by Nye, Laine
His voice was strained. His breathing ragged.
“I said no!” Brad yelled and exerted so much G-Force energy that Milo could not even keep his head off the ground. He was flattened, immobilized!
“You are never going to bother me again Milo! You get it? Have you figured it out yet?” Brad demanded.
He began walking backwards toward the school, keeping the gravity concentration under his enemy as he got further away. The further he went, the more exhausting it was becoming for him to continue to use so much force against Milo. He was about 120 feet away when he felt that he could no longer maintain the pressure underneath his enemy. He released him and walked into the school.
Just inside the door, Brad stopped, leaned against the wall, put his hands on his knees with knees bent, and tried to catch his breath, to get back his strength. Brad would just flatten him to the floor again if Milo came through the door. Fifteen minutes later, he finally felt his strength returning. He had never used that much G-force before. It drained him of most his energy. It's going to be a long day at school! He thought. He had no idea how true that was.
Just as he was getting ready to walk down to the office for the inevitable tardy slip, he heard sirens that were rapidly approaching the school. As the sirens approached, the shrill sound silenced. Brad had a bad feeling about this new event. He stepped back outside to see if his fears were correct.
A paramedics team coupled with an ambulance team were moving towards a human form that was lying on the football field. A city police officer and the school resource officer were also there. Brad immediately recognized who the still form was. It was exactly where he had left him. Exactly the same position.
The paramedics turned Milo over and checked for a heartbeat. At first, they didn't try to use life saving techniques. They believed he had been dead for hours from his appearance. But one of them felt the warmth in his body and thought maybe there was a chance. They opened a case and pulled out two hand size paddles on cables. Milo's shirt was ripped open and the paddles were applied to his chest. Brad continued to walk slowly towards the unfolding drama. Milo's arms suddenly flailed out spasmodically and his body arched slightly. The paddles were pulled away. Attempts to get him breathing were made by putting a breathing tube down his throat and pumping in air. The paddles were used again. Milo's arms flailed out again. Clear fluid shot out of the breathing tube landing on Milo's face. He did not flinch. Over and over they tried to resuscitate the still form. Arms flailed. Fluid shot out, but each time they checked him there was no pulse. They quit trying.
Brad was very close now and looked down at Milo. His face was a blackened color and his eyes were a deep dark red that almost looked black.
The school resource officer noticed Brad. “Do you know this student?” He asked.
Brad nodded. “His name is Milo.” I thought all you guys in the office knew him well. He thought.
“Last name?”
“I can't remember, Brad said in a distant voice. He was going into shock. “Why do his eyes look like that?” He asked.
“All of his blood has flowed to the side he was laying on. Apparently, he has been laying here for many hours,” said one of the paramedics.
“You mean that is blood in his eyes?” Brad asked.
The police officer turned to the resource office and said, “He should not be seeing this.”
The school officer turned to Brad and said, “Go to class son. We'll look you up later. What's your name?”
“Brad Shaw.”
“Go now, son. You don't need to be seeing this.”
Brad mechanically turned around and walked back to the school. He turned back to see them loading Milo onto a gurney and lifted into the back of the ambulance. The doors were closed. The ambulance started back across the football field. The emergency lights were not turned on. There was no siren. The ambulance drove away without urgency.
As the day progressed, news spread rapidly throughout the school that for some reason Milo's heart had stopped. He was dead. “He just laid down and died!” Someone in the crowd said loudly as everyone was in the halls going to their next class.
“He was a bully and a jerk!” Someone else said. “He deserved it!”
Brad heard. He agreed that Milo was a jerk but he had not been trying to kill him. He didn't want him to be dead. The trauma of the day's events settled deeply into his mind and heart as the day wore on in slow motion. That night at the dinner table when he tried to tell his parents that a student at his school had died, he broke down and cried. He could not finish his supper or his story.
“I need to go to bed.” He sobbed.
He stumbled down the hall to his bedroom and shut the door. He said to himself over and over, I killed him! I killed Him!
Only his exhaustion could cause his mourning to cease. He fell asleep fully dressed.
Brad's father Steve started to get up to follow Brad down to his bedroom. His wife reached out. Placed her hand on his arm. He turned to look at her before moving away from the table.
“Let it go tonight Steve. He's not up to it. He won't be able to accept any counsel from you tonight.”
Steve looked at her questioningly. She answered his unspoken words. “A mother's instinct tells her things sometimes. Right now, it's telling me that our boy needs some time alone before we can talk to him.”
“I don't want to counsel him. I want to comfort him.” Steve responded.
“Steve,” She said with a soft loving voice, “Will you please just trust me on this one and leave him alone? I know its best.”
Steve reluctantly agreed. He trusted his wife's intuition. But his heart ached for his son. He knew the same would be true of his wife of course, so if she could resist going into Brad's room, he could as well. He went around the table and hugged and kissed Kate.
Ten days later, as Brad sat in his second period class, the door opened. The principal stepped in and nodded to the teacher. She walked over and they talked in low tones briefly. Then she looked over at Brad. Gestured for him to come over. Brad walked up to them. The principal said, “Come with me Mr. Shaw.”
