Short Story and Ellie Remembers

A Gap of Sky
Through your adolescence you really find out who you are and what you want to do in your future. It’s of course different how the individual person achieves this kind of freedom to choose. People are different; some people like going for a run – to get the feeling of freedom. Others choose to take drugs to escape from the reality. This once happened to our main character in the short story “A Gap of Sky” by Anna Hope, which was published in 2008.
Ellie has an assignment for the next morning; she slept most of the day away because she was at a party the night before. She found out that their printer was broken and she went through London City to search for one. Ellie is a teenage girl; she is nineteen and she goes in school at London University College. She lives alone in London, and she is tired of school. She blames her parents for involving her in their problems. She thinks that it was their fault that she was doing this bloody course.
“Life seems, suddenly, filled with possibility, with giddy possibility, with irreverence, this delight, for what, really, was there to be reverent to? To whom? To what? To why? To God? To mum? To dad? Not them especially not them”L.63 P.2
She receives a letter from the school that says that she will be kicked out of school if she doesn’t pull herself together. She is worried about her future, but Ellie find it difficult to take the hard way, and want rather than being less glamorous.(<- Forstår ikke denne sætning??) She does not take anything serious in her life. Ellie does not feel well and she begins to think about death.
“In the lighted dark of the street, in the bustle, Ellie feels afraid. Nasty, brutish and short………. Doesn’t want any bloody ink, can’t write an essay, no matter what, no matter what It matters, doesn’t want any more coke, ever again” L. 85 P. 3
Ellie has an assignment and she has to write about the author Virginia Woolf, which is about a man, who begins to see the city with different eyes.
“Ellie remembers her mother giving her a stone like this. Of course, when she went away last summer, with Rob; it was to give her protection or something daft like that.”L.107 P.3
We do not hear about Ellie’s past or her actions because she does not feel that it’s important at the moment. Ellie feels alone and lost, and she tries to convince herself that she is someone else in reality. Ellie lives an unhealthy life with drugs and lots of alcohol. She is about to finish her education that her parents forced her to do. Ellie is confused about her situation. She knows it's wrong to give up life but she can’t make room to school and other things that require her attention at the same time.
It is a third - Person narrative. It allows us to see the narrator's view of the characters in the text. You get to hear her thoughts and feelings, which influences the language of the text quite a lot. The story begins in medias res when Ellie comes back from a wild night out.
The themes of the short story are drugs and freedom. Many young people tries to find their identity and many thinks that their lives are boring and will therefore do anything to experience things like Ellie do. Drugs, cigarettes and alcohol are things that they prefer because they aren’t thinking about how it can ruin their lives. They are taking advantage of their freedom.
Ellie discovers on her trip through London that the city is empty and she realizes that she is also lonely and empty inside. She is in her teenage years, which is a time where young people tend to cross their limits and be wild.
Ellie gathers the missing dots in her life through love. She finds out that her mother actually cares about her. She wanted the best for Ellie and it's one of the reasons why she sent her away. I can now conclude that "a Gap of sky" actually meant hope for Ellie.