He marched Shaun and Ellie through the halls, preaching about morals and how as young men and women the two of them should be striving to grow as people. He spoke to Shaun about how someone on the wrestling team who was a direct representative of the school should treat others with more respect. He led them to the in-school detention room which was an office with six desks. He left them there to think about what they had done, which neither felt in any way bad about, and instructed them to write a thousand words about respect. An paper which, over their dead bodies, would never be written.
Ellie stretched back in her chair looking around. "Look," she purred. "you hang with me, Shaun, and you're going to go places in life."
Shaun smirked at her. "Oh, yeah I'm going places alright. Like the morgue in about four hours when Dr. Fox gets called away from work and royally kicks my ass. How are things going to go with your mom?"
"Oh there's definitely a grounding coming my way, and I'll lose my cell until my mom realizes she can't ever get a hold of me and gives it back. It could be worse, right?"
Shaun had a visual of himself on a mortuary table with a tag dangling from his big toe. "How,
per se
, could it be worse?"
"Now that
is
easy! One of those guys could have kissed me ... or kicked the crap out of you!"
Shaun nodded. "Yeah, or one of them could be in here, too." After a brief thought, he continued hopefully. "I know Mr. Peterson's going to give us Saturday school. We could ride in together, hit up Casey's for donuts in the morning...? Maybe we'll get lucky and have the place to ourselves!"
"Well, I guess that wouldn't really be much different than being home by ourselves all day except for having the freedom to leave if we chose to. It's not like our parents would be there. The mighty corporation would have a meltdown if their employees tried to enjoy a full weekend," she joked.
Shaun nodded thinking about his dad and how infrequently he was home. "Hey, think of the valuable skills we're learning like self-reliance, cooking, and making sure we go to bed before three in the morning. Kids who have their parents' attention don't learn those things. It's a shame really."
Ellie punched him lightly in the shoulder. "Hey, your dad does things with you! What about your annual hunting trips?"
Shaun sighed. "Nothing says 'I love you' like teaching your son to walk into the woods, kill an innocent animal and then cut the meat off its dead carcass.... I think if my mom was still around maybe he wouldn't feel quite so compelled to try to save the world. I'm pretty sure that's why he works trying to design drugs. I think he's got some delusional hang up that he could be the one person in the world to cure cancer. He feels guilty about not being there for me and mom."
Ellie nodded slowly and let out a big breath. "Dude, you just went from deer hunting, to cutting apart venison, to your father's career and then to your mother dying ... that's an impressive progression! At least you have a reason for your mother to be gone. My dad's been gone for years and it's only because my mom says he couldn't keep his lips off his favorite guy."
Shaun shivered a little at the thought of two men kissing. "Ellie, you never told me that your dad was gay!"
Ellie laughed. "Oh, he couldn't keep his mouth off of Jack Daniels bottles! He loved the ladies so much he couldn't stay home ... or, for that matter, stay faithful to my mom. It's why my mom went back to school and to work at E&T Corp."
The door opened and Mr. Peterson leaned in. He looked disappointed, shaking his head at the two. "You do know that if you'd like to actually write the essay it will require the use of a pen and a piece of paper, right?"
Ellie smacked her forehead. "Crap! I totally forgot about that, Mr. Peterson! Thank you! You see, this is really our pre-planning stage, we want to make sure we write the absolute best essays we can for you."
Mr. Peterson nodded. "I can't wait to fill your mother in on how delightfully witty her daughter is, Ms. Randall. I hope neither of you have plans because you'll be spending Saturday together with a few of your fellow classmates here."
****
At three-o'clock, the school secretary accompanied them to the main detention hall with the other kids. The seventh graders looked like they were on the verge of crying. It was somewhat like a scared-straight program since all in attendance in Adel between the grades of seven to twelve had to share one school and one detention room. It was in no way a hundred percent effective method but it did tend to keep the kids who weren't sure what path they felt they should take going down the straight and narrow.
They signed the clipboard with Mr. Smith, the teacher on detention duty. He was the freshman math teacher and both of them were current students of his. He looked a little surprised to see them. "Just between us jailbirds, what are you in for? Did you shank someone?"
Shaun held back a grin and shook his head. "Assault with a loaded backpack, hip throw, and not yet being a member of the varsity sports program, sir."
Ellie jumped in before her teacher could ask by cupping her hand up by her mouth to keep it secret from everyone else and whispered. "Sir, I got harassed by a bunch of boys, and I kicked a kid in the testicles very, very hard. I'm not sure why I'm here, though. I actually thought Mr. Peterson was checking into the school harassment code but he hasn't gotten back to me."
Mr. Smith stared speechless at both of them. "Uh huh. Go ahead and find a seat. Oh, and try not to hurt anyone, please."
Ellie turned on her heel. "We can't promise miracles, sir."
Shaun looked around and pointed at a few seats in the middle of the room. "Hey, let's sit in the middle. The kids in the back are here too often, and earning detention while in detention is just stupid."
Ellie picked out a seat next to an older boy named Greg Thompson. He was five-foot-seven, easy on the eyes with his flowing black hair, and had natural muscles unlike the boys who made the weight room their lives. He was also one of the bigger trouble makers. He didn't seem to look for trouble but it always had its way of finding him. Shaun put it down to there being some kind of a curse with the children of cops.
