Dawnstar94 - Never mind! By the way...Hermianess. Love it!
Oreoskidz - No problem! I shouldn't be slacking off and posting on here anyway...I should be writing a biology research paper, an English essay, completing my media studies coursework and studying for a psychology test! Oh, and completing my extended project qualification!
iluvshinjimina - I usually update daily, so don't worry!
So, Verona's starting to catch up with our favourite couple, but meanwhile, Rosaline is enjoying life at the top. Also, the chapter's title comes from one of the songs in my favourite musical, Evita. And the bit about the Enrichment class is based on my own experiences from last year. Some of my friends were in the top group.
After the ball, Rosaline returned to school the pride and joy of Sister Agnes and the majority of the teaching staff. They smiled at her in corridors, asked her how her work was going and such. The younger students would acknowledge her, and once she overheard some year sevens saying how they admired her. This made Rosaline far happier than she thought possible.
She and Tybalt told their family that they were seeing each other shortly after they'd made love. Lord Capulet remarked with 'About time, too!' and Regina said her usual 'Oooh, my little Tibby is all grown getting such a lovely girlfriend!' However, she and Tybalt had agreed to keep their relationship quiet at school, due to the meddling members of staff, who very much disliked the rogue boy.
And it also seemed possible that Rosaline and her brother might have some sort of family relationship too. Gabriel smiled at her whenever he saw her, and even drew Tybalt a picture of the Montagues looking ugly to try and get along with him. He was quite sweet, in a weird, twisted psycho boy way.
But things with Angelo had still not been sorted out. It was the one blot on her perfect existence. Rosaline had everything, the beautiful clothes she had always wanted, the perfect hair cut and style, perfect shoes, perfect nails, and she was on track for some perfect GCSE grades. The teachers hurried around, trying to motivate the other students, and there was Rosaline, ready and waiting for whatever the exam would throw at her. She had risen from being little more than just another girl in an impoverished background, waiting to become yet another government statistic, and now she was everything. This was just glorious. Nothing would stop her now.
She wondered about Angelo when she had Enrichment class. In reality, Enrichment was where the teachers divided the students into groups based on ability, and the top group were told all about top universities and carers, whilst the bottom group ate biscuits. Naturally, Rosaline was in the top group. Last year, Tybalt had been in the bottom group.
Mr. Bastien had been on at her to take maths at A Level and to study it at university. Rosaline took one look at the maths nerds clustered together and wanted to barf. Sure, she wanted to do well, but she did not want have to spend time in their disgusting company! They made her think of that gross little Montague, Benvolio. The thought of sitting next to him in a university class made her feel even sicker. Gabriel had made some highly amusing remarks about him, which had both her and Tybalt in stitches.
In this particular enrichment lesson they were supposed to be looking at careers. She didn't care for the sciency side of maths, really, she was far more interested in money. Such as how to make profits, what happened if there wasn't enough and so on. Having helped her mother run a household for the past couple of years, she was a natural.
Economics looked good. She could get very far in that. It had money, as she wanted, and it needed intellect to understand the mechanics of how everything worked. Rosaline could do that. After all, her father was a politician, who was technically the second most powerful man in Verona after Escalus, and he had to have a good knowledge of how the economy worked. It was in her blood. She was certainly better at money management than her Oftmoro grandparents had been!
Mr. Bastien peered over her shoulder "Oh, Rosaline. A wise choice. I think you should consider Bocconi University in Milan. It's the seventeenth best university for economics in the world. It's about two hours away, and you'd definitely be up for the challenge"
Rosaline tapped it into the search engine. Well, it certainly seemed within her achievement range, and Milan was full of fashionable shops and fashionable clothes. That definitely suited her. The only thing that worried her was the price tag. The costs of living, the cost of her tuition fees, books, food, a computer, and so on. That was where she fell down.
The teachers didn't really care what background you had. As long as they could show your grades off and shove you into the best universities and show off about it. It was unrealistic to expect that a student who achieved the best grades in the class was always from a comfortable middle class background. It was pretty unfair to dangle opportunities within their grade range but not price range in front of their faces.
Rosaline didn't have enough to go. Even if she got a job, even if Tybalt lent her some money, Rosaline knew that without getting the account books and the calculator out that would never cover it. It would be cheeky to ask her Uncle and Aunt for more because technically, she had nothing to do with Lord Capulet.
But there was one person who did have enough money to pay for it. Especially considering that he had a son who was hell bent on becoming a ballerina rather than getting a university education. And especially considering that he hadn't done a single thing for her during her childhood, maybe it was time Angelo Fulgencio coughed up.
Maybe he could become part of her life again. Rosaline didn't have to like him, but she was so good at pretending to keep a good reputation with people that it wouldn't be too hard. It sounded like an ingenious idea. Gabriel would help her, too. He'd already stolen Angelo's credit card and raked him up in a few thousand Euros debt. He'd help her con money out of Angelo, no problem.