So Into You [The Jane Austen Academy Series #2] (17 page)

Ellie saw Dante nervously pacing in one corner of the courtyard. Lizzie had forbidden him to come near them so it wouldn’t confuse the issue once his parents were forced to go public. But she could tell how much he wanted to be with Lizzie and support her, since he also hated their interference. But instead, he was forced to watch them from nearby. Rick stood silently next to him, his hands stuffed in his pockets.

Josh sat on the main courtyard steps, still in his gym clothes, arms resting on his knees. The reporter seemed cued to interview him next, and Ellie knew he was more than ready for the spotlight.

"Just let me do the talking when she gets here," Lizzie said, taking a deep breath when the reporter finally made a beeline for them. Her cameraman trailed behind her.

Ellie felt Lizzie grab her hand in the grass. She squeezed back reassuringly.

But when the news reporter drew closer, she asked, "Which one of you is Ellie?"

"Huh?"

"What?"

"Excuse me?"

"Ellie?"

The news reporter glanced down at the black notebook in her hand. "Yes. A handful of the students said one of you is named Ellie?"

"Well . . . that’s me," Ellie said. "But there must be a mistake—"

"Roll tape," the reporter said, glancing back.

The cameraman turned on his camera and a beam of light shone in Ellie’s face. Dusk had settled just enough that it was blindingly bright, so Ellie brought her hand up to shade her eyes and squinted.

"Watch the light," the reporter said.

"What do you think you’re doing?" Lizzie asked.

"My job." The reporter smiled with all her teeth and brought a microphone to her face. "We’re sitting with one of the instigators of the protest—Ellie Dvorak—or Ellie to her friends. She’s transferring to another school in another country tomorrow, but is still chained to a tree in protest today. Ellie, knowing that you’re leaving and never returning to the Jane Austen Academy, why is it so important to you to be part of the protest to bring to light its new owners and protect the school’s name?"

Ellie’s mind went blank.

The cameraman dimmed the lights. Ellie brought her hand down and could see very clearly the microphone in her face, the expectant look in the reporter’s heavily made-up eyes, and the collective looks of everyone in the courtyard.

"I’m sorry?" Ellie asked.

The reporter moved the mic to the side. "Don’t be nervous, sweetie. Just say how you feel." She cleared her throat and repeated the question.

Say what she felt.

What she felt?

Then it hit her.

She felt.

So.

Much.

Ellie was suddenly overwhelmed with so much emotion—with a surprising amount of feeling and opinion. About school. About Edward. About her friends. Feelings that she’d suppressed so she wouldn’t hurt people or cause them inconvenience.

And where had it gotten her?

She didn’t have the guy. She wasn’t getting to stay.

But at least now she had a mic.

And very, very appropriately—she would be heard.

"My name is Ellie," she said.

"Look at me—not the camera," the reporter instructed.

Ellie gave a sheepish smile and looked back at the reporter. "My name is Ellie," she said, her voice firmer this time. "Tomorrow I’m transferring to another school because my parents can’t afford to pay tuition at the Jane Austen Academy." Ellie thought about Bergie—about her time in the kitchen. "There are actually a lot of people who can’t afford The Jane Austen Academy, and I hope that changes one day." She thought of Bergie—trying hard to bring in more scholarships for students like her. Anne’s parents had been generous—but in a way that had bankrupted the school. "I think it’s possible that the change will happen soon. But for now, for the people who can go here, the Academy is more than just a school. It’s a place that lets us be ourselves."

"What do you mean by that?" the reporter asked.

"I’m a surfer," Ellie said. "You can probably tell. But what you might not be able to tell is that I’m also a math geek. A total math geek."

"And great at science!" Emma piped up.

"Also gymnastics," Lizzie added.

"Thanks, guys." A smile broke out on Ellie’s face. "The Jane Austen Academy lets me be all these things. And it lets me be me. It’s a place where I don’t have to hide who I am or only be one thing."

She sat up taller, drew straighter, felt stronger.

"Have you felt like you have to hide who you are?" the reporter asked.

"I think everybody feels that way sometimes. Everybody feels like they have to classify themselves or limit themselves." Ellie glanced down at her friends. "Here, the nerdy head of the school paper can also date the most popular guy in school."

"Ex-head of the paper," Lizzie mumbled with a laugh.

"Here," Ellie said, "a popular fashionista can be friends with a total slob like me."

"Friends and roommates," Emma said.

Ellie turned back to the camera, her expression grim. "How can we be taught not to hide who we are when the owners of the school are hiding who they are? Our school motto is
We Will Be Heard
."

"We will be heard!" her friends echoed, fists to the sky.

"That’s right," Ellie said, her voice rising. "But how can we be heard when the owners won’t present themselves to listen to us? We have to make ourselves heard. Because we
will
be heard."

"We will be heard," Emma repeated, louder.

"We will be heard," the girls all chimed in, repeating it louder and louder until they were joined by the crowd, chanting in unison. "We will be heard! We will be heard!"

The reporter nodded and brought the mic back to her face. "Wise words from a wise young woman." She dropped the mic. "Let’s find the headmistress. Thank you, ladies."

The reporter waved good-bye as the chants crescendoed into applause.

The reporter had barely made it two feet when Emma hugged Ellie’s shoulders, Anne squealed, and Lizzie high-fived her.

"Chatter alert?" Ellie asked sheepishly.

"Not at all!" Emma said.

"Go, Ellie!" Lizzie said. "I didn’t know you had it in you. That was perfect."

