I didn't do it.

I may have made her feel bad, but I did nothing to her. I was there. But I did nothing this night. Why won't anyone believe me.? She did it herself. I don't see why I need to give you a 'statement', explaining what happened, because I did nothing. Mum won't let me talk to you, so I'm writing.

The detention was my fault. She seemed really down in the dumps, and everyone seemed to be irritating her, but she remained silent. It was utterly creepy. And I was just being me. I know that I should do homework, but I really couldn't do it for once, and my parents couldn't help. It's not my fault.

So I was going around, desperate to find someone who would let me copy. Susan was going to let me, but the girl turned. I don't even know her name. to me beforehand, she'd never been there, regardless of her being in my form. She was just 'the girl'. I never needed to talk to her, and I still don't, just have to talk of her, and you know whom I'm referring to.

Anyway, she was mad. Flames were almost dancing in her eyes, and I was so scared, although it isn't something I like to admit. Her voice was quiet, but the tone was cold, and it's just not something that someone does to me - everything's nice. Do it to her, but not me. I have earned some respect, she's just a little rat, so, naturally, I couldn't take it from her and keep up my reputation, could I?

Anyway, what she said: 'Don't weasel your work off other people. You'll do pathetically in your exams, and it'll serve you right. And anyone who lets you copy work is helping you cheat, which is just as bad as cheating.' And with that, she turned to walk away, and that was what got me enraged.

'I hate you, you little worm! We all know what YOU do, and it's ten times worse, so don't go on at me you little freak!' Admittedly, I shouldn't have said that, but I did, and it's what started it all.

We got to class. She told Miss Penchin that she'd lost her homework because it wasn't in her book, and she looked really worried, but Miss Penchin thought she was bluffing, and she, along with me, was put on detention. What happened to her homework? I took it. Dropped it in the sink. On went the tap. Hand in. Scrunch it up. Chuck it in the bin. I'm trying to be brutally honest here, I really am.

So anyway, we both got an after-school detention, scheduled for today. And we both attended, but Miss Penchin didn't. I believe she was off school that day. I was tempted to go home, but I knew that the girl would rat on me. She's just that sort of person; too good for words, but she didn't force me to do any work. Come to think of it, I have no idea what she was doing. Shamefully, I dozed off.

And then. Mr Weaver walks in, and it's about half past four. The detention ended half an hour ago, but neither of us are gone. My head's on the desk, she's lay sprawled across the floor. I'm not sure what she was doing. He sent us out crossly, and I walked out the door, before I heard his comment. 'What the.?!' Slowly, I turned. The girl was easing herself up, but the floor was stained in a little puddle of red, and a slow red trickle of blood crept lazily from under her shirt, to on her grey school-skirt, its effect being almost as good at permanent marker pen.

She didn't seem to notice, but she looked really woozy. She lifted a hand up, exposing a palm to him, telling him to stop his exclamation and let her explain but her hand told more than she'd bargained for. The other hand was clutching her now reddening school shirt as it pressed down on the bloody surface. Her palm dripped little beads of blood, and was also red, some from dry blood, some from fresh. The room had a horrible, yet now distinctive aroma of blood.

She seemed to realize what she'd done, and her hand dropped, also clutching her shirt to her chest. I was gob-smacked, and stood at the doorway, my jaw had dropped drastically, and I must have looked really gormless. I was scared. Apparently, I'm squeamish, and almost fainted at the sight of so much blood as I took the site in, but there was nothing around.

The girl muttered a single word ('Blast!') and shot out of the door, eyes really wide, looking panicked. She pushed past me and ran, trying to get away. I don't know why. Maybe she didn't care to explain, but to me that implies she was doing something we'd all laugh at her for. I bet she does the other stuff she's supposed to do. I bet this is tied in with that.

I don't think she thought anyone would bother to, or even could, follow her, but it was easy. From the room, I stepped out into the corridor, looking bewildered, and my eyes cast down to the floor. A trail of blood, trickled down at what can only be described as 'irregular intervals' where along the corridor. I walked out of the grounds, but the rain was coming down heavily now, something I hadn't noticed before. I don't usually notice much about the environment anyway.

