A Girl Named Elise, page 1
A Girl Named Elise
Daniel Green
Austin Macauley Publishers
A Girl Named Elise
About the Author
Dedications
Copyright Information ©
Acknowledgements
Chapter One
Chapter Two
Chapter Three
Chapter Four
Chapter Five
Chapter Six
Chapter Seven
Chapter Eight
Chapter Nine
Chapter Ten
Chapter Eleven
Chapter Twelve
Chapter Thirteen
Chapter Fourteen
Chapter Fifteen
Chapter Sixteen
Chapter Seventeen
Chapter Eighteen
Chapter Nineteen
Chapter Twenty
Chapter Twenty-One
Chapter Twenty-Two
Chapter Twenty-Three
Chapter Twenty-Four
Chapter End
About the Author
After finding his passion for creative writing and analysing movies at a young age, Daniel Green studied creative writing at the University of Greenwich, where he worked on finishing A Girl Named Elise. If Daniel isn’t writing, he can usually be found at the cinema. In addition to this publication his work has also appeared in the University of Greenwich Anthology 2018. A Girl Named Elise is his first full length novel.
Dedications
To the real Elise,
You taught me how to love and how love is never meant to be.
Thank you.
Copyright Information ©
Daniel Green 2022
The right of Daniel Green to be identified as author of this work has been asserted by the author in accordance with section 77 and 78 of the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988.
All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise, without the prior permission of the publishers.
Any person who commits any unauthorised act in relation to this publication may be liable to criminal prosecution and civil claims for damages.
This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, businesses, places, events, locales, and incidents are either the products of the author’s imagination or used in a fictitious manner. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, or actual events is purely coincidental.
A CIP catalogue record for this title is available from the British Library.
ISBN 9781398411784 (Paperback)
ISBN 9781398411791 (ePub e-Book)
www.austinmacauley.com
First Published 2022
Austin Macauley Publishers Ltd®
1 Canada Square
Canary Wharf
London
E14 5AA
Acknowledgements
Charlie Ball and Nathan Larter for being my oldest friends and sticking with me through every moment of my life, good and bad.
Abbie Hambleton for believing in me and pushing me to continue to achieve my dream.
Neil Nixon for giving me a chance when no one else would.
Emma Ward for giving me the motivation and self-belief I needed to finish this novel and for reading and giving heartfelt feedback in the process.
To my family who have seen me grow as a human and have supported me and allowed me to flourish into the person I am today.
Sarah Sorrell for being by my side throughout the publication process and supporting me unconditionally in all aspects of my life.
Chapter One
Now here’s the thing; from the beginning of our lives we are all told stories. Some are happy, some are sad, but all are needed. Our entire lives are formed around the stories we hear as a child and then as we grow to become our own person, we create our own stories. These stories mask the hidden messages that our thoughts are trying to scream out into this ever-changing world and sometimes, just sometimes, we need these stories to understand each other.
I never once imagined that stories would become such an important part of my life when I was around the age of fifteen. Back then, I was always creative but also slightly lonely, never quite fitting into the world around me as much as everyone had wanted me to. My friends at school, even if they were my friends, always seemed to keep me at arm’s length, never wanting to get to know the true person I am under the difficulties I endured growing up. As a result, I became quite fond of my imagination, often creating worlds and, sometime surprisingly, amazing adventures where I would whisk myself off away from reality and escape.
I lived like this for a long while, used to how I was and how everyone around me was. I became so good with my own creation of stories that I decided that I had preferred my fictional world rather than the harsh reality that the world often lives in. Naturally, I started writing down my little adventures in short stories, or when I failed to write, I would store them inside my head and play out my fantasies like a movie for my own personal pleasure.
Many of these stories have stayed with me over the years and often I can remember some of the original ideas, a vast world where I could be in charge, all of the creatures that I create around me all loving and caring, never anything bad happening without my permission. Other stories entailed fantasies about finding that one true love that everyone gets promised from the moment the first story is read to us. Personally, my fairy tale true love never seemed plausible as with such an imagination as mine, the image constantly shifted, never settling on one perfect girl. She always seemed taller than me though, although that wasn’t exactly fetching much as I myself was, still am, quite small at only about five foot two inches of mass. Anyway, I’m getting off subject…
As you can probably guess by now, stories have played a massive part in my life and still do as a matter of fact, but I’m jumping the gun slightly. So, the year is something with a date and I am around the age of fifteen; I’m a seemingly happy child with only one or two feeding difficulties that were resolved using a rucksack that contained some form of liquid nutrition, or milk as I always called it. I lived with my mother and father, Hilary and Jacob, and my two sisters; Abigail, who is older than me by a year and a half and Mona, who is younger by three years.
