A/N: Racialized violence trigger-warning for this chapter. I am aware that there already has been some in this, but this is both explicit and very much reminiscent of the kind of assaults that continue to this day. So, proceed with caution.
On the 4th of September, one of the Three, as Corinne had started calling herself and the other colored students she'd enrolled with, had their first consequential run-in, with a racist.
Bianca had been grumbling to herself as she walked down the halls, on her way to Miss Estelle's class.
"....I cannot believe this, I do not want to be in this lady's boring-ass class....Kensington ain't following the rules herself ...she's making me do it...just goes to show, you can't trust crackers...."
One of the campus security officers, Randall Gates passed her as he went in the opposite direction. He stopped in the middle of his stride.
"Are you calling me a cracker, you little spade!?"
" ...I wasn't talking to you." she said.
"What did you say?"
"I said, I wasn't talking to-UNH!"
Officer Gates elbowed Bianca in the face, making her stumble back, against the wall. Dazed, her hand wandered up to her lips, which felt wet. Bringing her fingers to her eyes and seeing blood, she realized her lips had been split open.
Her two front teeth also felt loose.
"I gonna' do something about that uppity little mouth of yours. "
Randall put Bianca in a headlock, and punched her in her ribs. The few white students who were in the hallway, stopped and stared at this, but did nothing.
He switched to a sleeper hold, constricting her jugular vein. Bianca's eyes rolled up in her head as she struggled to breathe.
After she'd passed out, Gates released her.
She dropped like a stone to the floor.
Feeling a smug spike of an adrenalin high, he walked around her unconscious body and kicked her a few times. She began to stir. He then knelt down and cuffed her wrists behind her back, squeezing them until they cut into her skin.
That awoke her fully, but she was still dazed, and now going into shock.
As he dragged her along, the cuffs tightened even more. A pained scream was ripped out of her.
He roughly lead her down the hall towards the door.
"I DIDN'T DO ANYTHING!!" she screamed.
That earned her another sharp jab in the ribs, "Shut-up."
Once the officer got to the door, one of the frozen students snapped out of his shock and turned around, running up the stairs.
...It was a ten year old white student. Among the man white students who had witnessed this who were older teens, he was the only one who had moved.
He met Miss Estelle halfway up the steps. She was swiftly coming down herself, because she had heard the struggle.
"What's going on?! I thought, I heard screaming.-"
"It's Gates, mam. He was beating on one of the students, a colored girl. He arrested-"
"-oh, lord!"
She maneuvered around the boy and swiftly ran down the steps.
She ran around the corner of the first floor and stopped where she saw several students were still gathered. She thought she spotted something red on the floor, and knelt down to get a closer look.
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ASHWOOD ACADEMY
Historical Fiction[EDITORS' CHOICE, June 2020][#1 History June 2020] -- Five black students make history as the first to integrate a prestigious school for gifted students in 1950's Vermont. One student, Anita Prescott, is a young girl whose strength and leadership...
