Читать книгу The Story of Rosemary Buttons - Gregory J. McKenzie - Страница 5

At the beginning there seemed to be no difference between Year Nine and Year Eight. In Year Eight all of Rosemary's friends had agreed on one point. Boys were disgusting. All their birthday parties were girl only affairs. Even brothers were NOT invited. Yet Rosemary noticed that all her classmates adored their fathers. This was a relief to Rosemary because her father was the most important person in her life.

The changes began after Easter. Rosemary had gone to the Royal Easter Show with her Very Best Friend. They had a marvelous time! Swearing eternal friendship when they thought they were going to die on the Cyclone ride, the two girls squealed their delight

Rosemary got home to find her brothers fighting once again. They were surprised when Rosemary simply smiled at them before going to her room. Rosemary got her diary out of its secret hiding spot and using one of her many coloured pens she recorded:

BEST DAY EVER!

Then she went to see if her brothers had succeeded in killing themselves.

When Rosemary went back to school after Easter, she noticed a coolness in her best friend's attitude to her panter. They used to huddle up close at lunchtime to share whispered nothings. Now her BFF would insist on sitting apart from Rosemary. Ever willing to accommodate her friend's moods, Rosemary put up with this new regime. But then it got worse. Suddenly her BFF was making excuses about sitting near her at all during the lunch break. At first these excuses seemed reasonable and unavoidable. Then they became cursory. Finally Rosemary got the message that her BFF wanted a break from their friendship pact. That night, when she finally realized that her VBF was snubbing her, Rosemary went home to cry herself to sleep.

Things just got worse between Rosemary and this now ex-BFF. Rosemary did everything she could to win back her friend's affection. But nothing worked. If anything it seemed to drive her friends even further away. Now Rosemary realized that she was all alone with no BFF.

Not long after this traumatic event in a young girls school life, Rosemary began to get hate mail. Like all other teenage girls Rosemary was active on various social media sites. On one of these sites the trolls began to target her posts.

When this cyber bullying got too bad to bear Rosemary sought help. With no mother to turn to she thought about approaching her father. But her father was a very busy man. He was rarely home when Rosemary got back from school. Worse still, her father had little idea about anything to do with social media. Struggling to find an adult in her life who was not too old to understand her problem, Rosemary finally chose to go to her Year mistress at her school. Making an appointment to see your Year mistress is fraught with difficulties for a Year Nine girl. But Rosemary was brave and determined. So she eventually found herself sitting in her Year mistress's office. Due to school protocol, the school's pastoral care officer was also present during this interview. Rosemary was apprehensive about appearing to be a whinger so she spoke in a hesitant tone of voice,

"Thank you for seeing me. My problem may be school related or it may not. But just in case I thought I would speak with you. Is that alright?"

The Year mistress was young but experienced in the problems of young girls. She saw the signs of real stress and early signs of depression. Signaling the pastoral care officer to take a record of what was said, the Year mistress, a Ms. Grace Temperance, replied to Rosemary's question in a soft tone of voice,

"Yes Rosemary, that is alright. I am here to help, as is Mrs. Parsons, who will take down what you say if that is okay?"

Rosemary replied with relief threaded through her tone of voice,

"Oh yes. I would not bother anyone but I am being targeted by trolls on my social media page and the insults seem to be based on incidents that are happening at school."

At once both Mrs. Parsons and Ms. Temperance were very alert to what was being discussed by Rosemary.