Things were often quiet around my neighbourhood and nothing ever really seemed to happen until that one day where all of the stories in my head finally came into focus. She wasn’t like anything else I had ever seen, or she was but at the time I didn’t realise it. She actually looked fairly similar to one of my best friends at the time, Jenny, but none of us ever mentioned it or cared. She seemed different somehow and I instantly felt a connection towards her, pulling me closer with an invisible rope that would eventually bind us together, or so I hoped.
Her name was Elise and she had just moved up the road from where I was currently living. She seemed quiet and kept to herself a lot but when it came to the first day back at school after the summer, we were all in the same class, me, Jenny, and Elise. Our school was only just around the corner from where we lived and there was a little alleyway allowing a quick short cut from my house to the school. On the other side of the alleyway though was Elise’s house… and the corner shop.
“Come on, Olly!” Jenny shouted, banging on my front door, waiting for me to be ready.
My mum opened the door and let her in, knowing that as tradition, both she and I would walk to school together. My mum clearly thought that Jenny and I were an item, and I guess at some point we probably almost were back then, but you can stop being judgemental for my negligence for never dating her as it’s my story, so shh! Anyway, I was running late as usual, just putting the maroon jumper over the top of my shirt, putting my shoes on, and then placing my school bag and medical bag on either shoulder before hurrying out of the door.
“We can’t be late on our first day!” she said, clearly wanting to get back to school to see our friends.
“Alright, fine, I’m nearly done!” I called back, just as I was finishing tying my shoe laces.
It was still quite warm from the summer just passed and I didn’t feel like wearing a coat, mind you even when it was snowing, I still would do anything to get out of wearing a coat. So, once I was finished both me and Jenny walked out from my house and right towards the alleyway. This normal trek didn’t last very long as I had since started getting curious about that girl Elise.
“Hey, do you want to go to the shop?” I asked Jenny, keeping away my secret motive of hopefully seeing Elise.
“But you don’t have any money…” she replied.
“Yeah, but that’s not the point!” I complained. “I just want more of a walk…”
“But you hate walking…”
“Sooo…”
“Alright, fine, but we have to walk quickly.”
She caved in.
I silently congratulated myself with a smug smile. It wasn’t long, about ten seconds, till we reached the new girl’s house. As we walked past her house, Jenny expressed her curiosity for the girl and luckily didn’t notice my eyes scanning each of the windows, hoping to catch a glimpse of the mystery that lives inside.
“She looks a little bit like me, don’t you think?” Jenny asked me as we reached the end of the road.
I walked into the shop, knowing that I just wanted to waste time until school started. I never replied to her as I didn’t see it. Yes, they were both taller than me, but who wasn’t, and
After a few minutes of aimlessly searching the shelves for items not to buy, I reluctantly gave into the constant moaning of Jenny saying that we had to leave. Walking out of the shop I looked back down the road, still hoping to see the girl, but the road was almost silent. We turned right onto the school road and began walking quickly, or Jenny did and I had to keep up. With every footstep she seemed to be getting more and more excited, whereas with me I just became more curious.
Within two minutes we had reached the school gates and everybody, students mostly with the exception of one or two teachers, were all spread across the playground, all talking loudly, running about, or just staying silent and waiting. The sound of the first day back I guess, everyone talking about how exciting their summer holidays were and then there is me and Jenny who had just spent it together playing in the park close to where I live.
We walk over towards a group of friends from our class and stand near them, we weren’t with the type of kids that ran about, shouting and playing bulldog or football. As we neared, I could hear them, Jerome and David, laughing about something.
“What’s so funny?” I asked.
“Jerome’s little sister shat her pants and then threw it at their dogs!” David laughed.
“Eww that’s horrid!” Jenny exclaimed, clearly wondering on how they could find something like that even remotely funny.
I had actually forgotten about the new girl for a short moment and actually laughed. Jenny shot me a dirty look, clearly disgusted that I found such a thing amusing. For the next few minutes, we continued to laugh and talk about some inappropriate things which I dare not say… okay, it may have included more poo throwing… anyway soon enough the school bell rang and each of us lined up in our classes and walked into our new classroom for the first time this year.
Once we were all inside and seated, I noticed something strange. There was a single chair that was empty just across from me. Of course, this could have meant that someone was ill, yeah it happens on the first day sometimes, or that we have someone new…
“Alright class welcome to the new term…” Our new form tutor said as he walked through the door. “I’m Mr Guilford.”
