I cannot believe it. I just can't. I am stunned.

Even though I haven't seen my father since he left, haven't heard anything from him, he suddenly appears in my school for a meeting with the headmaster. Sitting right next to my mother in his office and everything. A grumpy, 'I'm going to kill that boy' look across his face like nothing has happened.

Best I can figure is that the White Witch still has it in for me. I haven't done any science homework since…well, it's been so long I can't quite remember. And it isn't as if Professor Kirke's going to lie for me and say I show up to History every day like a good boy. I don't think he would try to get me in trouble, but I doubt he feels much sympathy for an errant student either.

Then there's still all that rot about the P.E. coaches. Hey, they're probably all scared of the White Witch, too. For pity's sake, she's practically taller than they are, though not as wide. Now that they know I'm not of any use to them, they sure as anything don't think twice before telling the headmaster on me.

So the next logical step would be to phone my parents. I really should have seen this coming. But with all that's been going on, it came as something of a shock.

My father turning up is the cherry on top of the whole load of awfulness, though. Really, I have no idea how I am supposed to act around him now.

As soon as I have seen him, taken him in, and my brain has registered him as 'oh yeah, that's your father, stupid', I wish I were back in English, doodling a few fantasy-themed sketches with a blue pen while the teacher attempts to explain the beauty that is proper use of pronouns.

I should have stayed in my basement room, they'd probably never have found me there.

"Have a seat, Edwin," says the headmaster.

"Edmund," my mother corrects him.

I take a seat and sit with my arms folded across my chest. I'd bet any amount of money they want me to talk. To explain myself so that they can punish me.

"Wipe that surly look off of your face," my father growls at me.

Without much effort, I tighten my face into an even grumpier expression just to spite him.

The headmaster has some papers spread out on his desk. "You haven't been doing what is expected of you, Edward."

"Edmund," my mother reminds him-again.

"Right, right," says the headmaster.

I try to think of other names he could call me by mistake. Ones that begin with Ed: Edgar, Edric, Edgemont…

"Edmund!" snaps my father, glaring at me.

Oops! What were they saying just then? I wasn't paying attention.

"What do you have to say for yourself?" growls the headmaster.

"He's not saying anything," my mother realizes.

Took her long enough to figure that out, didn't it?

"You're not doing yourself any favors," says the headmaster, chuckling a little at his own joke before he even tells it. "This isn't a court of law."

It might as well be, I think. I'm already sort of condemned, right? I mean, there's no way they're just going to let me go no matter what I do.

If I did blurt out that I hate my life (and sometimes even myself), would they listen? I can't imagine they would. If I broke down crying about how much I miss Lucy Valiant, would they even try to understand? Not likely.

"Come on, Edmund," says my father, "just cut this out and explain yourself."

No. You can't make me.

"Are the two of you having problems?" asks the headmaster in a low voice as if I am not going to understand what he is asking my parents.

My father glares at him and says that doesn't matter. They're not here to talk about them. This is all about me. Stubborn, willful, mute, angry, unresponsive, me.

Why is it that when you want attention you have to fight to get it, but when you don't want it, it's shoveled into your face faster than you can comprehend?

"Has he been through anything…er…traumatic…recently?"

Father glowers. Even though this is about me and not about him, just what he said he wanted, he's still displeased. I wonder if he would have preferred me to go to school in the old days when the headmaster would have just warmed my behind up with a wooden paddle until I broke down and talked.

"His girlfriend…died…" Mum falters.

Good of you to remember, I say in my head sarcastically.

"This has nothing to do with that," says my father. "He's just being difficult."

And you would know that how? It just so happens to have everything in the world to do with that. Well, that and a few other things. Susan dating Rabadash doesn't help my cause much. And I am not difficult. I'm complex. So there!

"You know," my father goes on, "I bet the rotten influences at this place aren't helping him much. Exactly what sort of kids do you have roaming these halls?"

"Well," says the headmaster diplomatically, "I can't speak for every single child in this building, but, with all due respect, no one's seen your son spending time with the wrong crowd."

I make a mental note to figure out who the wrong crowd is and be seen with them. I won't talk to them or anything, I just want to see how people react when I sit at their table for lunch one day without so much as an invitation. That would mean actually going into the cafeteria once in a while, though. Darn. Probably not worth it. Shame.

