“But you broke it up.”
“Well, of course!” She glanced down at the spiral binder that lay between her hands, planted palm-down on the desk. “I’ve had concerns from the first day, but I wouldn’t have called you yet, I would have let Brett settle in and seen how it went, except for this.”
Her touch ginger, as if the garden-variety spiral notebook held directions for building a nuclear bomb, she lifted it, turned it around and held it out to him.
Uncomprehending, he took the notebook.
“In my class, everyone has to write a journal. They make entries every day. I do warn them that I’ll be glancing through their journals, mostly just to be sure they’re writing. Sometimes I read more than other times, particularly if I’m concerned about a student. Sometimes they write quite a bit about their home lives.”
What in hell?
Craig looked down at it, strangely reluctant to open the cover. Something had shaken a woman who’d been teaching sixth grade for a number of years. He’d have thought she would have seen—and read—it all by now.
With an abrupt movement, he flipped open the notebook and saw his son’s nearly illegible scrawl filling the page.
Lots of people deserve to die. Not my mom—she’s not dead anyway—but lots of other people. That cop. I want to go, like, burn a cross on his grave. Or something. So people know he’s a son of a bitch.
Actually, “son of a bitch” was preceded by some horrific obscenities. Words Craig hadn’t realized his son knew, far less used.
Heart drumming, he continued to decipher the scrawl.
Like Ryan Durney. I wanted to kill him! I still want to kill him!!! Maybe I will. He says I’m like my dad. He thinks I’m a murderer, so maybe I’ll be one. I’ll just punch him and keep punching…
Feeling sick, Craig read to the bitter end. The appalling stream of consciousness broke off midsentence. Apparently journal-writing time had ended. Hands shaking, he closed the notebook and sat with his head down.
Oh God, oh God. How could this rage, this rot have been filling his son’s head without him knowing?
Craig had read about the stunning tragedies at schools like Columbine without understanding how it could have happened without the parents seeing that their children had turned into monsters.
Now…now he knew.
Eyes burning, he looked up. “I had no idea.”
Voice soft, Robin McKinnon said, “I assumed you didn’t.”
“He says I’m ‘like my dad,’” Craig quoted. He scrubbed a hand over his face. “Does Brett think…” His throat closed.
With clear compassion, his son’s teacher said, “I don’t know. He did defend you to me, but…what a child says isn’t always what he believes, deep in his heart.”
Pushing the spiral notebook away with revulsion, Craig asked, “Have you ever seen anything like this?”
“Not…quite. Hints of it.” She nibbled on her lip. “These kids have all seen slasher movies, you know. Really grisly stuff. So imagining themselves in that world, if you will, isn’t the stretch for them it might have been for us when we were kids.”
He nodded numbly, wanting to believe that Brett didn’t mean any of this, but unable to.
“This, though…” She, too, gazed at Brett’s journal. “It shocked me.”
Craig shook his head. “He must have known you’d read it.”
“Yes, and that’s what gives me hope. I think he must want an adult to know what he’s thinking and feeling.”
“He could have told me.”
“Maybe,” she said, “he wants to be strong for you.”
Maybe he did. Craig remembered the clean bedroom, the folded laundry, the help raking the lawn and vacuuming the living room. Brett didn’t even ask about his mother often, he went on as if, on the surface, nothing had changed.
“I suggested counseling. Six or eight months ago. After he started picking fights.” He had to breathe deeply a couple of times. “He said no. He was okay.” His mouth worked. “He’s not okay.”
“No. He’s not.”
“Thank you, Ms. McKinnon.” Craig blundered to his feet. “You undoubtedly want him out of your classroom and this school. I don’t blame you.”
She shook her head and said firmly, “Please sit down. I don’t want Brett to go anywhere.”
Craig stared at her now determined face.
“This,” she nodded again at the notebook, “suggests he is quite troubled. But he’s only eleven years old. He has plenty of reason to be angry. What he’s feeling isn’t irrational. The other children do stare and whisper, in part because his attitude invites it. But, in fairness to Brett, that’s not the whole story. Ryan Durney did suggest that—” Here she faltered.
“I’m a murderer.”
“Um…” Her gaze shied. “Something like that. Ryan warned a girl away from Brett, suggesting that…”
“He’s just like me.” Craig swore under his breath.
“The sad thing is that Ryan isn’t an unusually cruel boy. They taunt each other at this age, the boys in particular. They…hunt for weaknesses, in themselves as much as in the others. I really believe if Brett had fought back in a different way, if from the beginning he’d said, ‘Jeez, I know my mom took off. I don’t know what that cop’s problem is,’ the other boys would have dropped it.”
“But they smelled blood.”
“Exactly.”
He sat in silence, feeling defeated.
“I strongly recommend counseling,” Ms. McKinnon said.
Craig nodded. “Do I tell him you showed me this?”
“Why not? I warned the students that what they wrote wouldn’t be private. If he doesn’t know how inappropriate his thoughts and fantasies are, it’s time he finds out.”
“Damn straight,” Craig muttered.
Voice tentative, she said, “I assume there’s a reason you haven’t moved to a community where you can make a fresh start.”
“We’ve been strongly encouraged to stay put.” He made sure she heard the irony.
“I see.”
Weirdly, in the midst of his turmoil, Craig was distracted by the swing of her ponytail when she nodded, the way light from the overhead fluorescent fixture shimmered from it. He realized he was staring and made himself look away, at the blackboard.
“I talked to the administration in Salmon Creek about moving Brett, but they turned me down.”
“They’re desperate to pass a bond issue, and classrooms are bulging. I’m not surprised.”
His impression had been that they hadn’t wanted Brett and his problems. But he kept that to himself. “I even looked into the Christian school here in town, but they let me know that they thought Brett’s presence would be disruptive.” If he’d been a member of their church, it might have been different, they’d implied. He didn’t buy that.
His son’s teacher asked, “How is your relationship with Brett?”
“Actually…”