“Do the faculty members have access to the student email accounts?”
“Uhm, well, I believe so. The emails are monitored randomly for offensive and inappropriate content.”
“What about you?”
“What about me?”
“Do you specifically have access to those accounts?”
Mr. Feldman squinted his eyes and chewed on his bottom lip. “Are you accusing me of something, Troy?”
“No,” the boy said, paused, then added, “Not yet.”
* * *
“Home schooling?” Troy shouted. “Are you guys nuts?”
“Honey, just hear us out,” his mom said. “We just think it might be best for everyone if we pull you out of that environment right now. We’re not saying forever, just for the rest of the semester. A sort of cooling off period.”
“Don’t you think that’s a little knee-jerk?”
“We’ve given this a lot of thought,” his dad said.
“Really? Since Monday?”
“Son, we always knew there was a possibility we’d have to do something like this, because of your…well, you know, what you are.”
“And what exactly am I?”
His mom jumped in. “Honey, it’s not your fault, we know that. You are just as God made you, and we love you for that.”
“Although it might help if you didn’t go around writing love notes to jocks,” his dad grumbled.
“How many times do I have to tell you, I didn’t write that damn email! Why won’t you guys believe me?”
“Okay, let’s say you didn’t write it. What does that mean? Just that someone is screwing with you, trying to stir up trouble, trying to possibly get your head bashed in.”
“And for that, you want to punish me? Jesus, I haven’t done anything wrong.”
“Son,” his dad said, “you have a lot to learn about the world. It isn’t always about right and wrong, it’s about learning to play by the rules, even if they aren’t fair. Sometimes you have to make compromises to get along in life.”
“Well, why don’t I just get married and have a dozen kids, live a lie and die miserable? Will that make you happy?”
His dad threw his hands up in the air. “You just don’t want to listen. This is exactly what he was talking about.”
“What who was talking about?”
“We got a call from one of the guidance counselors at your school today.”
Troy suddenly felt hot and cold at the same time, a chill working its way up his spine even as his face flushed with heat. “Let me guess, Mr. Feldman?”
“Seemed like a very caring man,” his mom said. “He is concerned that you aren’t taking these incidents at school seriously enough, and he’s worried it’s going to get you hurt.”
“Funny, but I wasn’t having any problems until he showed up.”
His father barked a sharp laugh. “What, are you suggesting the counselor is somehow responsible for everything that’s been happening lately?”
Troy bit his tongue. He knew it would do not good to throw around wild accusations when he had nothing to back them up. “Look, all I’m saying is that you didn’t raise me to run away from my problems. I mean, Dad, you’re the one who is always going on about how you can’t stand cowardice.”
“There is a difference between cowardice and practicality.”
“Semantics, if you ask me. I may be gay, but I’m still a man. I don’t turn tail just because the going gets rough.”
His mom looked like she was fighting tears again, but Troy could see the pride beaming in his dad’s eyes. Over the years, Troy had certainly learned the right buttons to push to get the desired outcome.
“Fine, we’ll stick it out,” his dad said. “For now. If things get worse, we’ll have to reevaluate.”
“Sounds reasonable to me,” Troy said, and for good measure he and his father shook on it.
* * *
Another day, more graffiti spray-painted on Troy’s locker. Today’s bon mot—“TROY HAS AIDS!” As soon as he saw this, and the way everyone was looking at him with their lips twisted into smirks, he turned around and headed for the nearest exit. He’d talked a good game to his father last night about not running away, but he just couldn’t take another day of this. Almost free, Mr. Feldman stepped in front of him, bringing him to an abrupt halt.
“Not thinking of going truant, are you?” the counselor said.
“I’m suddenly feeling sick; I think I need to go home.”
“You look fine to me, maybe you should go see the nurse.”
“The nurse doesn’t have a cure for what’s bothering me.”
Mr. Feldman didn’t say anything for a moment, just looked down at Troy with a secretive smile. Then, “I saw your locker this morning.”
“I’m sure you did.”
“It’s a shame, but the harsh reality is that a lot of people equate homosexuality with AIDS, it’s an unfair prejudice we have to deal with.”
“Maybe in 1985 people thought like that, but these days there’s a lot more information out there; people aren’t that ignorant anymore.”
“Really? Well, I saw some graffiti that suggests otherwise.”
Troy tried to bite his tongue, count to ten, picture a happy place, but he just couldn’t keep it in anymore. “You just can’t stand it, can you?” he said.
“And what’s that?”
“Coming back here to the place where you were so cruelly humiliated and degraded, only to find me thriving, popular and accepted. Must just eat you up inside.”
“Is that what you think?” Mr. Feldman said with a laugh.
“It’s what I know.”
“Well, chew on this for a moment: if you were truly so accepted, would everyone have turned their backs on you so quickly? Seems to me they were just looking for any excuse to make you their scapegoat.”
Troy found he didn’t have a response to that one, and he just stood there as the guidance counselor walked off.
* * *
“Maybe it wouldn’t be such a bad idea,” Jessica said at the lunch table.
Troy couldn’t believe what he was hearing. “You can’t be serious? You’re turning on me too?”
