Chasing Starlight 💫

10. Three months later

Ash:

Principal Wallinger shuffled Ash's latest assignment with a foreboding that made her gulp and stare at the desk. The desk was rosewood, polished, as shiny as the principal's bald patch peeking through his comb-over. After a quick glance of her work and the post-it notes the science teacher had attached, he peered over his glasses at the offending student and her mother.

"I'll ask one last time, who did you copy this assignment from?" he asked.

"No one. I swear," Ash replied.

"This might have your name on it, Ashleigh, but after looking over your previous assignments this last one doesn't reflect your style at all." He picked up the cover page and read, "'The effects of quantum physics and quantum teleportation. What really happens inside wormholes.' A very advanced subject matter, and one we have not covered in our curriculum. Now if we look at the previous titles you've chosen to explore..." He opened her file and read from the top sheet of paper, "'What must go up must come down—Wrong!' and 'Do Alien's exist? Yes!' we are blessed with two brilliantly ridiculous titles that have no scientific foundation on which to stand upon."

He closed the file and interlaced his hands, crunching her assignment as he did so. Ash was beginning to dislike that smug smile of his more and more. It had been bad enough witnessing it at assembly over the years, but he'd worn it at least five times while she'd been sitting in the room.

"I think they're creative," Marianne said, smiling.

"I see," he said, unamused. "But as I was saying, Ashleigh's work has been well below par for the past four-and-a-half years, so unless she has miraculously become a genius in the last week, I think we can say that this newest assignment has been plagiarized to its last full stop."

It has not! Ash was about to say, but Marianne patted her on the arm.

Marianne sighed. "Mr. Walling—"

"Principal Wallinger," he corrected.

"Principal Wallinger. Ashleigh worked very hard on that assignment. I saw her typing away with my own eyes, and I never saw anything to lead me to believe that she was cheating."

"Then she is more cunning than you think. Not smart enough to write a physics paper of the caliber before me, but she is cunning."

Marianne scoffed.

"Parents always prefer to see their children through rose-colored glasses," he said, "but sometimes those glasses need to be dropped to the ground and smashed, because—"

"You know nothing about my daughter!" she said, standing. "The fact that she is producing work of such a high standard is downright amazing considering that my husband walked out on us three months ago. To her credit, she has been strong throughout it all, never complained. Just made my life easier, if anything."

Ash dared a glance at her mum, surprised that she hadn't started crying. She certainly sounded upset enough to cry.

In the first month after David left, Ash would catch her Mum crying out in the garden, weeds in one glove, wiping the tears away with the other. Ash had thought Marianne had been happier lately, but maybe she'd just gotten better at hiding it.

The principal managed a sympathetic smile. "As unfortunate as that might be, it still doesn't change the issue of who is responsible for this assignment."

"I am," Ash said, standing beside her mother.

"No, no, no," he smiled, wagging a finger at Ashleigh. "Someone else..."