Student Bodyguard for Hire

by Callie James

  “I wouldn’t use the term bullying.”

  “What term would you use?”

  He cleared his throat. “Not bullying.”

  “What you’re doing right now is the definition of bullying,” I said. “You’re in a position of authority over me physically and otherwise. You told me to do something, and when I refused to do it—”

  “Are you refusing to do it?”

  “Yes, I am.” His eyes narrowed and I shifted again. “And when I refused to do what you asked, you threatened me.”

  “That’s another inappropriate term. I didn’t threaten you.”

  “I’m curious.” I narrowed my eyes. “How do people stay confused as to why students bully other students, when the adults are acting the example of the problem? Kids are killing themselves, Mr. Tanner. Every day. Because the school environment you think you have under control has become so toxic for some students, that it’s a fate worse than death. Death. Yet no one seems concerned about this. And now—”

  “Ms. Greene.”

  “And now,” I said, refusing to let him interrupt me, “when a student steps forward with an idea, a good idea, for a mashup website to alleviate the problem, your plan is to threaten me by tarnishing my grade point average if I don’t shut it down. Sorry, that’s bullying by anyone’s standards.”

  “I said your idea was creative, Ms. Greene,” he said. “Not good.”

  “I happen to think it’s a good idea. Mr. Smith agreed.”

  “Well, I don’t agree, and I stand by what I said. You can’t label me, or the parents who contacted me with their concerns, as bullies. It’s not the correct term here.”

  “Fine. I’ll explain your offer to my mother tonight. Maybe she can explain how the VP overriding my teacher’s opinion by failing me when my website meets all the criteria for this project isn’t bullying.”

  He’d paled a fraction. “I didn’t mean you’d fail the class, Ms. Greene. Just this project.”

  “The project is the class. Didn’t Mr. Smith explain that?”

  “Listen,” he said, sliding forward and placing both hands flat on his desk. “I think we got off on the wrong foot here. I’m capable of being reasonable. I’ll ask Mr. Smith to give you an extension. A chance to do another project. How does that sound?”

  I couldn’t fathom finding the time to do another project. “Fine, I’ll take the extension.”

  “You’ll do another project?”

  “I will,” I said, wondering how I’d come up with another idea, much less the time to complete it.

  “I think you’ll see this works out better for everyone,” he said.

  “What’ll work out better?”

  “Removing the website.”

  “I’m not removing it,” I said. “I’m agreeing to submit another project. That’s all.”

  He sighed and ran a palm down his face. “I don’t think you want to push me on this matter, Peyton.”

  I didn’t appreciate his sudden use of my first name. “Beyond this class, my website has nothing to do with this school except that most of my customers happen to attend here. You have no jurisdiction over the website, or me. I’ve withdrawn my project and I’ve agreed to submit another one. That’s the best I can do.”

  “Then you give me no choice,” he said, rubbing his jaw. “I’ll have to call your parents. I hate to do this. You’ve been an excellent student. It’s a horrible way to end your time here.”

  I clutched my books. “My mother supports this project. Believe me when I say the last thing you want to do is try to bully her, too.”

  “Quit using the term bullying, Ms. Greene, or you’ll find yourself in detention. Perhaps worse.”

  My eyes watered. Detention freaked me out and I couldn’t comprehend suspension or expulsion on my record. The release bell rang and I stood, determined not to cry. I wanted to show him his threats hadn’t worked. I could be tougher than that. “May I use your copier?”

  He looked startled by the request. “We don’t normally allow students to—” He paused, staring at my watery gaze. “All right. Follow me.” He stood and walked to an adjacent office where the staff and I watched him punch a code into the copier.

  I unfolded the threatening note, placed it carefully against the glass, and made a copy.

  “What is that?” he asked.

  “It’s for you,” I said, pulling the original from the glass and handing it to him. I grabbed the copy. He read the original, his eyes widening before I turned and stalked back into his office to stand by the door.

  “Where did you get this?” he asked, following me.

