by Cole Parker
Circumstances 9
She stood, anger still flowing off her in waves. He had a difficult time meeting her eyes. He tried and failed. He started to speak, but stopped. He looked agonized.
My mom said, with rising inflection and hard, uncompromising anger, “The apology?”
Mr. Johnson gave up. I could see it. He turned to me. “I’m sorry, Keith. I hear so many lies from the kids that are sent to me I sometimes don’t realize not everyone is making something up. Your mother is right: I didn’t look into what you were telling me. I will, now, and if I find what you told me is true, I’ll withdraw the detention.”
My mom harrumphed, but didn’t object. What she did do was say, “And, most importantly, if you want this incident to go away, you’ll find a way to protect Keith from all the bullying that will result from the rumors you helped get going. Keith has to be made whole, or we have no deal at all. He has to come out of this intact. No bullying, no rumors, he has to be protected. That’s your job. How you do it is up to you, but that’s your job. Keith will tell me how it’s going. If he’s getting hassled, then we’ll find out if you’re right in thinking there’s no merit in my claims. Of course, we’ll find it out very publicly, and even if there is no merit, think what the notoriety and the coverage in the papers of the lawsuit will do for your career as a public educator. Think about testifying. Think how you’ll answer when I ask you why you had a practically naked teenager in your office alone with you, and why you made him sit there and talk to you instead of being allowed the common decency of getting his gym gear and getting dressed first. And why you then made him sit out there in the office where anyone coming in could see him without any clothes on. Every adult in this community will read about it in the morning paper every day, and it will be drawn out, that I can guarantee. But that’s just every adult in town who reads the paper. It’s the adults on the jury you have to worry about. It’s amazing, absolutely amazing, what pictures a good attorney can put in the heads of jurors, given circumstances like these.”
Mr. Johnson paled. I simply looked at my mother in awe. I knew she could be awfully strong. I hadn’t realized what a good lawyer she could be. Now I was seeing it.
“I think I can do what you want,” Mr. Johnson said, all signs of his hot temper how missing from his voice and demeanor.
“Good,” said my mother. “And the quicker you start, the better. This school has to know that teasing or bullying Keith is a non-starter.”
Then she left Mr. Johnson’s office without looking back, and I was right on her heels.
When we were out in the hallway, my mom walked me to where there were no kids, then said to me, “You’ll be OK now, I think. If you aren’t, you go see Mr. Johnson. He’s a bully, I can see that clear as crystal, but it’s in his best interest to help you. He doesn’t want you complaining to me. So do that if you have to. But try your best to not have to. You’ve got to stand up for yourself, Keith. And this is a good time to figure out how.”
She looked around, saw no one looking in our direction, and then gave me a really quick kiss on the cheek. I could have blushed and complained, but did neither. I liked it and what it meant.
But as I saw her walk off, my stomach started tightening. I was on my own, and the entire school thought I was an exhibitionist who jerked off on the bus and then streaked in the hallways. An exhibitionist bus-wanking streaker.
I turned and started down the hall, toward my homeroom. We all went to homeroom first thing, were checked in for attendance purposes, and heard any announcements the school had for us. It was only a fifteen-minute period. Then it would be on to classes. I passed some kids on my way, but they just looked through me as usual. One nice thing about being a nonentity at school was, very few people even knew my name. So, if they’d heard about a kid named Keith who’d run down the halls naked after spewing seed all over his bus, they didn’t relate him to the scrawny looking nerdy kid walking past them in the hall.
I made it into my homeroom unrecognized and unbothered. Here, though, everyone knew me, or at least knew my name. Here, I’d get a taste of what was in store for me, what I’d have to put up with when people knew who I was.
Except it didn’t work that way. I walked into homeroom, and a lot of kids looked up at me. Even the teacher, Mr. Banton, stopped talking to the kid in front of him and looked at me. The whole room fell silent. Then, before anyone could say anything, the loudspeaker in our room blared into life.
“Attention. All students and staff. There will be an assembly today instead of first period classes. Everyone please go to the auditorium immediately following the bell after homeroom. Thank you.”
Now what?