13. Making Trouble

“Come with me.”

The hand on my shoulder digs in and drives me forward before I can head into my history class. By the sheer force and surprise, I think it’s Gus behind me. Yet my brain catches me up and tells me it’s an adult.

I turn my head enough to see that it’s some guy I’ve never met wearing bad pants and an even worse tie. Whatever hair he has left is slicked over in a way that seems to wave defeat.

The man guides me to the principal’s office, where the door opens to reveal a group of adults.

There is the principal, Miss Harking, who said hello to me in passing on my first day. Next to her stands my gym teacher, whose name escapes me for the moment. He looks like the athlete who couldn’t stand to let his high school days slip him by, so he simply stayed around to teach. And to pump iron. Next to him stands a cop. If we were back home I might think this guy is security at a mall, one of those “faux cops,” as Brady called them.

“Young man, you are in serious trouble.”

A part of me wants to turn around to see if Miss Harking is talking to someone else. The guy in the tie stands right next to her as if this is an intervention.

“Is there anything in your locker you want us to know about?”

I think about the bag lunch I brought and wonder if they’re here for that. I shake my head.

“Can you tell me anything about that?” Miss Harking says as she points to her desk.

On it is a revolver, a short stubby kind that looks ideal for hiding in your pocket.

I glance at it, then at the stern faces in front of me.

“We got word this morning that someone saw you take this out of your bag and put it in your locker,” the cop-or-not says to me.

“Who said that?”

“Does it belong to you?”

“No,” I say with a bewildered laugh.

“You’re in serious trouble, Chris,” Miss Harking says. “We’ve called your mother.”

“I’ve never seen this gun before.”

It’s clear they don’t believe me. I stare at the tie guy who led me down here. He looks like he’s been itching to take out his own teenage aggressions on someone for about forty-five years, and boom, here I come.

The outsider from Chicago, only here a week, is packing heat.

Come on.

“What are you doing with this, Chris?”

“That’s not my gun. I didn’t put it in my locker. What else I can say?”

“We’ve heard you’ve been making some trouble with some of the boys here,” Miss Harking says.

“If ‘trouble’ is trying to avoid getting my face bashed in, then yeah, I’ve been making lots of it.”

“And who has been trying to do this to you?”

“Gus and his buddies,” I say.

The cop and my gym teacher look at each other.

“Did you bring this in to hurt one of them?” the cop asks, his nostrils flaring.

I want to flare mine back at him, but can’t. “No. That’s not my gun.”

“You were suspended from your last high school for drinking.”

The principal has done her homework.

“That’s a lot different from carrying a gun to school.”

For a few more minutes, they continue to drill me.

And I continue to say the following: “That is not my gun.”

Finally my mother comes in, her eyes red and swollen. Sad to say, I can’t tell if it’s from being upset or being hung over. She gives me a hug, then stares at the other adults in the room. “What is going on here?”

“Mrs. Buckley, we received three different reports this morning from students who said they saw your son bring in a gun and put it in his locker.”

“That’s a lie,” Mom says to Miss Harking.

“Have you ever seen this gun?” the cop asks.

“Of course not. Are you seriously saying Chris brought this in?”

“I didn’t,” I say.

“I know that. What proof do you have? Who said this?”

“We have three different sources—”

“Three? Where are they? Get them in here right now. I can tell you one thing. That gun doesn’t belong to my son.”

“There’s going to be an investigation so we can find out if it does.”

My mother curses in a way that both shocks me and makes me want to high-five her. She grabs me by the arm. “You’re not doing anything with my son. He’s not going anywhere with any of you.”

“Ms. Buckley, there are certain procedures we have to follow—” the cop begins.

I would bet big money my mother could take him. She’s not big, but she’s scrappy.

“Your son has had some run-ins with some of his classmates.”

Mom stares at me, then looks back at tie guy. “Run-ins? Like how? He’s a new kid who sticks out like a sore thumb. Or should I say he’s like the normal thumb on a sick hand. When do new students come in and make trouble?”

“It’s happened before,” the principal says.

“Well, it’s not happening here. I can guarantee you that that gun is not my son’s.”

“But we have to—”

“You listen to me,” my mother says, aiming her finger at the cop. “Chris’s grandfather was shot when I was eighteen years old and not even out of high school. Shot with a random gun in a random shooting. Chris didn’t tell you that, did he? He didn’t tell you that he’s vowed never to touch a gun, ever. Ever.”

“Please, Ms. Buckley.”

“No,” Mom says. She grabs me just like Tie Guy did earlier.

I want to cry out that I’m not some animal who needs to be pulled around on a leash.

“You do whatever you must, but Chris is coming with me. You have a problem with this, I’ll call my lawyer. You touch my son and I’ll sue every one of you, and you’ll end up on an NBC primetime special on the abuse of power in a hick town.”

My mother storms out, still holding onto my arm. I walk with her in silence, bewildered and stunned.

We get into the car and she turns to me, red faced and breathless. “You look at me right now and swear, Chris, you swear that—”

“Mom, stop.”

“Just tell me.”

“It wasn’t my gun. I swear.”

“Then whose was it?” She pulls the car into reverse and almost rams a car behind us as she veers out of the parking lot.

“I have no idea.”

But on second thought, I do have an idea.

It’s an ugly idea, with an ugly face attached to it.

“Are you in trouble?”

“No.”

“I mean with some other kids.”

“No. I’m fine. Just typical high school stuff. Bullies.”

“Why didn’t you tell me?”

“There’s nothing to tell.”

We drive for a few minutes, my mother seeming to realize finally that she’s not a superhero. I can see her deflating.

“Thanks,” I say.

She grabs my hand. “They’re not going to touch you. Nobody’s going to touch you.”

“Because of your lawyer?”

Mom looks at me and can’t help the smile forming on her lips. “Like that one?”

“Yeah. I had to keep from laughing.”

“I’d call him. If you were in trouble, I’d call him.”

“Really? And you think Dad would actually help me out?”

“He’d help out if I called him,” Mom says. “But he’s the absolute last resort. Besides, there’s nothing to call him about. That wasn’t your gun.”

“Yeah, but it was someone’s. And whoever put it in my locker did it to get me in trouble.”