Brad followed him out of the classroom and heard playful jeering behind him.
“Knock it off class!” his teacher said forcefully as the door shut.
Brad followed the principal down the hall. He asked him, “What's going on Mr. Phillips?”
“We won't be talking until we get to my office,” he responded in an officious manner.
They walked the rest of the way totally silent. Brad surmised that the silence was meant to unhinge him. It was meant to build up tension and intimidation so that Brad would be pliable and unresisting once in the office. Pliable and unresisting about what? Brad wondered.
They entered the secretary's domain, passed through it, and entered the principal's office. Mr. Phillips sat down in his chair and gestured offhandedly to Brad to sit. Brad did not sit in the chair directly in front of the desk. He went over to a chair against the wall and plopped down.
“What's this about?” He asked again.
“We have a late arriving guest who will join us soon. Then we'll talk.”
He began to open drawers, look in them, close them, shuffle papers on his desk. Stacked them neatly and re-arranged them on the surface. Nothing he was doing was productive. He was just trying to further unnerve Brad with his continued silence and his officious imperious manner.
The principal was a short squat balding man of thirty-nine years who looked to be about sixty. He wore glasses low on his nose and liked to tip his head down as he peered intently at people over the top of his glasses. His stare was baneful, condescending. All part of his act to let people know that he was in charge.
The door opened. In stepped the school resource officer. His name was Gerald Jenkins. It was rumored that he wanted to be a city cop but didn't have the qualifications so the police settled on him being a school officer. He was tall, lanky and awkward in demeanor and appearance. Instead of tr
ying to act officially aloof from the students, he tried to be their friend with easy conversation. Brad thought that if the cop had ever had to grapple with Milo Weathers, he would have lost, hands down. Maybe that was why Milo had never been disciplined to the extent he had deserved. Thinking of Milo in this context caused Brad to see a flashback in his mind. Milo laying on the ground, arms jerking spasmodically. Eyes and face blackened with blood.
Brad shook the traumatic memory off as Officer Jenkins sat down near the principal. Jenkins began the conversation.
“We have recently had correspondence with a young lady who used to be a student at this school. So as a result of her words, we need to have this talk with you.”
Not Linda Day I hope. Brad said to himself.
“Her name is Linda Day and I believe you knew her well. Did you not?”
Oh crap! “Yes, I knew her.” Don't volunteer too much information.
“You also knew Milo Weathers. Yes?”
“I did know him, but not very well.”
“Did Milo Weathers ever give you a hard time?” Jenkins asked.
Me and everyone else. Yeah.” Yes, he did.”
“Linda Day states that you broke his arm a couple months back.”
“I'm a little small to be breaking a giant's arm sir.”
“You caused his arm to get broken. You didn't actually do it with your own strength. Isn't that true?”
“No. I don't know why Linda would say that.” Brad responded indignantly.
The principal couldn't contain himself any longer. “There was some strange incident reported by several students as well as Miss Day, that Mr. Weathers was somehow pushed up to the ceiling and then he dropped to the floor breaking his arm. Miss Day said you were there. Is that true Mister Shaw?”
“I did see something weird happen with Milo that day. Just like a lot of other students. What has that got to do with me?” Brad said with a puzzled expression.
“Please Mr. Phillips. Let me conduct this investigation.” Officer Jenkins said.
“Gerald, these incidents happened at my school where I am in charge. I will not butt out. I would like Mr. Shaw to answer my question.”
Jenkins turned to Brad with raised eyebrows. “Well Brad?”
“I saw him fly upward. But I did not see what happened afterward. I don't know who was strong enough to throw him up into the air like that. I'm sure not.”
“Linda said you caused it Brad. She said that somehow, you threw him up to the ceiling. Now I know that sounds a little weird but she was not the only one who reported this bizarre situation.”
“About me? Come on Officer. How could I possibly do that?”
“No. Other students did not say you caused it. They only told us about the incident. Miss Day. Linda. Is the only one who spoke of you. In a letter.
“Your answers need to be cooperatively forthcoming Mr...”
Jenkins interrupted the principal. “Let's jump forward to the day that Milo died. You were the only student there at that incident.”
“I know. I remember.” Brad stated simply.
“Do you remember what happened before I got there and called the ambulance? Because Linda seems to think, quite strongly I might add, that you had something to do with Milo dying that day. Did you kill him somehow?”
“No! How could I have done that. You guys said he had been laying there for hours. I just happened to be there. And what would Linda know about it anyway? She had moved away before that day.”
Officer Gerald Jenkins puffed out his cheeks with a strong exhalation through rounded mouth. “Look Brad. I am aware of how strange this whole thing looks and sounds.”
Brad nodded emphatically as he said this.
“But we still need to investigate as there are abnormalities with both situations that need to be understood and you were the only one present at both incidents. Linda believes that whatever you allegedly did to Milo the day he broke his arm must have been the same thing you did when he died. Did you maybe throw Milo up into the air the day he died like in the hallway?”
