It's a phrase she's said a thousand times, crying and grovelling or dancing with a smile on her face. She didn't actually need the grovelling, frankly, her teachers were fine, it's just that it's hard to imagine anything else to do after you've fucked up. In retrospect, she thinks they hated that; she's sure she would have.

'Can't you see, can't you understand?'

(They were very damned reasonable. Ashna knew she was often wrong, didn't she, so why the collapsing of any disagreement into them ignoring her? They didn't even always ignore her. Most of them admitted mistakes fairly readily, and more bragged that they would.)