‘But she didn’t get chance to explain, not properly, and Ms Chase—’
    The finger came up again to shush me, and I resented it, but I stopped talking too, because I could hear my voice, and it was shaking and high, and who was going to take me seriously?
    ‘Miss Bloom,’ he said, ‘are you here looking for trouble?’
    He blinked again, and his grey eyes were severe as I took a breath, preparing myself. In five seconds I would confess.
    Five.
    ‘Because your friend Titania, I’m afraid, was. We pride ourselves on allowing our students freedom, but some are not responsive to this. Your friend didn’t take her education seriously. In fact, I have it on good authority that she did not contribute anything very positive to the Fairfields community at all. Ms Chase on the other hand—’
    Four.
    I rolled my eyes. Here it came.
    ‘
Ms Chase
has breathed life into our Drama department. She has grown a broken piano, some rusty triangles and the odd maraca into something close to an orchestra. And how do you think these instruments and materials turn up? It’s all a matter of Ms Chase’s tireless campaigning, her resourcefulness and fundraising, her connections.’
    Three
.
    ‘She made eight hundred and thirteen pounds for the Drama department last term. Eight hundred and thirteen pounds! Now
that’s
the way to perform at school.
That’s
the way to contribute.’
    Two
.
    His eyes had sort of glazed over, and I wondered if he’d forgotten who he was talking to, and why he was making this speech. The finger rose again, and I watched it dance, wanting something to pin my eyes to.
    One.
    ‘I was in the garden with her.’
    That’s what I should have said, and maybe I would have if Kes hadn’t said what he did next.
    ‘Your parents expect more from you, Rosie, and I know for a fact