The headmaster's secretary, a blonde woman with a high-pitched voice, chimes in, "Actually, Edmund has some very nice friends. I've seen him talking to Susan Pevensie. Lovely girl, she's always such a help…"

How did my session with the headmaster turn into 'ode to the glory that is Susan'? Can someone please explain this to me?

"You've seen him talking?" My mother snips, arching a brow.

I wonder if she knows how insensitive that sounds.

"Well, I don't recall." The secretary opens a pack of gum and pops a few strips of green-and-white mint into her mouth.

"Susan hangs out with some very nice people," the headmaster notes.

Are all educators this way? So clueless? So easily distracted? At this rate, I'll be avoiding any real punishment altogether in favor of them talking about nominating Susan for best dressed instead of worrying about me.

"Are those your friends, Ed?" asks Mum.

I slump in my chair and shrug my shoulders indifferently. Part of me wants to shift uncomfortably under my father's furious gaze, but that look can't scare me now. I am too far gone. Nothing they can say can hurt me.

Finally, after what feels like for ever, they all resort to ignoring me and talking about me getting professional help as if I'm not even there. As if I'm not listening to every word they say and mocking them in my head. What do they know about me? About what I go through?

It all comes down to this: I will have to be more careful. If I ever want a moment of peace, by myself, I have to earn their trust back to some degree. I don't want them hauling me into some psychiatrist's office because I never show up to class. They can't just expel me, I don't think, because they're convinced by this point that I fall more under 'mentally unstable' than 'rebel'. So they'll try to analyze me, make me talk. And I won't want to. And they'll punish me. So I'll become even worse just to get their goat. Why start that whole mess when I can avoid it? I have made up my mind.

I vow to go to all my classes (even the White Witch's) for a few weeks, until they've all gotten this out of their system. Then, when I'm nobody again, I'll reassume my basement room ways. That's what I must do.

So, because I know I will not be there for a while, I go down to the basement room at lunch to sort of make up for soon-to-be-lost time.

I admire my drawings on the wall. I glance up at the Jack Lewis poster. I think I remember reading somewhere once that he had a frozen knuckle as a child and couldn't play sports with the other boys. Another outsider. Like me, though for different reasons. I'm glad I hung the poster up here. It would have been a pity for it to have been thrown away.

My laurel-crown is almost finished, just a few more adjustments. I've been keeping it in here, hanging from a little brass hook made for hats and coats. I always come and pick it up right before Art class.

It will be sort of strange not coming here every day. Sitting up in class, knowing this room is going to be empty, untouched, for so long. But not for ever.

I wonder how I will endure being the White Witch's victim again. Then I remember what I thought while I was in the headmaster's office. That they couldn't hurt me anymore. Maybe she can't either. I wonder if that is a good thing or a bad thing. I don't know.

The hardest part about staying away from here until the dust settles, will be that this was the one place thinking about Lucy was easiest. With the exception of that embarrassing moment at the dance when I grabbed onto Susan Pevensie's hand (yes, we all saw that episode, no need to recap!), this was the one place it didn't hurt as much to remember.

Leaning back on one of my cushions, I close my eyes half-way. One more memory in this place, I think, one last little thing to hold onto to get me through the days. I wonder what I will remember. I never can be sure. Sometimes memories swoop down on me slowly. When that happens, I can see them on the horizon and ready myself. But when they come flashing through like an electrical storm, it's harder to be prepared.

This time, it seems, it is neither. Not soft, not hard. Not a flash. Just simply what it is. A memory. Not too quiet, nor too loud. Just normality. Only deeper. Much deeper. In its own way.

"All right," chuckled Edmund, shaking his head and pulling away, laughing along with her even though he hadn't the foggiest idea why, "what is so funny?"

"Nothing," Lucy insisted, biting back a grin. "I'm sorry."

Having both realized that, although they had decided to start calling themselves boyfriend and girlfriend, they hadn't actually kissed yet, they were attempting to 'give it a go'. The only problem was that every time Edmund came near her with his head tilted, she burst out laughing.

"Do I have a booger or a piece of spinach in my teeth or something?" Edmund had to ask, beginning to feel a little self-conscious.

"Well," said Lucy in a pretend-serious voice, "you would actually have to eat spinach in the first place to have it stuck between your teeth."

Figures she'd remember I hate spinach, Edmund thought. Out loud, he said, "So it's the booger, then?"

She shook her head, trying not to crack up again. "No worries, Ed."