“I’m not turning on you, I’m just trying to look out for you, like your parents. We just want what is best for you.”
“And you think dropping out to be home schooled is what’s best?”
Jessica raised her fish sandwich to her mouth but put it down again without taking a bite then started building a structure with the carrot sticks in her vegetable medley. “Troy, I’ve been hearing people talk around school, and I’m kind of scared someone’s going to do something.”
“You mean like dunk my head in a toilet?” he said with a dry laugh.
“Like something worse than that. Some guys on the football team have really been talking big, and maybe it’s mostly just talk, but maybe some of it isn’t.”
“Guys on the football team, huh? Does that include Brent and Joel?”
Jessica didn’t answer, just stared down at the orange skyscraper she had created on her tray.
“Jesus, how did all this happen?” Troy said, his voice a growl of frustration. “I mean, just a few weeks ago I would have said I didn’t have a single enemy in this school.”
“Yeah, I’d have said the same, but now I’m beginning to suspect there was a lot of this brewing under the surface but no one wanted to be the first to bring it to the foreground. Like everyone was just waiting for one person to get the ball rolling.”
“And our mysterious emailer and graffiti artist set things in motion.”
“Seems that way. I just wish—”
“Hey, you need to move.”
Troy and Jessica glanced over to find Vic Rydell, a senior and the biggest guy in school, standing by their table.
“Excuse me?” Troy said.
“You have to move.”
Troy glanced at Jessica then back to Vic. “I sit at this table every single day.
Why would I move?”
“New cafeteria rules. Only normal people can eat here.”
“Then shouldn’t that exclude you?” Jessica said tartly.
“I’d shut it if I were you, Fag Hag. You need to keep better company.”
“That’s enough,” Troy said, his voice carrying loudly throughout the cafeteria which had suddenly become silent. “You can puff up your chest and play the part of some over-the-top bully in an 80s teen movie all you want, but you aren’t some little demigod and this isn’t your kingdom. We can sit wherever the hell we want and there’s not a damn thing you can do about it.”
“That so, queer?”
“Yeah, that’s so.”
“What’s the problem?” Brent said, stepping up beside Vic. The two seemed awfully chummy, considering that not too long ago Brent used to call Vic “Frankendork” behind his back.
“This fudge-packer doesn’t want to move.”
“That right, Helen-of-Troy?” Brent asked, and after all the years of friendship, he now looked like a stranger. “You think your diseased faggoty ass can sit up in here with the rest of us?”
“Brent, when did you become such a dickhead?” Jessica asked.
Without looking at her, the football player replied, “Zip it, Jess. You picked a side, and it’s the wrong one.”
Jessica gaped at him incredulously. “When did this become about ‘sides’?”
“When the fag here showed his true colors.”
“There are some true colors being shown here, that’s for damn sure,” Troy said. “But you can go sell your brand of tough-guy-bullshit somewhere else, because I’m not buying. I’m going to sit right here until I finish my lunch, and that’s final.”
Brent reached across the table, put his fingers under the edge of Troy’s tray and flipped it onto the floor. “Looks like you’re finished.”
Troy was out of his seat in a flash, and he placed his hands on Brent’s chest and shoved hard, sending the jock tumbling onto his ass. At first Brent looked too shocked to react, his mouth hanging open and his eyes wide, as if he just couldn’t believe Troy had the audacity to fight back. Then suddenly he sprang up, lunging for Troy and tackling him at the waist. The two landed on top of the table and slid off the other side. Troy heard Jessica scream.
Then Vic was there, hauling Troy to his feet while pinning his arms behind his back. Troy struggled, but Vic yanked until it felt Troy’s shoulders were going to pop out of their sockets. But that pain ceased to matter when Brent strode forward and planted a solid jab to Troy’s gut. All the air wooshed out of his lungs, and he would have doubled over had Vic not been holding him up.
Jessica screamed again, telling them to leave Troy alone, but he saw one of the other football players holding her back. A crowd was gathering in a circle around Troy now, all guys, mostly jocks, and they all looked thirsty for blood.
Troy was no stereotypical sissy, and he wanted to defend himself, even if he was grossly outnumbered, but Vic had him efficiently incapacitated. All Troy could do was watch as Brent’s fist hurtled toward his face. Then before he could even register the pain, there were more fists added to the mix, pummeling him from all sides. His stomach, his ribs, his face, even his neck. He heard his nose crunch, and hot blood cascaded down his chin. He felt a tooth knocked loose, and his left eye was puffy and would not open fully. He couldn’t catch his breath, and his legs felt like rubber. He suddenly wished he’d skipped out this morning like he’d wanted to.
Finally Vic let go, and Troy collapsed to the floor, a broken heap. He heard voices, concerned adult voices, and he realized that some of the teachers must have intervened. Troy looked up with his one good eye and saw Joel standing over him, his size 10 shoe coming down toward Troy’s face like a crashing moon.
