After Before and After

Conclusion: Chapter 6

Jack started at Parkview Public High School a week after the rest of the world went back to school. Once again, he was the new kid. As a veteran newbie, he normally wouldn't have been all that fazed. But this was his first time going to a new school where everyone would already know his name.

Upon arrival, Jack learned that Parkview Public High School wasn't any better or worse than the public school he attended back in Dalton. The hallways were plastered in just as many anti-bullying posters and the stalls in the bathrooms had just as many phone numbers and accusations of homosexuality written on them in permanent marker.

Many of Jack's junior classmates did know his name when the new principal introduced him to his homeroom class, and those who didn't know it would surely know it by lunch. Jack should've known the kind of people his notoriety would attract. There were kids who thought he was cool for being convicted of a crime connected to a murder. Some even asked him to describe Piggy's death in detail. Others asked him if Roger Conroy was really his former roommate, and if it was true he was a budding psychopath. And of course, there were also the kids who moved to walk on the other side of the hallway when Jack passed by.

Jack and Paige were both surprised, though they shouldn't have been, that there were parents banging on the doors of Parkview Public High School demanding Jack be unenrolled. They apparently went on about him posing safety threats to the other students. Some parents even went as far as to say they feared their kids would turn up dead in the corner of the basketball court behind the school.

Jack could handle being notorious. He was prepared for it. But what he wasn't prepared for was the fact that not a single person he told the truth to believed him. He had no part in killing Piggy, it was all Roger. But a false verdict spoke a lot louder than the truth from the mouth of the convicted.

In spite of the angry parents and the judgy classmates, Jack actually adjusted quite quickly to the social scene at Parkview. He was a little too gracious in accepting the oohs and awes from the kids who thought he was the cool felon kid. And people really did call him Cool Felon Kid. Jack didn't complain though. He'd been called worse things by more important people.

It took a couple weeks for Jack and Paige to finish settling into the new house. For the first little while, Paige was too busy for interior designing. She spent hours looking for vehicles online, over at the Langley house asking for advice and sharing updates with Jeffery and Laurie, and prepping for the next and hopefully final father vs. daughter moment.

Another thing that ended up taking over a lot of Paige's time was Jack's sentence. His probation officer was assigned in the first week of January, and he called to schedule his first meeting with Jack for the following week. Paige informed him of their current situation and begged for more time to get Jack moved, in school, and into a routine of some sort. The probation officer was reluctant to agree, but Paige dropped the biggest bomb as a last resort and thankfully, it did the trick.

Paige formally announced what that final bomb was to Jack at the end of January. She did it at the Langley house with all three residents present. It had been just an average dinner night between the five of them, something neither of the boys questioned because they did it relatively often since the move.

"I don't know how surprising this will be for you, Jack, given the move and all, but... I'm gonna need you to be with me on this, or things are gonna unravel really fast" Paige rambled over the dinner table, Jeffery and Laurie on either side of her.

Jack studied his sister curiously from across the table. He felt Ralph take his hand underneath it. So he knew it too. Something was about to happen.

"What the fudge are you talking about?" the blond boy questioned, a shortness to his tone.