He took his desk and looked at Greg, instantly regretting his seating choice. He was pretty sure Ellie sat there because of him. Shaun looked at who was sitting next to Greg and realized it was Lucas' sister, Tina. He shrank down in his seat a little.
Tina, unlike her brother, had been blessed with blonde hair and a slim, curvy body. She also wore the tightest jeans a teenage girl could buy. She was staring Ellie down with a cat-like expression. It was obvious the story of the day was the fight, and all the details had probably been exaggerated throughout the final periods.
She stared directly at Ellie whom she felt had no business sitting next to Greg, then looked around the room taking it in one more time. Tina, being a cocky sophomore, finally spat out. "Hey! Why the hell'd you kick my brother in the balls?"
Shaun's face went a little red thinking Ellie's chances of earning additional detention were increasing greatly by the moment. He was baffled by her seat choice and thought she really couldn't have chosen anywhere worse. Ellie barely missed a beat, smiled widely and replied. "Well, your asshole of a brother tried to assault me in the hallway between class and Shaun beat up two of his friends. I kicked him in the balls because I couldn't let the stud here have all the fun!" Shaun went even redder.
Tina sat back, not expecting such an honest answer. "He's such a loser.... I can only assume he got off because he's in football."
Shaun looked at Tina and Greg awkwardly, instantly embarrassed, and smiled weakly. "Well, it was kind of a misunderstanding, but they got what was coming to them."
Greg smirked. "A misunderstanding, huh?"
Shaun didn't know Greg at all other than hearing the rumors about him, and was fairly confident he really hadn't stabbed a teacher with a fork last year. Nonetheless, he had a tendency to not trust anyone who wasn't a fellow freshman. All upperclassmen seemed to think that they had the right to pick on the underclassmen. So Shaun decided it safest to sit to the side of Ellie exactly where he could keep Greg in his peripheral vision. Ellie leaned over and whispered. "We're kind of like rock stars at this point.... How many kids get to serve detention in two separate places in one day, and then tell their story to the victim's sister?"
"Who needs Christmas after today?" he managed.
Ellie looked behind her trying not to check out Greg all at once, and instead gazed at some of the students sitting in the back. "You know, come to think of it, I'm probably right. How many people get escorts to detention?"
Shaun shrugged. "Out of all the kids here, I might be the only one counting down the minutes he has left to live. My dad's kind of good with chemicals...."
Greg let out a laugh, one that sounded much more mature than Shaun's. "I really doubt your dad's going to off you when you get home. What kind of chemicals would he have--is he some kind of meth cooker?"
Ellie stepped in before Shaun could answer. "Worse! He could give Shaun an overdose of vitamins!" She smiled in a more of a flirtatious way than Shaun would have preferred and continued. "His dad's a biochemist. I don't know how dangerous he really is, but I think Shaun has a chance of pulling through if he just doesn't eat at home the next few days."
Knowing how dangerous his dad could be, Shaun smirked cockily. "Yeah, well, when your dad's an ex-Army paratrooper, he can kill you with just about anything. I probably have a half hour ... maybe forty-five minutes left to live. It just depends on how long it takes him speeding and driving like a madman to get here."
Greg looked Shaun over, judging the credibility of his story, and knowing that if he was truly worried about his demise he would not be waiting around in a detention room. Greg liked his sense of humor and commented. "Better pray for rush hour, kid."
Tina didn't have any interest in Greg or Shaun, but wasn't happy being anything less than the center of attention. "Your dad was a paratrooper? That is so, like, awesome! Does that mean he drove tanks or something?"
Shaun thought it out, and came to the conclusion she knew diddly about the military. He shook his head. "It means he can jump out of airplanes, land within a few miles of his destination, go into a camp, kill someone with a bomb, knife, or gun, and then hike it back out of there with his team and not get caught."
Tina bit her lip. "So, is your dad like really hot too?"
"Where do you think I get my good looks from?"
Ellie laughed. "I've been trying to figure out what happened to you for years!"
All three of them laughed at Shaun's expense, but he wasn't expecting compliments to come from a loaded question like that.
Ellie, unfortunately, was caught in a fit of laughter. She had been trying to play it cool in front of the upperclassmen, but was incapable of stopping the laughs from coming. The more she thought about it, the harder it was to stop. Mr. Smith stared at them, but was unable to see everything going on. He stood up just as she got it under control and shouted. "Who is it back there making all that racket!? Do you want me to tack on time!?"
Ellie opened her mouth to take the blame for it, but Greg spoke first. "Sorry, sir! I was just thinking about something and it made me laugh out loud."
Mr. Smith trusted Greg no further than he could throw him. "Yeah? And what's so funny, Mr. Thompson?"
"Well, sir, I'm working on being a respectable young man, and I don't think Mr. Peterson would appreciate me repeating something like this in front of all these fragile minds!."
Mr. Smith shook his head. "I don't know if there are any impressionable minds at this age."
Greg smiled and pointed to Ellie. "I don't know, sir. I kind of have a feeling about this one." He gave a quick wink at Ellie, which made Shaun's stomach turn just a little with jealously.