Odd little pools of red blood lay about, but the rain was making quick work of them, and the further away she got, the more rain could get to the blood, so I stopped. Sat down on a rock and thought for about an hour or so, then ran home as quickly as possible. It was about a quarter to six. My parents weren't too happy with me being home late, but they weren't particularly mad. That is, until you police showed up on the doorstep.

That's my account, and it's true. It's what happened, though, as you can see, I was asleep. I didn't do it to her, I swear, so please don't get back to my parents about this; it's one hundred percent accurate, honestly.

Pamela:

Yeah, yeah, yeah. Go on. I can hear you all now. Jeer, laugh. Yes, I'm a freak, and you know what? I'm proud of it. Not proud of what I do to become a freak, but still. I'm different. I can't see a problem with that. And it really annoys me when people do. Also, you'd think 'popular people' were nice, because otherwise how do they become popular? But they're not. They're the worst. They love to insult you, and I think that the only reason that they seem to 'rule' is because of fear. Strange, as I'm supposed to be the scared one, the one always letting myself be pushed around. But I'd never change me to become popular; I'm content with how I am. Well, obviously, not exactly, but I'm sure you understand my meaning. Anyway, at school, they want to know what happened, but, diary, I can't tell them. Eleanor even has to give a statement to this police. This is stupid. It's obvious what happened; I did it myself, but oh no, they can't accept that. I almost feel sorry for her.

Anyway, what happened? Well, I'll tell you diary, as, hopefully, this thing will never get into someone else's eyesight. As you know, I mainly keep you to remain sane, though I have a feeling my sanity went a long, long while ago.

Coming back to it, it really was Eleanor's fault. I've never had a detention in my life before, but now I have to, and the error isn't on my part. Eleanor was the one who completely destroyed my homework, and yes, I know that.

Most people say that you can't know something unless they tell you, you can only assume. I agree, because that was, originally, my advice. But there's one more bit to it now - unless you catch them at it. And that's exactly what I did. I hate the way she's so snobby, and everyone likes her. So I wasn't particularly bothered what I'd say to her, apart from that cold fear running through me, stopping me saying all that I'd have liked, a fear of getting a punch from them.

Living a life of fear. I'm sure that you just wish you could be me, diary, you'd only have to live through hell.

I'm not doing a very good account, am I? Seeing as no one is reading this, I can be as honest as anything, but there's nothing I need to hide. Maybe some stuff that Eleanor does though. I swear, the way her eyes blaze if anyone mentions her attitude problem, the problem becomes even more apparent, although she doesn't seem to notice.

Well, I was in the locker room. Staring out the window, as usual. Thinking. Thinking what, you're going to ask? Something along the lines of this, though I can't remember one hundred percent accurately: 'Such a place. lights from the city, shining everywhere. Beautiful. So why can't I go out there? Why must I be free, but in a cage non-the-less? Why must I be cursed to have to stay here, when everybody else can do as they wish? Why, why, why?' Um, yeah, that's how I usually think. Most people find it strange, but I can honestly say it's better than drooling over boys and mentally undressing them, and that's what most of the others do.

She walked in. Eleanor's in my form, don't pay much attention to her, but I do know that she's very popular, very horrible and very catty. She hadn't done her homework - and that's nothing unusual - and I wasn't really bothered. She can do what she wants if she doesn't want to do her homework, she can get bad grades. The one thing that really annoyed me, was that she was requesting to copy other peoples work. I can't stand it when people do that. I would have told her directly, but I'm too shy. A girl called Susan was going to accept her offer and let her copy, but I stepped in, saying 'She'll notice if your homework is the same, besides you shouldn't leech things off other people. And, if you're letting her copy, can you truly say that you're any better than her?' It made Susan decide not to let Eleanor copy her homework, and I received a death glare. I truly was quite scared. 'I hate you, you little worm! We all know what YOU do, and it's ten times worse, so don't go on at me, you little freak!' That was her reply. She stormed off. I think at one point she must have found my homework, because I watched her sabotage it. I didn't want to rat on her, so when we got to class I told her I must have lost it. I tried to look really concerned, but she knew I was lying. Unfortunately, she got the wrong end of the stick, thinking I hadn't done it. I got put on detention. Afterschool, scheduled for today. Eleanor, who had found no one else to let her copy, got a detention too. Just the two of us.