Brad ignored the question. With his heart pounding hard and his face growing flushed he asked, “What kind of abnormalities?”
The principal shook his head in frustration. “Mr. Shaw I am about one minute away from calling the regular police to join us in this room. Do you want that?”
Brad glared at him. But tears were forming in his eyes.
Jenkins went on as if Phillips had not spoken.
“Abnormalities such as his body temperature. It was still at near normal range of a living breathing person. So, if he had been laying in the field for many hours on a cool night why was his body still warm? When they did the autopsy, his organs were compressed and seemed to be pushed toward the front of his body and I found him lying on his face. That doesn't happen in a normal death Brad.
“Also, toxicology reports said that there was nothing in his body except traces of marijuana. No drugs that could have killed him. He had red spots around his eyes. That only happens to a person who has been choked or asphyxiated. He died from forced oxygen deprivation and subsequent heart failure. How Brad?”
Before Brad could even begin to think of a response the principal interrupted. “Gerald, he does not need to be privy to that information. He simply needs to explain how he killed Mr. Weathers. Well Mr. Shaw. How did it happen?”
“Phillips, we haven't accused him of this death. We are only questioning him due to a student's letter. You’re are jumping the gun.”
Brad did not even hear the officer's words. He was glaring at Mr. Phillips with something akin to hatred. Through gritted teeth he said, “My name is Brad. Not Mr. Shaw! Now you're no cop. You can't arrest me or handcuff me or anything else so stop acting like you're a detective or something!”
Brad had never spoken this way to a person of authority in his entire life. He had always been respectful and polite. But Principal Theodore Phillips had provoked him as much as Milo Weathers had. He made a show of turning away from facing directly toward the principal and pointing his knees and whole body toward Officer Jenkins. Who was about 4 feet to the left of the principal.
“You will not speak to me in this manner young man! I am your principal and right now you are about one inch away from being permanently escorted off this campus where the real police can deal with you.”
“All right! Now everyone just calm back down. This is getting out of control,” Jenkins asserted.
“Listen to me Jenkins, you work at my school.”
“Yes, I do which you believe puts you in charge over me. And in some limited ways that is true. But make no mistake Theodore, if you were to break the law, I would have the authority to arrest you. Our power, if you want to call it that, is equal in this setting and as a police officer it is up to me to conduct this interview!”
The principal looked like he was going to go apoplectic any second. His face flushed as dark as Brad's but he held his not very disciplined tongue.
“What exactly did Linda say in this letter?” Brad asked the school resource officer quietly.
“She told us that Milo had a history of bullying you. She said that day in the hallway Milo was getting ready to assault you but then, and I quote, 'Something strange happened then. Brad forced some kind of energy out of himself and then Milo flew up to the ceiling and stayed there for almost a minute before he dropped to the floor.' Those were her words. Can you explain this thing about the energy? About Milo floating in the air?”
Brad forced a laugh that he hoped would sound natural. “Has she been tested for drug use?” He questioned scornfully.
“Yeah. I know. It sounds weird. But Brad. How do you explain all of this? Jenkins asked in a non-accusatory manner.
“I don't see why I am the one that has to explain this. Just because of what Linda wrote? How is that fair?”
“We are not looking for fair. Once again, you are the only student that was involved in both situations.”
Brad put hi
s elbows on his knees and his face in his hands as he shook his head slowly. “Seeing Milo's dead body and everything was very hard for me and now I am brought in here and am forced to relive it all. That's not fair!”
Brad jumped to his feet with his hands on his hips glaring at the principal.
“Brad. Sit down.” Both men said simultaneously.
Brad remained standing.
Officer Jenkins looked at him and quietly said, “Come on Brad. Sit down. Please.”
Brad slowly sunk back to his chair most of the way then just dropped into it as his arms flopped to the sides limply. “I want my parents here.” He stated quietly. “I'm not going to talk anymore until they can join us.
There was silence in the room. Jenkins looked at Phillips for a long moment then back at Brad. “No. It’s alright. Go back to class Brad. Sorry to have upset you. We may need to talk again but let's just drop this for right now. It isn't critical enough yet to involve your parents.”
“You can't decide when he returns to his class. That's my job Jenkins!” The principal asserted forcefully.
“That's Officer Jenkins to you.” The school policeman said with ice in his eyes and voice.
“I'm going to report you to your captain!” Phillips said looking over his glasses with that condescending look. He was determined to be in total control.
“You do that. Teddy.” Jenkins said his nickname in a disparaging tone. Then, “Go ahead Brad. Leave.”
Phillips sat there shocked into silence staring at Jenkins with his mouth open. Brad bounded out of his chair went to the door and pulled it open and stormed out past Mrs. Tyler who was the secretary. He went into the hall. He did not go back to class. He walked down the opposite hallway and out the door. Brad was entirely unaware that in his agitated state, a certain energy was emitting from his body.
Several things on the secretary's desk raised up six inches then scattered across the desk with some things falling on the floor. She was flustered and irritated thinking that the student from the principal's office must have rushed by so quickly that it stirred everything up.