Behind Her Demeanour

Chapter 4

"Hi, Mr Hollow? I was told to meet you here," Andrea said in a stroppy tone as she entered room 104.

"Yes, Yes, Andy, come in," Mr Hollow smiled, looking up from his paperwork. He could tell straight away that Andy didn't want to be there, but that wouldn't stop him from doing his job. "So how are you today?"

"Great," She replied shortly. "Is this gonna be long?" She said, placing herself at the desk in front of his.

Mr Hollow smirked. "Why? Got somewhere to be?"

"Not particularly, No."

"Good. Let's begin then shall we."

Andy sighed as she pulled out her school workbooks. Majority of them had very little writing in them, and the ones that did were mostly full of things she scribbled when she was bored.

"Can I have a look at those, please. Just to see what we need to work on," He stretched out his hand before a snarky reply could come out of Andy's mouth.

She hesitantly picked up her books, stretching from her desk to place them in front of Mr Hollow.

His eyes scanned a few of the books, his face showing his dissatisfaction as he opened each book to only find a few lines written. After looking through three books he had an idea about how the rest of them would look. But he also had an insight on just how tough working with Andy just might be.

"These barely have any writing in them, Andrea," He said to the girl in a disapproving tone.

"It's Andy," She corrected.

"That's all you have to say about this?" Mr Hollow said, both of his eyebrows raised.

"What am I supposed to say?" Andrea slouched back into her seat. "Lessons are boring. I have nothing to write."

Mr Hollow sighed impatiently, his problem wasn't that he couldn't handle the teenager, it was that he didn't want to start handling her behaviour so early. He knew there had to be a way to break through her hard-shelled demeanour without getting mad at her. After all that's what Andy liked the most, she liked to get teachers angry, she enjoyed pushing their buttons or seeing how long it would take before she finally got under their skin; but Mr Hollow was certain that she wouldn't do to him what she had done to other teachers, not even if she tried.

"Okay, so what would make your lessons less... boring?"

Andrea leant up from her seat, no one had asked her that before, all she'd ever hear from those around her was to simply 'suck it up and move on'. Andrea believed that her opinion never really mattered that much, though she never had trouble giving it anyway. But this time Andy didn't know what to say, "Erm, I'm not sure," She muttered lowly.

Mr Hollow noticed the change in her personality, he frowned with a confused expression, whilst looking at her. "What's wrong?"

"Nothing, Nothing," Andy said quietly.

"Okay, we can come back to that topic later."

"No, well, it's just that I find the work too easy sometimes, except maths, I can't stand it. Sometimes it just seems like the teachers just go on and on and on. But they never seem to make lessons enjoyable, nothing makes me want to learn," Andrea explained.

Mr Hollow smiled at her. He was happy she'd shared something with him. From what he had heard Andrea would never discuss how she felt with anyone; so he felt honoured just to hear a small portion of what was going on inside her head. There was so much he wanted to know about her, but it'd be hard to draw it out of her.

"Okay. Have you spoken about this to your parents?" Mr Hollow asked.

Andrea felt her body drain of any happiness she had left, she almost felt a little sick in her stomach, at even the mention of her parents. Even her face dropped, but only for a second, she didn't want the teacher to notice any sudden change.