Quote:
Rejection 101
The blonde girl stared at the envelope in her hands. It was the plain white security envelope, just the same as you would receive from a bank or relative. Or the government. And that, in fact, was who the envelope was from. The building it originated from was on some unknown street in Washington D.C., and even the stamp had an eagle bleeding patriotism all over the place like some great big bleeding patriotic eagle.
While most might dismiss this as another dumb pointless government letter (bleeding eagle is shamed that you would call the government pointless), it was actually much more important than that. Calintha Johnson held the envelope delicately in both of her hands, almost as if it was breakable. She'd been holding it in her hands since she got home; a good 20 minutes before.
She couldn't judge what they had answered with. With college letters, you could always tell if you got accepted, because they sent you a huge envelope thick and heavy with information (versus the plain white security envelope like the one she was holding that was sure to spell rejection). With the governemnt, however, it was more difficult to tell. It was very possible that they could actually say yes or no in a single letter.
Had someone else been present, the girl would have demanded that they open it for her. But since her only flatmates were plants (who were all absolutely inept at opening letters), she had no choice but to tear the seal and read the letter herself.
The letter itself was just about as interesting looking as the envelope that had contained it (not very interesting at all).
Quote:
Dear Miss Johnson,
We regret to inform you that your appeal to the Dept of Education has been rejected.
Even though your case is an unusual one, this department cannot justify allowing you to graduate when you have not completed the required number of classes as required by law. Since the school you listed as being in enrolled in was not ever validated by this office, we cannot assume that the classes you took there were up to the same standards as required by this department.
We thank you for voicing your concern on the matter and we wish you a happy school year.
Best Regards,
Jane Miller
Secretary of Student Relations.
The letter shook a little as she stared at it some more. This time, she was no longer staring at the words themselves, but the paper behind them. It was a thicker paper, very official looking and probably very flammable.
Now, that would be an interesting theory to test. Did the government put flame retardant on their paper just to prevent students from lighting fires with their bullshit? Getting up from the couch, she crossed her small apartment to kitchen, rummaging around in several drawers before laying hands on what she was looking for.
A small green lighter that she had procured for doing various odd things that required a lighter. Like lighting candles, or burning stray fraying threads. Or lighting official government documents on fire. She held the paper with her fingers in the top right corner over the sink, and lit it from the opposite corner on the bottom.
Calintha was now certain that the government did not flame-retard their papers. If anything, it was like they had doused them in some kind of oil. The paper burned up in under a minute, sending flaky charred carbon floating down into her sink. Before it reached her fingers she dropped it, allowing it to finish burning completely before washing it down with some cold water.
Walking numbly into the other room, she flopped down on her bed, face in a pillow. While burning that rejection letter had felt pretty good, it still didn't console the fact that she'd be stuck at Meadowview for another year. It was serious discrimination against the living dead. Calintha couldn't help it that the hospital had made a mistake, or whatever the hell had happened to her. She shouldn't be punished more than she already had been.
Picking herself up off of her soft comforter, she rummaged around in a drawer for a little while before fishing up a sweatshirt. Hastily putting the bright yellow hoodie on, she grabbed her phone, wallet, keys, and backpack and headed out from her apartment, locking the door behind her.
If she was going to be stuck at Meadowview, she might as well go and study for her finals.
Failing out wasn't quite the same as graduating early.
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