He followed his introduction of himself by writing his name on the whiteboard and taking the alphabetical registration form that the school used to keep track on which students were in class or not. The strange part though was about a third of the way through the register he paused, looked over at the empty chair, and then continued with the list of names, seemingly missing out the someone that was not in the chair.
The register soon ended and silence filled the room, each of us not knowing or expecting what was about to happen next. Within the silence I could feel my curiosity screaming out of my chest, needing to know who was meant to be in the empty chair. Mr Guilford didn’t say anything in particular, he just stood as if he was waiting for permission to start his first lesson. Then there was a swift knock at the door and every single head turned towards the sound.
Through the window we could see our head mistress, Mrs Penny-Smith. She looked slightly blurred through the misty glass used for the door but just as polite and friendly as she always was. She stood rigid as Mr Guilford walked over to the door, opened it, and after a few whispered sentences, stepped back inside the classroom, followed by Mrs Penny-Smith. We all stare, I know slightly rude, but hey, we’re kids, at the new girl that shuffles through the door quietly before it automatically closes.
The door clicks shut and I look at her, the mystery girl that has been around all summer but has never been seen making friends. She seemed perfect to me though and after about a minute of staring, and a minute of not paying attention to anything the adults are saying, Jenny, who sat next to me for that year, elbowed me in the ribs. I didn’t say anything but gave her a look of slight anger as suddenly I heard what the adults in the room were saying.
“We need someone to volunteer, to help her around the school and to get her used to the way everything works. Do I have anybody willing to help?” Mrs Penny-Smith finished.
There was silence around the room. I obviously wanted to be the one but I was too scared, besides I doubted she and I ever could become friends. She doesn’t seem like the type of girl that would want to make friends with someone as different as me. Around me I saw that no one else had risen their hand to volunteer.
“Olly? Why not you?” Mrs Penny-Smith suggested.
I instantly felt a happiness inside me that meant I could possibly talk to the mystery girl. I answered positively, a little too quickly for what I had hoped. So, it was settled that I would be the new girl’s tour guide for the time being and as she sat in the chair opposite me, I looked over at Jenny before looking at the girl.
“Hey…” I said slightly nervously, not sure on what else to say. “I’m Olly.”
She didn’t respond by speaking however though. What she did was take out a small notebook and pencil and wrote down something on it quickly. Then she slid the notebook over the desk towards me. I looked down at it in bizarre amusement and read the few words that have been stuck inside my head for the rest of my life.
Once upon a time there lived a girl named Elise.
Chapter Two
There comes a time in everyone’s life when they feel overly connected to a story, to something fictional that has a real-world effect on them. Elise and I however, used such a time to create our friendship and to keep the stories around us always alive and not just when we needed to escape. We developed a system where stories would become our entire emotional state, but once again I’m skipping ahead so I will just continue from where I first met the quiet girl that was Elise.
So, I sat and stared at the words written on the paper for a long while, not knowing how to respond. Jenny had tried to take a look at the notebook to see what the mysterious girl had written, but before she could see what was written elegantly on the paper, I had torn the paper away from the book, pushed the notebook back to Elise, and placed the paper in my pocket.
I could feel my cheeks burn red as Jenny glared at me in surprise and frustration at my defiance of her. I shot Elise a quick smile to reassure that her message was not a waste and about halfway through the lesson, I quickly decided to write a reply to her original message – or a start of my own story aimed at her – on the bottom line of the first page in my new notebook.
In a land a lot like this, a boy named Olly lived with a hope of a new friend.
That was the moment when I knew that we both had storytelling in common. I had always liked stories and once I had even tried to write a short story of my own. It was this fact that had caused us both to collide into the friendship that we had and would remain to have for a time to come.
It took a long while, after I had written the note, to be able to discreetly tear it away from the book, without Jenny noticing, and place it also in my pocket. I glanced over at Elise once I had torn out the paper and it turns out that I had been watched carefully by her all the way through my supposed secret message writing. I nodded at her slightly, hoping that she would understand that the message would be for her, and to my delight she nodded back in the same fashion.
Upon the close of the lesson there was a short break before the following one began and Jenny had to quickly use the toilet. Taking the opportunity I was given, I remained in class with Elise until everyone else had left. Only Mr Guilford remained except us, and that’s when I took out the note written by me and handed it to Elise. She studied it for about a minute while I watched her anxious and anticipating the worst. But then she stood from her seat and walked around the small table towards where I was sitting with an ever so slight smile on her face that could have been mistaken as a blank face by anyone not paying close attention to her every movement.
