Leave the Lights On

Chapter 8

You spend most of the day in your office, taking care of paperwork until you get called to the middle school with a strange rash of vomiting pre-teens. It doesn't take you long to find out that the reason is a particularly nasty mixture of vodka, tequila, and gin in a plastic water bottle.

One of the boys that is laid up in the infirmary begs you not to tell his parents. You just shrug and pour out the rancid liquid in the drain and trash the bottle. You just tell them that they need to not mix their liquor, drink water, and then you go to the high school to look at a sports injury. You can't tell them to not do it. You were just as bad if not worse when you were a kid.

Your phone vibrates as you walk back to your car to go back to the admin building so you can get ready to go home. You pull it out before you open your car and see that it's a text from Brittany. Do you want to come to the GSA at the high school in half an hour? Help the kids? I'm going to be a little late.

You text back, remembering how angry you were when you found out that people had treated Brittany poorly in high school and how she told you about the kids that are going through the same thing right now. I'm already here. Where is it?

You arrive in the meeting room a little early and find that it's a regular classroom. There's a girl in the front row wearing all black, listening to music. She's all by herself and you walk in slowly. She looks up and takes off her headphones. "The Health Occupation Service Association meeting is two rooms that way." She points behind her.

"Oh no," you pull out your phone to check the room number, "I'm here for the GSA meeting."

"Oh," she says and looks you over. "Then that's here. Are you a G or an S?"

"Um, what does it stand for again?" you ask.

The girl chuckles. "Gay Straight Alliance."

"I'm the alliance," you try a joke and she laughs.

"Stop!" you hear a yell from the hallway and run out of the room.

There are two huge guys in letterman jackets pinning some much smaller boy against the lockers. You trot over to them, "Hey!"

The jocks step away from the other boy. One of them looks at you, "Who are you?"

Part of you wants to punch this guy in the face. A younger you would have. Instead you step between the small boy and the beefy jocks. "Get out of here."

"What are you going to do about it?" he asks, glancing back at his friend.

You smirk. He just gave himself away. You know why he's doing what he's doing. "You're threatening a school administrator to impress your friend?"

"No," he shakes his head, but you can see in his eyes that you caught him.

You cross your arms, letting the high school you out a little bit. You take a step toward him which he answers with a step back, "Oh really? You didn't just take a step at me?"

"I-I," he looks back at his friend who looks ready to run.

"I'm going to say this one more time before I have to bring this assault on a student to the attention of the school board," you narrow your eyes and growl, "Get out."

They both glance at each other before walking away as quickly as they can without looking like they're running away. You look back at the kid. "You okay?"

He nods, fixing his hair. Then he straightens his shirt and adjust the strap of his messenger bag.

The girl from the GSA meeting puts a piece of the boy's hair back in place before leading him back into the GSA classroom. You walk in after them and sit on the teacher's desk. "Does that happen often?"