Beyond the Reasons || JUSTIN FOLEY

Twenty-Two

SCHOOL HALLWAY
THIRD PERSON'S POV

"Let him go!" Justin shouted at the officer who was holding down Diego. The two of them had started a fight and the officer ran in to break it up, but he was being a lot more aggressive towards Diego than he was being towards Justin.

"Hey, what the fuck!" Imogen shouted as she walked up to the scene in the hallway and the guard slammed Diego into the locker again.

"Jesus!" Justin exclaimed.

"What the fuck!?" Jessica yelled. The guard had tied around Diego's wrists and basically perp-walked him out in front of all of us while everyone was saying how typical it was, so I went to find Bolan.

"There are innocent people being treated like criminals," Imogen said.

"I'm told they were fighting," Bolan said.

"That's bullshit! Then why was Diego the only one who got detained and perp-walked out of here? Why didn't he do the same to Justin? Because he's white and Diego's not?" Imogen asked.

"And it's not just them! It's all of us!" Jessica snapped.

"Yeah!" The students started to echo.

"Presumed guilty? No charge? No due process?" Imogen asked as the crowd was cheering for both of us. As the President and the Vice-President of the school, the students' interest and safety fall to them since Bolan is clearly not doing a good job.

"Alright people, folks! Hey, please. The situation is being addressed. Let's get back to class." Bolan said and everyone started to murmur amongst themselves, but none of us headed in the direction of their classes.

"No," Imogen said boldly.

"Do not make matters worse. Get back to class," Bolan said.

"No... we're not going back to class." Clay said as he started to step forward.

"Clay, I promise you we will get into this. Diego's being released, the officer will be disciplined if appropriate...-" Imogen cut Bolan off.

"...-If appropriate? He was slamming Diego into the locker for no reason." Imogen snapped and that made everyone start booing towards Bolan. And he started to raise his voice to try and speak over them.

"And we will address the situation according to..-" This time, Jessica cut him off.

"...-Fuck that! Enough is enough!" Jessica said.

"Fucking right!" Justin said as he walked over to join Imogen by her side.

"Alright, I understand your point without all the inappropriate language," Bolan said.

"Fuck you, motherfucker." Clay said and Imogen looked over at her brother impressed. She's never heard him speak to any kind of authoritative figure like that before and since it was Bolan, she truly didn't care, and all the students started cheering.

"We're together on this," Imogen said.

"Everyone get back to class right now, or there will be consequences," Bolan said.

"Bring it on," Jessica said as she shrugged her shoulders.

"We're not afraid," Imogen said.

"We're finally doing something." Clay said.

"Doing what, exactly?" Bolan asked. Imogen looked at Clay and Jessica and they were all waiting for someone to say something and then the three of them looked at the doors and had a different idea. They looked at each other and nodded their heads before they started to walk out of the doors. "No, turn around! Turn.. turn around! What do you think you're doing!"