  “My locker. Before seventh period.” My legs shook, weak as a newborn lamb. I had no idea what Mr. Tanner knew about my rumored reputation here. Did faculty get wind of that sordid stuff? My stomach churned to know he’d read the playing hard comment. “Consider this my official complaint that one or more students at this school are threatening me. I need your protection, Mr. Tanner. Can you help me?”

  “Do you have something more … concrete than a typed note?” he said, sitting in his chair again. “Maybe something in handwriting?”

  I stared at him, took a deep breath, and turned to lower my shirt down my shoulder blade enough to uncover the growing bruise from that morning. “Only this.”

  His eyes rounded. “How did you get that?”

  “Someone.” I looked down. “I don’t know who. Someone punched me from behind earlier today. I turned around but there were too many students.” I released my shirt and turned to him. “Can you help me?”

  “Of course.” He sounded confident but looked uncomfortable. “We’ll do what we can.”

  “Like what?”

  He stared at me in silence.

  So no, he couldn’t help me. “I see.”

  “You know,” he said, “in looking up your website, I found an interesting video of you and your friends. I recognized your brother, too. Have you seen it?”

  I nodded as heat crept into my cheeks to recall the lewd dialogue. A shiver ran through me to imagine Mr. Tanner hearing those things while watching me.

  “Do you think this—” he waved the note, “has anything to do with that?”

  “They want me to take down the website. It states it clearly on the note.”

  “Interesting,” he said. “I wouldn’t agree. Perception is everything, Ms. Greene.”

  Was he saying I deserved this treatment because of a stupid video? The air suddenly felt too hot and I opened the door to see Sam leaning against the wall. He straightened when he saw me, his scowl shifting over my shoulder to the VP behind me.

  “Ms. Greene?”

  I pulled my books tightly to my chest and turned to see him still seated.

  “Have your parents seen the video?”

  I shook my head. “Not that I’m aware.”

  “Interesting,” he said.

  I sensed Sam’s simmering presence behind me before his hand brushed my back. “Is it interesting?” I said. “Most would probably find it disturbing. I mean, the person who created the video is obviously a student here since he or she made the video in the school parking lot. I wonder what the media’s spin might be on a school that churns out kids who produce videos with that type of content. On school property, no less. With the added audio, the video is practically child pornography. And as you said, perception is everything.”

  He lost his superior smile somewhere between the words media and child pornography. “You can close the door, Ms. Greene. I wouldn’t want to keep you after school hours. We’ll talk again soon.”

  I closed the door, my hands shaking the entire time. Turning, I bumped into Sam and dropped everything. Our heads nearly collided when we both bent to retrieve them.

  “Sorry,” I said, snatching the note and stuffing it in my pocket as I simultaneously grabbed my A Tale of Two Cities paperback. My hands wouldn’t stop shaking.

  He gave me the notebook and grabbed my trembling hand, holding it firmly. “What d
id he want?”

  “He—” I stood and shook my head, letting my explanation die a quiet death while I blinked hard and tried not to cry. Sam took one look at my watery gaze and pulled me into a hug.

  I wanted to be tough but melted against him instead, not caring that anyone stared or whispered. Students milled around us on their way to the buses, gawking as they passed. I doubted anyone had a clue Sam and I had become a couple. At least they hadn’t until now.

  His arms tightened. “You’re shaking. Tell me what he said to you.”

  I took a deep breath and backed away from his hold, determined not to fall apart at my first real challenge. “I’m overreacting. He … he gave me an ultimatum. That’s all.”

  He dropped his hand to hold mine and we headed toward senior hall. “What ultimatum?”

  “He threatened to fail me if I didn’t pull the website.”

  “What?” He sounded as shocked as I felt. “You told him to go to hell, right?”

  “No. Of course not. But I did tell him I’m keeping the website, which means I have to submit a different project.”

  “That’s bullshit.”

  We stopped at his locker first. “Well, he didn’t exactly give me a choice.”

