“OK. Think about it and let me know.” Tara wiggled her fingers at him in a waving motion as she drifted slowly away from his cubicle, her eyes still locked with his.
The phone on his desk rang. His head still reeling from Tara’s smile, Tyler lifted the receiver. “Hello?”
“Mr. Jones? This is Rebecca Hough. I’m an assistant principal at Runnymede Secondary.”
Tyler’s brain, which had been momentarily side-tracked with Tara’s shapely legs, suddenly snapped to attention. “Yes? Is something wrong?”
“Well, there’s an issue with your son, Brandon. I can’t really talk about it on the phone. Would it be possible for you to come out to the school sometime today?”
“Have you tried to call my ex-wife?”
“Yes, we tried to call her first, but we couldn’t reach her.”
Tyler’s irritation surged. What now? Where was Christina? And what was it with Brandon that he couldn’t pull himself together and get with the program? Tyler sighed heavily into the phone. “I have a lot going on at my job today. Is this urgent?”
“Yes. I would say it is. It’s pretty important.”
“OK. Let me shuffle some things around, and I’ll be out there as soon as I can.” He hung up the desk phone and fished out his cell to speed-dial his ex-wife. It went straight to voicemail. With barely restrained anger, Tyler left a message. “Christina, where are you? A principal at Runnymede just called me about Brandon. You know, I’m getting tired of this. I’m busy. I work for a living. Whatever this behavioral nonsense is that’s going on with him, it needs to stop. Call me back so we can get this sorted out. In the meantime, I have to cancel a bunch of meetings so I can get all the way back to Herndon to find out what’s going on.”
~*~
The sight of Josh Wolf’s uniform—the dark gray shirt covered by a flak jacket, a radio protruding from the shoulder—gave him a funny feeling in the pit of his stomach. Why was Josh here? What had Brandon done?
Josh nodded to Tyler as he sat on the opposite side of the conference room table. A teacher Tyler recognized from back-to-school night sat on Josh’s other side. Ms. Richardson, or something like that. Young, twenty-something, blonde thing, first year of teaching.
Rebecca Hough, the assistant principal, pulled out a chair from the head of the table.
Tyler’s hands were clammy as they intertwined in his lap, and he was careful not to allow them to rest on the table where they might leave visible, sweaty streaks on the surface.
The door to the conference room opened again.
“Sorry I’m late.” A young woman breezed into the room and reached across the table to shake Tyler’s hand. He noticed her nails were filed into claw-like shapes and painted pink. “I’m Melanie Hewick. One of the guidance counselors.”
“We’ll call Brandon in to join us in a few minutes,” Rebecca Hough said. “We wanted to have an opportunity to chat with you first, let you know what’s going on.”
Tyler nodded, a knot forming in his throat. He met Josh’s gaze. “I’m eager to know.”
Rebecca motioned toward Ms. Richardson. “Kate, do you want to tell us what happened?”
Kate Richardson looked nervous. She leaned forward. “During first period this morning, two students came to see me and reported that someone they knew showed them a picture of some naked girls from this school. Apparently, the pictures are being uploaded and circulated around some social networking sites.”
“OK. So…how does that involve Brandon?”
“We talked to the girls to get more information,” Josh spoke up. “They said Brandon was one of the boys flashing the pictures around on his phone.”
Tyler’s face flamed.
Josh looked down at his hands.
The room was silent. Everyone staring at him.
Was he supposed to say or do something? Maybe express shock or horror? Instead, he sat back in his chair. “Isn’t this pretty common? Boys looking at naked pictures on the Internet?”
“Yes,” Josh said. “It’s extremely common. In the past few years, sexting cases have been rampant.”
“There are several factors here.” Rebecca Hough said. “One, Brandon allegedly showed pictures to fellow students. Two, the pictures were of fellow students. We don’t know who took them or how they were circulated.”