"Are you sure?" Ellie felt herself shaking. "It wasn’t too cheesy?"

"Perfectly cheesy," Emma assured her.

A shadow fell across them and the girls looked up.

Fanny smiled down at them, dimples in her cheeks. "Room for one more?"

Ellie scooted over. "Sure, have a seat."

* * *

By the time the moon rose in the sky, four other reporters had arrived. No one from CNN or any of the major news networks, as Lizzie had hoped, but she was certain the story would get picked up by other networks.

Dante and Rick had come by with heavy jackets, which Lizzie accepted before shooing them both away. Fanny, the only one of them not officially chained up, had brought sandwiches from the cafeteria as well as a deck of cards.

So they were full-on food and mid-game when Bergie returned.

"Do you think his parents went public?" Anne asked.

"Whose parents?" Fanny said.

Lizzie shot Anne a quick look to be quiet. Fanny didn’t know Dante’s parents were the owners of the school. "Nothing," she said. "And no—Dante and Rick would have come to tell us if the owners had gone public."

"Then why is Bergie coming back?" Ellie asked.

"Does she need a reason to yell at us?" Lizzie asked.

"She’s actually not a yeller," Emma said. "In all fairness."

Bergie reached them and knelt down, careful not to let the grass stain her clothes. She smiled and the corners of her eyes crinkled behind the frames of her cat’s-eye glasses. "How are you ladies?"

"We’re doing fine," Lizzie said. "We could stay here all night."

"You could," Bergie agreed with a purse of her lips. "Or you could undo that lock, come with me, and Ellie would have the funds to stay through the rest of the year."

"What did you say?" Ellie asked.

"You’re lying," Lizzie said.

But Emma was already reaching for the hidden key in her back pocket and undoing the lock to Ellie’s shackles.

"Emma, wait," Ellie said. "I’m not leaving. Not until the new owners go public."

"Please, just come with me." Weariness crept into Bergie’s voice. "We’re done. You’re free to come back here and chain yourselves to the tree and wait for the new owners to reveal themselves. But I need your signature if you want to stay."

"You should go," Emma said.

"We’ll be waiting," Lizzie promised.

Anne and Fanny also gave her encouraging smiles.

Ellie slipped her leg out of a loop of chain and stood. She waited for Bergie to draw to full height beside her.

Together they walked toward the cottage.

* * *

Ellie waited patiently in the large, leather chair as Bergie pulled different papers from her desk drawers and shuffled them around. Her monitor was turned away, but Ellie could see that a video link streamed the news.

"Is that me?" she asked.

Bergie turned up the volume and tilted the screen her way, and she watched as the Ellie of twenty minutes ago led the schoolyard in a chant.

Her cheeks flushed. "I can’t believe that’s me."

"I can." Bergie favored her with a rare smile. "I liked what you said on the news, by the way. A lot of people liked what you said."

"Thank you."

"Enough people liked what you said that a large donor stepped forward in support of your tuition."

Ellie leaned in, blinking. "Who would do that?"

"The donor has asked to remain private."

"But . . . why would someone do that?" Ellie asked. "Why would someone pay for my tuition when they don’t know me?"

"Maybe someone liked to hear the kinds of things that you said. Idealism is hard to come by at my age, Ellie. Inspiration even more so." She pushed the papers across the desk. "The scholarship is enough to keep you here through year end. No promises for next year, of course. I need you to sign where I’ve marked to get the paperwork started, then I’ll email your parents for concurrence."

"No . . . wait . . . don’t email then," Elearno said. "They’ll be here tomorrow. Can we wait until tomorrow?"

Bergie sighed. "I’m starting to doubt whether you want to stay."

"I do want to stay. But I have to take care of some things first."

A scuffle from the computer screen caught Bergie’s attention and caused her to inhale swiftly.

Ellie looked at the screen. Dante’s parents—looking rich and refined—stood behind a man in a dark suit who addressed the cameras.

"On behalf of the owners of the Jane Austen Academy, I’d like to address recent events."

Ellie’s mouth dropped open.

They’d done it.

* * *

The next morning, Ellie waited for her parents on the main steps to the school. They pulled into the parking lot in a rented car in a long parade of cars as the remaining parents came to pick up their kids for Thanksgiving break.

Before she knew it, she was running toward them, her long legs kicking up behind her.

They’d barely made it out of the car before she reached them for a hug. They pulled her tight. Her mom and dad felt a bit frailer beneath her hands, but their skin was more tanned.

"We missed you so so, so, so, so much," her mother said, and with each
so
, she planted a kiss on the top of Ellie’s head.

"Where are your bags?" her father asked.

"Mom, Dad." Ellie swallowed, looking at them. "We have to talk."

* * *

For all her parents’ talk about accepting the path the universe had set, they fought hard.

They said no.

They said hell no.

They asked how she would fend for herself if she were so far away.

She said Guatemala made no more difference than Santa Cruz.

They asked how she could abandon them.

She said it was no more than when she’d first been abandoned to the very Academy they were now trying to wrest her from.

She cried.

They cried.

She stormed back to her dorm room—Emma had left earlier in the morning with a smile and a wink and a promise to see her on Monday.

Lizzie had already left for Chicago—part triumphant and part sad for Dante, who had to go home to a storm of media frenzy.

She cried some more, falling exhausted back onto the bed.

Her mom sat by her and she folded herself away, but her mom pulled her toward her and rested a hand at her spine. "If this is about the adoption . . ."