I turned up for the detention, and so did Eleanor. I was quite surprised actually; her obeying the rules and actually turning up for a detention didn't seem very like her to me, however little I know her.

I was cutting during the detention. We had no work set, and there wad nothing better to do because Miss Penchin hadn't turned up (she is the teacher who set us the detention, if you didn't gather that). The only problem was that it got a little, er, I don't know how to put it. Out of hand?

I suppose you're wondering why I cut with Eleanor there. It was something that they'd kill me for, I felt sure. People at school, friends, parents, teachers. Well, minus the friends. I have no friends, other than you, diary. Well, Eleanor fell asleep. She must get loads of sleep; sleeps at home, sleeps through lessons all the time. It's rare a teacher notices. or maybe they do, it could explain her constant detentions for no apparent reason. They've never tried to awaken her from her slumber anyway, maybe they just realized she'd probably be a right grumpy person if they woke her up anyway. That's just my impression, I'm not sure if she WOULD be grumpy, but you know.

Anyway, I'm straying from the point, aren't I? This is why I'm so bad at accounts. Like I said, the cutting got out of hand. M shirt was sticking to my chest with blood and some of it dripping to the floor. I went a bit over the top, didn't realize what I was doing.

Mr Weaver, our caretaker, walked in at I don't know what time. It must have been after all the detentions ended, because he seemed cross to still see us there. I got up to go, and so did Eleanor, as his yelling aroused her from her sleep. She walked out the door, and I got up, hoping he wouldn't notice the little mess, but he did. 'What the.?' he muttered, and I nearly cursed under my breath, but quickly changed it to 'blast', as me swearing would probably have somehow made it worse, although I can't see how.

I felt really off, and raised her hand, before thinking 'what on earth are you doing?' My suspicions were confirmed when I looked at my hand, and realized it was dripping blood. I could probably have got away with it dripping from the shirt, but where I held the instrument it was just a pale patch of skin, not to mention dry patches of blood laying around on my hand. I quickly grabbed at my shirt, holding it to my chest, wishing I could somehow look less incriminating.

The room stank of blood. I'm used to it, and it even made me shudder. Eleanor looked like she was going to faint, and I almost felt sorry for her. She looked terrible, and awfully shocked. However, she believed I did it myself, she believed everything else people say about me. I could see it in her eyes. I'm good at judging people, but from the choice of popularity, I don't think most other people are, no offence meant to them.

I didn't know what to do, so I ran out of the room as fast as I could, down the corridor. I nearly slipped on the blood puddle, and my shoes left a few bloody footprints (although they subsided rather quickly), but the blood pouring from my stomach still fell. I was still clutching my shirt to me chest, hoping it would stop the flow of blood. The running was making me feel so bad, even worse, even more in pain than the gaping cuts I'd created on my stomach. It was agony, yet I ran. I ran out of the school, into the rain.

The rain stung my stomach. It soaked my shirt, which soaked through to my chest, to the cuts. It stuck to them, and it was so painful I was silently screaming. However, the rain seemed to cut off my bloody trail, and for that I was pleased. The water also cut the flow of blood, maybe it stopped me bleeding to death. Nevertheless, it still pained me. I kept getting slower and slower, and everything got darker and darker, and eventually the ground rushed up to my face and I didn't know what was happening.

You know the rest, diary. I told you when I woke up in the hospital, I explained all that was happening then, the accusations, what the police thought, everything. So I'll go now. I've learnt something though. I'll never do that in school again. EVER.