“Did you talk to Brandon?” Tyler asked, a little defensive. He hoped they would bring Brandon in soon. He wanted to get to the bottom of this. “I mean, I have a feeling that he didn’t intend for this to be a big deal. He’s only thirteen, you know.”
Rebecca glanced over at Josh with an expression that seemed to say, you wanna tell him or do you want me to do it? Something about her smug, middle-aged mouth suddenly bothered him. He didn’t like her hair either—it was all wiry and disheveled. She reminded him a little of…Lana.
“Tyler,” Josh began in a tone that suggested he was being as gentle as possible. “This is pretty serious. What these kids don’t seem to understand is that once a picture like that is on their cell phone, they’re in possession of child pornography, which is a felony. And if they send it around? Well, now they’re guilty of distribution.”
“Yeah, but…well, I mean, he’s thirteen,” Tyler repeated.
Josh shook his head. “Doesn’t matter. We have to open a formal investigation.”
“Investigation?” That seemed extreme. These were kids, for heaven’s sakes!
“Especially because it involves other students within the school,” Rebecca added.
“Mr. Jones?” Now the guidance counselor was leaning forward, using that same condescendingly gentle tone and a sickly sweet smile that made his stomach ache. “Have you known Brandon to look at any kind of inappropriate pictures? Online stuff? This is around the age when boys become interested in things like that. Sometimes even younger.”
Tyler shook his head. “No. No, he doesn’t look at anything.” The words spilled from his mouth easily. He knew his son. Brandon didn’t express interest in anything nowadays, except maybe video games. Definitely not girls.
A strained silence settled over the room.
“Well, let’s bring Brandon in,” Rebecca said.
“I’ll go get him,” the guidance counselor offered. “He’s just outside.”
The quiet of the room continued as she stepped outside to retrieve Brandon.
Tyler was all too aware of Josh’s presence in the room. The awkward nature of the situation was nearly unbearable.
As Brandon entered, his gaze fell heavily on his father, and then Josh, before dropping to the floor. He slipped into the nearest chair as the voices all greeted him in unison.
The guidance counselor spoke in her irritatingly sweet tone. “Now, Brandon, we’re here because we’re concerned about you. We’d like to hear your side of the story.”
“I already talked to him.” With a quick flick of his eyes, Brandon motioned to Josh.
A sudden rush of anger coursed through Tyler, and he gritted his teeth. He’d had to leave work for this. And now they were going to waste his time with this ridiculous psycho-babble about hearing Brandon’s side of the story? Why not mete out his punishment and let’s get this over with!
“I realize you and Officer Wolf already spoke,” Melanie Hewick said. “But I think your dad might like to know what happened.”
“I don’t know…it was just like…Jared and I were checking out our Trapster account—”
“What is Trapster?” Tyler growled.
Brandon looked down at his hands and shrugged. “It’s just a site where kids post stuff.”
“Like naked pictures?”
Another shrug. “I guess. Sometimes.”
“Well, you won’t be using that account anymore.” If they didn’t move this little summit along, he would do it.
“So,” Melanie Hewick jumped back in, once more steering the conversation, “so you and Jared were looking at your Trapster account…”
“Yeah, and he said, ‘that looks
like Caitlyn and Astrid.’”
“Two girls you know?” Melanie clarified.
“Yeah. And so then we started calling other people over to look at the pictures.”
“Then you downloaded the pictures to your phone,” Josh clarified.
“Yeah.” Brandon looked down again.
“Did you repost them?” Josh asked. “Send them around to your friends?”
“I…don’t…think…so.” Brandon’s eyes raised as though trying to remember. “I think maybe Jared did…” Which probably meant Brandon did, too.
Josh sat forward in his chair. “Like I told you earlier, Brandon, having those pictures on your phone is a class six felony possession. Reposting them or sending them out is a class six felony distribution…of child pornography.”
“Really?” Brandon’s blue eyes were wide.
Josh nodded, his lips pressed together, his eyebrows raised.
Tyler figured they were just trying to scare the kid with all of this class six felony stuff, and he was OK with that. Hopefully, he would learn his lesson from this little escapade.