  “I don’t know. After what you said back there, I’d say he’s the one who walked away with the nosebleed. Child pornography? Jeez, Sunshine. You don’t pull any punches.”

  Daddy would be livid if Mr. Tanner told him what I said today. “I panicked when he threatened to fail me. All I could think was how my mother would have handled him. Whenever she’s on a crusade for the underdog, she finds her opponent’s weak spot and squeezes. At least that’s what she calls it. When she’s really trying to scare someone, she mentions the media. I might have overshot a little.”

  He grabbed his last book and closed his locker, grinning. “Must be where you get your tenacity.”

  I dragged myself in stunned silence to my locker with him next to me. “Mr. Tanner was bullying me into pulling down a site I created to prevent bullying,” I said, pushing in my combination. “I’d laugh if I wasn’t so shocked.”

  “He’s just pissed a high school senior is making progress on an issue this country can’t find consensus on, much less resolve. You kicked the shit out of him back there. Call me twisted, but it totally made my day.”

  “Yeah. Tough words from me, a person who has no idea for a second project. But I’m motivated more than ever now for the bodyguard project. I just decided to go national. Maybe he can put that in his pipe and smoke it.”

  Sam frowned. “Peyton, you can barely keep up as it is. You’ll drop.”

  “If the website is really working,” I reasoned, stuffing two more books in my bag and closing my locker, “I have to help everyone I can, don’t I? Maybe what I’m doing will prompt someone else to start a similar project.” His doubtful smirk told me what he really thought. “Okay, I’ll admit the weeks ahead feel endless. But this is what I’ve always wanted. An idea that forces change. A good change. Do you know what it means to me to have already found that? I don’t even have a degree, and already I’m making a difference.”

  “Yeah, and your schedule is about to become worse than mine.”

  “I know. Ryan already thinks I’m working too many hours.”

  He leaned back against someone’s closed locker. “You do, but I’ll bet Naruto Uzumaki would have done the same thing. He’d have stuck with it like you are.”

  I looked up at him, unable to tamp down a massive smile. “You watched it! You watched Naruto!”

  His smirk became a half-grin. “I traded sleep to catch the first twenty episodes. It helped that they’re short.”

  I stepped between his legs and kissed him right there. “Well? What did you think?”

  “The show is totally you. And you’re right,” he said. “It’s addictive.”

  “Did you cry?”

  He grinned and I couldn’t stop myself from kissing him again. “Like I’d tell you if I did. But do that one more time…” I leaned in, stopping just a half-inch from his mouth, “and I might admit to getting a little misty-eyed.”

  CHAPTER FOURTEEN

  Peyton

  I didn’t talk to my parents that night because I had no idea how to start that conversation. Huge mistake. Mr. Tanner called them the next morning, giving my dad all day to stew about it. He launched into me about it over the dinner table—his favorite place of attack.

  “You’ll do as you’re told and pull it,” he said, his hard gaze promising a hardcore interrogation if I didn’t comply. My brother’s worried gaze swung to mine.

  “How can you say that?” I asked. “You helped me write the terms and conditions. I thought you supported me.”

  “I did. But now it’s a problem. Don’t shake your head at me, Peyton. Shut it down.”

  “No.”

  He looked stunned—my own reaction after the word left my mouth. Thinking back, I couldn’t recall ever telling Daddy no. “What did you say?” he asked.

  He’d never been a violent man, yet he could still scare the bejeebers out of me when his voice rose to a vibrating level or dropped to that menacingly calm manner, like it just did. “I said no.” I cleared my throat. “I’m not pulling the website.”

  He braced his wrists against the table. “Tanner told me what you said. Challenging him the way you did. You’re making a bad reputation for yourself, Peyton. Is that what you want?”

  “She already has a bad reputation,” Ryan muttered. “And challenging Tanner isn’t how she got it.”

  Daddy locked eyes with my brother. “What’s that supposed to mean?”

  Ryan glared back. “What do you think it means?”

  “Ry-an,” I whispered. He turned to me and shut his mouth when he recognized my pleading eyes.