* * *
Troy sat up in the hospital bed while his parents talked to the doctor. He had a lot of bruises and swelling, a broken nosed and two cracked ribs. Also possibly a mild concussion and the doctor wanted Troy to stay overnight for observation. Troy would rather have gone home to lick his wounds in his own bed, but he went along with the doctor and his folks, all the fight having been drained from him.
So when his parents broached the subject of home schooling again, insisting this time, Troy did not argue. He couldn’t imagine setting foot back in that school anyway, not after what had happened. Not after what had been done to him by people he once considered friends, and not that long ago.
His parents were starting to get on his nerves, his mother constantly breaking into tears while his father railed against the fact that those identified as part of the group that had beaten Troy had been given only two weeks suspension instead of outright expulsion. Troy himself could muster little in the way of tears or anger. He felt emptied, hollowed out, like a shell of a person and not an actual person.
When his parents said they were going down to the hospital cafeteria to grab a bite, Troy was secretly delighted, happy to be rid of them for a while. He just wanted to be alone with his misery, he’d even refused to see Jessica when she’d stopped by earlier.
On their way out, his parents ran into Mr. Feldman, who was carrying a “Get Well Soon” balloon. “How is he?” the guidance counselor asked, as if Troy wasn’t in the room.
Troy’s mother just started crying again and hurried from the room. His father shook his head sadly then followed after.
Leaving Troy alone with Mr. Feldman.
“So,” the counselor said, stepping up next to the bed and tying the balloon to one of the railings, “I guess I don’t have to ask how you’re doing, huh?”
Troy looked up at the man but said nothing.
“I’m not normally one to say I told you so, but I did warn you this sort of thing could happen if you didn’t heed my advice.”
“Are you happy now?” Troy said, his voice weak and raspy.
Mr. Feldman put a hand to his chest in melodramatic offense. “How could you say such a thing? You think it brings me joy to see you beaten and humiliated this way?”
“Yes I do, because it proves some point in your twisted mind.”
“And what point would that be?”
“That I’m not better than you, that if you had to suffer for what you are then I should have to suffer too, something insanely idiotic like that.”
The counselor chuckled softly and patted the lump under the coverlet that was Troy’s leg. “You’ve been through quite a traumatic ordeal; you don’t know what you’re saying.”
“Oh, I know exactly what I’m saying. And maybe I can’t prove it, but I’m positive all this happened because of you. You just couldn’t stand to see me living the life you didn’t get to live, and so you had to ruin my life to make you feel better about your own. You’re the one that needs some counseling, Mr. Feldman.”
Mr. Feldman’s mouth became a tight line, but then he shrugged with one shoulder and said, “Think what you want, Troy. Doesn’t change anything that happened.”
The fire that had momentarily animated Troy suddenly doused, he slumped back in bed. “No, it doesn’t,” he mumbled. “Would you please leave now?”
“Of course.” Mr. Feldman started from the room, but at the doorway he paused and looked back, his expression one of mild amusement. “One last bit of advice. Be more careful in the future. The world’s a dangerous place, and you just never know what people are capable of.”
Then the counselor was gone, and Troy sank into the pillow, pulling the coverlet up over his head, trying to lose himself in the oblivion of sleep.
OUT OF PRINT
Selections from author Ken Bryant’s online message board
Author: Mischief1
Topic: Rare collection
Posted June 02, 7:47:15 PM
Hey all you Bryant fans out there. Have I got great news for you! Well, for one lucky bastard among you, at least. It just so happens that I have in my possession a near-mint-condition copy of Ken Bryant’s out of print, extremely rare short story collecti
on Nails on a Chalkboard. As you diehard fans already know, this was technically Bryant’s first book, which he published himself through a vanity press. Only 100 of these puppies were produced, and one recently sold on eBay for close to $500. I am willing to part with mine for the right price, and since this is where all the true aficionados of Bryant’s work hang out, I’m giving you guys first dibs.
Author: GoryHole
Re: Rare Collection
Posted June 02, 7:50:22 PM
You have no idea how long I’ve been searching for Nails on a Chalkboard! It’s the only Ken Bryant book I don’t own, and it just kills me that my collection of his work is incomplete. I’d almost resigned myself to the fact that I’d never get my hands on a copy, and here you come, opening up that old wound again. So, Mischief1, what are you asking for it?
Author: Mischeif1
Re: Rare Collection
Posted June 02, 7:52:42 PM
Make me an offer. I’m officially opening the floor to bids. May the best fan win!
Author: GoryHole
Re: Rare Collection
Posted June 02, 7:55:03 PM
Damn, this opportunity couldn’t come at a worse time. I got laid off from my job last month, and I haven’t found another one yet. Still, a chance like this isn’t likely to come my way very often. Just checked the bank account, and I think I could swing 50 bucks.
Author: TrollGod99
Re: Rare Collection
Posted on June 02, 8:03:38 PM
$50?!?!? You’re joking, right? That’s chump change for the kind of rare edition we’re talking about here. Mischief1, you’re obviously dealing with amateurs here, man, so I’ll gladly take that book off your hands for $75.
Author: GoryHole
Re: Rare Collection
Posted on June 02, 8:07:29 PM
Tales From the Midnight Shift Vol. 1 Page 18