Josh turned to Tyler. “You’ll probably be contacted by investigators.”
With another surge of anger filling him, Tyler turned to Brandon and held out his hand. “In the meantime, you can hand over your phone.”
“They already took it,” Brandon said.
Tyler looked at Josh.
Josh nodded. “Yeah. We had to confiscate the phones with the pictures on them.”
Geez. Grimacing, Tyler rubbed his forehead. “OK. Well, is there anything else? I really need to get back to work.”
“We’ll handle it from here,” Rebecca Hough assured him. “I’m sure Officer Wolf will keep you in the loop if we need to question Brandon again.”
Melanie Hewick turned to Brandon, addressing him as if he were the only person in the room. “And sweetie, I want you to come see me every week, OK? I want to check in on you, see how you’re doing. If you just need to talk…”
Tyler felt his upper lip curl involuntarily. Give me a break. He pushed his chair back and stood. He had to get out of there before he threw up. When he had been in school, someone looking at naked pictures of girls would have been taken to the principal’s office, suspended, and that would have been the end of it. All of this drama—investigations, guidance counselors and their touchy-feely platitudes…
5
Kaki
October 12
Sneak-out mission #2. As Kaki crept down the stairs that night, she waited to hear, “Hey! Where do you think you’re going, young lady?” But the house was silent. She guessed she was lucky her dad and stepmom were too wrapped up in their own problems to notice her. They hadn’t really acknowledged her existence since she was twelve anyway.
Damien had told her he’d wait for her out front at eleven that night. “I’m not gonna wait long. If I don’t see you out there right at eleven, I’m taking off.”
Kaki didn’t want to disappoint him, so she made sure to start her escape a half an hour earlier. It might take a while to get out without making a sound. It was easier than she thought it would be. She repeated her tactic from before, walking on the sides of the stairs, avoiding the middle section, trying to prevent each step from creaking.
One of the steps creaked anyway, so she just walked normally down the last few and right out the front door. It was that easy. As she looked back at the house, no lights popped on in the windows, and her cell phone didn’t ring. No one knew she was gone. But it was a cold night, and she had to stand on the curb shivering for fifteen minutes until Damien finally showed up.
This was the third time seeing Damien, but her nerves still got the better of her when climbing into his car, almost as if those black leather seats that smelled of smoke, car cleaner, and pine-scented air freshener, held some sort of danger. And she couldn’t make that feeling go away, no matter how crazy she was about the guy. She realized that was part of her attraction to Damien. The risk she took each time she was with him made him that much more appealing. Not everyone got to be with someone like him, and he had singled her out. In his eyes, she was special, and winning his attention made her somehow worthy of love.
“Anyone see you leave?” His dark eyes flashed in the glow of the dashboard.
“No. Everyone was asleep.”
He nodded his approval and drove slowly out of the cul-de-sac, leaving her breathless with the anticipation of what would happen between them that night. Moments before, she’d been safe inside the warmth of her dad’s house. With Damien, she was anything but safe. Even so, exhilaration filled her lungs and pumped blood through her heart, creating an electrically-charged friction inside her body.
“Where are we going?” she asked, as they turned onto Elden Street.
“You’ll see.” He looked over and raised his hand to touch her cheek. “It’s a surprise.”
Her heart hammered, and all the fluid in her mouth dried up as her teeth chattered together, partly from the cold and partly from his touch.
They drove down a road that took them through an industrial park and into a neighboring town—only a few miles from congested Herndon—where the lights and houses disappeared, and open, undeveloped land eclipsed the noise and neon. They passed a few tractor trailer stores, car shops, and warehouses and finally turned into a gravel parking lot marked by a motel sign, The Cove Motor Inn.
Damien parked the car and turned to her, his face shadowed from the overhead street lights. “Yeah, well, it’s not the Hyatt, but I know the guy who owns this place. He won’t give us any trouble.” His meaning was obvious. By trouble, he meant the guy wouldn’t care she was underage.