  Daddy’s attention pivoted from me to my mother. “This is what happens when you encourage them, Maggie. She’s on her way to becoming an insubordinate like Ryan. First that Guerra boy and now this. It’s as though I’m not even here. I no longer have any say in my own home.”

  “Insubordinate?” I echoed.

  “You know I expect more, Peyton. This sudden defiance is due to that Guerra boy’s influence. I’m sure of it.”

  “Sam has nothing to do with this,” I said. “And you can’t deny my point to Mr. Tanner was a valid one. If the current system worked, students wouldn’t need to rent a bodyguard. Do you realize how much two hundred dollars is to someone my age? Yet they’re paying it. Their parents are paying it. Their parents’ friends are paying it. What does that tell you?”

  Daddy eyed me critically. “You act as if your generation is the first to have bullies. It gets better after high school.”

  “And in the meantime, we do what?” I said. “High school is difficult enough without having to look over your shoulder all the time.”

  “I was harassed,” Daddy said, as though I hadn’t said a word. “I lived. Believe it or not, the experiences motivated me to succeed. No one wants to live in the wrong section of town.”

  “That’s a disgusting thing to say, Paul,” Mom muttered under her breath.

  “I hope that’s not the new measurement of a successful childhood,” I said. “To live through it? As opposed to what? Not live through it?”

  Mom looked up. “She’s making perfect sense to me, Paul. And I’m proud of what she’s doing.”

  He stopped chewing. “Of course you are.”

  “Take your jabs at me if you want, but your daughter is right,” she said. “Something needs to happen and the current establishment isn’t doing it.”

  “Which means you’ll be parading behind her with banners and horns, I’m sure,” he said.

  Ryan and I exchanged nervous glances at Daddy’s sarcastic tone. The usual pre-empt to a massive blow-up.

  “I support her in keeping the website,” Mom said. “If that means I go toe-to-toe with the school administration when they decide to threaten her again, then that’s what I�
��ll do.”

  My dad started chewing vigorously this time. The beginning of the end. “You want her to fail a class, is that it?”

  “They can’t fail me,” I said, pulling his baleful attention back to me. “Not legally.”

  He glared at me over his glasses. “You have a degree in law I don’t know about?”

  “It’s a simple deduction,” I said, ignoring his condescension. “They can’t fail me for a project I won’t submit. I told you I’m submitting something else. Everything I do with the website is outside the school’s jurisdiction. Why are we still talking about this?”

  “Now see? That makes this worse,” he said. “You don’t have to submit it, which means you’re continuing the project out of spite.”

  “I’m continuing the project because it’s the right thing to do, Daddy. I’m not exactly having fun, you know. This is taking up all of my personal time. I barely see Adam anymore.”

  “Yet you see enough of the other one,” he added.

  I wouldn’t let Daddy pull me into another argument about Sam, which was likely his real agenda. Sometimes I wondered if he thought more about Sam than I did. “Do you think I like the threats I’m getting? Or when people punch me in the hallway?”

  Ryan stiffened, his gaze swinging to me. “Who the hell punched you? When?”

  “Yesterday in the hallway.” I shook my head. “Someone hit me in the back. I didn’t see who.”

  “It’s a horrific bruise,” Mom muttered, who had seen me in my pajama tank top this morning.

  “What?” Ryan asked, looking between us. “Where was I?”

  “It was … nothing,” I said. “I didn’t mention it because I didn’t want you to get upset.”

  “Upset?” he said, scowling. “Try pissed. Did you report it?”

  “I told Mr. Tanner.”

  “And?” Ryan’s nostrils flared. “What’s he planning to do about it?”

  I shrugged. “What can he do?”

  “But we should—” Ryan stopped, hitting the same conclusion I had after it happened.

  “Honestly, I’ll take a punch over the threats,” I said. “First the lewd emails with way too much personal information. Then this note in my locker. It’s obvious some of these people know me. I’m starting to get paranoid.”