Sighing, he leaned forward again.

Lucy couldn't help it; his lips hadn't come within a full inch of hers before she burst out laughing again.

"I'm sorry," she gasped out in-between giggles. "I have no idea what I'm doing."

"That's fine," said Edmund, feeling more amused than frustrated. "Maybe I should…"

"Should what?" Lucy was afraid he meant to say he should go.

But leaving was the farthest thing from his mind at the moment, so she had no reason to worry.

"Nothing…" His face was turning a little red.

Lucy, never having kissed a boy or been kissed by one, hadn't the faintest notion of how to go about it. At least, she figured if she could only will herself to stop giggling wildly every time Ed came near her, that might be a start. But how to go about it in general was a little more confusing.

"All right, perhaps I should explain what I'm doing," Edmund said after a somewhat awkward pause, as though he were a great authority on the subject when, really, he didn't know that much more about it than she did; "I'm just going to put my arm around you like this," -one of his arms slipped around her waist- "and then we sort of try the leaning thing again…"

However nervous she felt, Lucy managed to keep most of her laughter in check this time, and followed his lead as their faces came closer together.

"Then we…" his voice trailed off as their lips met and he started to kiss her.

Pulling away and opening his eyes, Edmund glanced up, noticed Mr. Valiant standing next to the living-room couch they were sitting on, glaring at him, and grimaced.

"And then I get up and run for my life," he added quickly, letting go of Lucy's waist and jumping up off the couch, trying to make a break for it. "Bye, Mr. Valiant!"

Unfortunately for him, Lucy's father was not about to let him get off that easy, grabbing him by the ear and dragging him out of the room.

"Ow!" he protested, wondering if a person's ear could be yanked clean off.

Perhaps, he thought as he rubbed his sore ear, standing on the porch after having the door slammed in his face, it wasn't the best idea to try to kiss for the first time ever in her house…even though we thought her father was busy with an important phone call...

For the next three weeks, I am the poster child for good attendance. I don't talk or participate, but I do show up to every class. Even science.

When the White Witch mocks my supposed stupidity and embarrasses me in front of the class by writing my current marks for her class (already quite low) on the board and then erasing and lowering them every time I don't answer her or she just feels like sticking it to me, I don't say a word.

Professor Kirke comments on how well I'm doing on my History reports. I give him that same fake, gargoyle-impression face I used to give to the coaches.

In Art, I finish my laurel-crown. Peter is impressed. Lasaraleen gushes over how 'pretty' it is. Caspian just says, "Good job, mate." Time to start a new drawing, I suppose.

The hallways are filled with students. Plenty of them are probably couples. But I only notice one couple when I wall from class to class. Rabadash and Susan. Still together, still happy, still sickening. I want Peter to grab Rabadash's ear the same way Mr. Valiant grabbed mine and hurl him into moving traffic. I haven't the foggiest notion how he stands it.

Sometimes I see him with his arm around her. Twice, I've see them holding hands. If I still knew how to speak, if the world still turned, I imagine I would stand up on a soap-box and scream, "For the love of God, dump him already!" into a megaphone as they pass by.

The worst part is that she always acknowledges me. She never just brushes by without a hand wave or a kind greeting. I bet Rabadash is the jealous sort and doesn't like this. But, of course, I really could care less what he likes. I just want him gone.

Not only is what he tried to do horrible in itself…worse still is knowing that if I hadn't been there…if nothing had stopped him…he might have done unspeakable things to an innocent girl and gotten away with it.

My mother has stopped asking to see my homework, satisfied that I am back on the right course for the most part-even if I'm failing science. I don't know where my father is. I haven't heard from him since that day in the headmaster's office. Whatever. The point is that I know my plan is working. Soon, I will be able to retreat back into myself again. Back into my basement room. Where it is safe.

I feel guilty knowing that that is not what Lucy would want me to do. If she were alive, she'd want me to move on with my life. She wouldn't want my world to be over. She would want me to find happiness. Only, I'm not sure I know how to do that. I'm not sure I know much of anything anymore, actually.

The one thing I do know: it's high-time for another mental health day.

AN: Please review. (I've noticed some people adding this to their alerts and not leaving any comments. Don't be shy, I won't bite, I just want to hear your thoughts. LOL. To those of you who HAVE been reviewing, I look forward to hearing what you thought of this chapter as well.)