They kissed in the car for a long time before going inside, and when they finally did get out of the car, Damien wrapped his arm tightly around Kaki’s neck and shoulders, almost as if he was worried she might take off running into the woods. And there were a lot of woods around them. Dark, silent. She shivered.
The lobby was small and smelly, with wood-paneling like in old houses. There were two couches positioned in an L-shape, both of them beat-up and tattered. On the brownish leather one, discolored and worn with decades of use, sat an old man and a much younger Asian girl. He was fat and greasy looking, and he puffed away on a cigar. Kaki nearly choked on the smoke that filled the room. The woman laughed and flirted, pushing at him with her small, thin hands. Her nails were painted green.
The second couch was orange fabric set into a wood frame. It also looked a million years old. The fabric was worn around the edges, pulling away from the frame, which allowed the stuffing to poke through.
Damien pointed at it. “Go sit over there while I check us in.”
Kaki did as she was told, but she sat at the end farthest away from the man and the woman pawing at each other.
Damien and the man at the counter mumbled something, and the man looked over Damien’s shoulder at her. His dark eyes widened momentarily before constricting into a squinty smile. He dangled a key in front of Damien’s nose. When Damien reached for it, the man snatched it away from him, laughing hysterically. Damien laughed too, but with a final “Give me that!” he managed to pull it out of the man’s grasp.
“Come on,” he said, wrapping his arm around her shoulders as she rose hesitantly from the couch.
The room was dark and covered in the same wood paneling as the lobby. It was also freezing. Kaki’s breath materialized in the air like a puff of smoke as Damien flipped the wall switch and the fluorescent, overhead lights flickered and glowed.
She stood just to the side of the door, frozen, as Damien moved with expert ease around the room, turning on the television and the heat. He held a brown bag, and as he sat down on the creaky bed covered in an ugly, lime-green bedspread, he began pulling miniature bottles from it—a mixture of clear and brown ones—and lined them up on the dusty nightstand.
He looked at her briefly. “What are you doing just standing there?”
She shrugged, nearly
paralyzed, and focused on a black-ink tattoo on his neck that said Devil-Dog. “I’m cold,” she croaked.
Damien grabbed some kind of container from the long chest of drawers that held the television. “It’ll warm up in here in a minute. Go ahead and take your coat off. I’m running down the hall for some ice.”
As soon as the door closed behind him, Kaki looked around the room. This was her chance. She could just run. She could run right out that door. Or she could climb out the window. She knew what she was there for, and with the way things were going it seemed pretty certain what she thought was going to happen would happen. But Damien hadn’t said he loved her, and she wasn’t even sure if she loved him. She liked him a lot. The idea of being with him had filled her mind for the last few weeks, and she’d fantasized about him some. But now that it came right down to actually doing it? This wasn’t how she’d pictured it happening at all. Not in an old, ugly, dusty motel room smelling of stale smoke and mildew.
Damien returned a few minutes later with the tan container full of ice, and remembering she was supposed to take off her coat, Kaki shrugged out of it, allowing it to fall onto a chair.
“What’s your pleasure?” He motioned to the bottles on the nightstand.
Her stomach rolled at the idea of drinking. She felt as if she might throw up. “I don’t know.” Her voice trembled.
“Whiskey or vodka?”
She shrugged. “Whatever you’re having.”
“Well, I’m a whiskey man. My dad drank whiskey, his dad drank whiskey, and his dad’s dad drank whiskey. I like tequila, too, but I didn’t get any of that.”
“I’ll have whiskey, I guess.”
The trembling moved into her legs as she watched him pour the brown liquid over the ice. He filled two glasses and handed her one of them. “Come on.” He patted the bed beside him. “Sit down here. I won’t bite.”
Kaki wanted to talk. She wanted to talk more about his father and his father’s father. “Did you grow up here?” She took a sip of the cold liquid that stung the back of her throat like the medicine she used to take for coughs.
Suburban Dangers Page 5