“You take your things and sit at the kitchen table,” Alan said. Joe was looking out his window at one of the barn’s plank walls. Someone had hung a collage of old license plates there. “You’ve got two things to do before I confine you to your room. Do you hear me?”
“Yes.”
“Get going,” Alan said.
He waited for Joe to disappear through the door to the long shed before Alan got out of the car. His anger bubbled just beneath the surface of his thin layer of restraint. Alan thought of his own father—a man who would smash his fist through a window because he couldn’t get it open. His father was a man who would work for several hours fixing a radio and then throw it across the shop because he couldn’t tune in the station he wanted. His father would lose his temper and then let his anger destroy his hard work. Alan despised that impulse. He understood it, but he despised it.
Back at the school, after watching the video of his son pushing a little girl down the stairs, he’d wanted to grab Joe by the shoulders and shake him. He’d wanted to take Joe’s little hands in his own and squeeze the evil out, like some deranged Baptist healer. Those concrete stairs had rubber treads with big raised circles for traction. They had rounded metal edges on each stair to absorb the abuse of a million little feet climbing and descending. Now they had splotches of blood.
Alan closed his eyes and beat his fists against the barn wall, trying to expel the image of bright blood painted down the stairwell—blood his son had spilled. He took a deep breath and walked through the shed. His father’s rage in his veins saw the outboard engine sitting in the trash can full of water and wanted to shove the whole thing over, drenching the shed floor. His father’s blood wanted to destroy. Alan paused, took another deep breath, and folded the anger over in his mind, looking for a clean spot to rest his thoughts.
When he had control and could unclench his fists, Alan went inside.
“From the top, tell me what happened,” Alan said.
Joe wouldn’t look up. He stared down at his own hands which were gripping the edge of the table and trembling.
“Joe?” Alan asked as he sat down. “Can you speak?”
“Yes,” Joe’s voice was strong and defiant.
Alan blinked and shook his head.
“Joe?”
“You won’t believe me,” Joe said. His hands were still trembling.
“I need the whole story, Joe. And I’ll believe you if you’re telling the truth. You know that.”
Joe started breathing fast. Alan wondered if he was about to pass out or perhaps drop into seizure, but then the boy’s shoulders slumped and he let out a sigh. “I couldn’t help it, Dad.”
“From the top, Joe.”
Joe shook his head.
“Joe—look at me. The first sentence is the hardest. After that everything is easier.” He covered his son’s trembling hands with his own.
For a minute, Alan thought Joe would never start. His son looked like he was holding his breath. His mouth was pressed into a tight line and his face began to turn red.
Joe’s words burst from his mouth—“She stole my lunch.”
“Go on.”
Joe’s tears began to flow again.
“I went to my locker after History and I looked in my backpack, but my lunch bag was gone. Polly was walking away and she turned around and told me to have a good lunch. She was holding my lunch bag.”
“So you went and got a teacher, right?”
“No,” Joe said. He looked up with red-rimmed eyes. “She was always so nice. I thought she just made a mistake. Her locker is right next to mine.”
Alan nodded.
“I went up and told her she had my lunch bag,” Joe said. “She opened a door we’re not supposed to open. It’s a supply closet or whatever. She pointed to me and told me to come in.”
“To the supply closet?”
“Yeah. So I went in.”
“Why did you go in?” Alan asked.
“I thought maybe she was ashamed she took my lunch and she wanted to give it back where nobody would see.”
“Did anyone else see you go inside the closet?” Alan asked.
“I don’t know.”
“What happened?” Alan asked. He was no longer sure that he wanted to know.
“When I went inside, she was holding the lunch bag up over her head. She’s taller than me, so I couldn’t reach it. She closed the door.”
Alan held his breath.
“Dad, she said terrible things.”
Alan exhaled and then croaked his question. “What happened, Joe?” Alan’s thoughts swirled with perverted images. You spent so much effort to protect your kids from damaging sexual imagery from the media and—God forbid—wandering hands of sick adults. Then, quite possibly before they’re ready, their peers shed light on their own twisted views of sex and it feels like there’s no way to protect your children. No amount of calm, rational discussion about the body will trump lurid stories whispered at recess.
“She said I’m a demon,” Joe said.
“What?”
“She said that the devil had visited me and that I had a demon inside me that would bring darkness to our world.”
“Joe, what exactly did she say?” Alan asked. He wasn’t sure if he should be relieved or not.
“She talked about you and mom and her voice got really deep and her eyes were red. The lights went out in the room and she lit on fire.”
“What?” Alan asked. “Joe, what are you talking about?”
“I knew you wouldn’t believe me. You said you would,” Joe said. Fresh tears made new tracks down his face.
“You’re not making sense, Joe.”
“Then she said that she was going to come get me tonight. She said she was going to get all of us. Tonight! She had little white worms coming out of her mouth and her nose and even her ears. She went back to normal and then she left with my lunch. I ran after her and when I saw her at the top of the stairs I just pushed her. I didn’t want her to come get us.”
Alan leaned back, away from his son. The boy returned his gaze to his own hands. They’d stopped trembling.
“You’re going to take out a sheet of paper and write an apology to this girl. I want it to be at least half a page. You’re going to tell her how sorry you are…”
“But Dad!”
“And you’re going to apologize at the beginning and the end. You’re going to tell her that you hope she feels better and you hope that her lip doesn’t hurt too bad. You’re not going to mention anything about the lunch or anything else. Do you hear me?”
“I can’t,” Joe said. His tears were running a close race with his dripping nose to see which could produce more liquid.
“What did you say?” Alan asked. The waves of his anger were crashing against his logic.
“I had to get my lunch bag back because Danny Wayland said you can’t let them have any of your possessions. Danny said that they use your possessions to trap you. If I give her a letter, she’ll have one of my possessions.”
“Joe, stop. You’re going to write that letter right now,” Alan pointed a finger at his son. He did not pound the table, even though his hand itched to feel the slap of the hard wood.
Joe looked down.
“Right now.”
Joe reached for his bag.
“I don’t understand,” Liz said. She sat in the same chair where Joe had written the letter. She looked at the shaky script. It looked like the work of a third-grader. The blocky letters barely stayed between the blue lines.
“That makes two of us.”
“And he’s suspended for two days?” Liz asked.
“We’re lucky they didn’t expel him,” Alan said. “The video was brutal. He just shoved her.”
“I have to see it,” Liz said.
“Honey, trust me. You don’t want to see it.”