The Castaway Hotel - 4 - 20. Chapter 20 - Saving Shannon

Monday I started making my calls, seeing if the school would be amenable to having Pat return. I began by calling the high school principal first, but he was worried about the liability issues involved, so he referred me to the superintendent. The superintendent had similar concerns and said he would have to get the Board of Education’s approval before he could allow Pat to return his classes. He said he would put it on the agenda to be discussed at their next meeting, which would be held tomorrow night. He told me I probably should attend, to state my case and answer questions, so I told him I would be there.

That night I worked at the dining room table after dinner, trying to make a list of the possible objections the Board might have to Pat’s returning to school, and then I tried to have an answer for each objection or an alternative proposal that might be acceptable to both sides. After about three hours of playing the devil’s advocate and then switching hats to become Pat’s champion, I thought I had come up with every possible reason the Board might have to his resuming his role as an active student. Once those steps had been accomplished, I then addressed each issue and produced a defense worthy of Clarence Darrow. I felt I was as prepared as I could possibly be to face the Board and soothe their concerns.

Tuesday after the students had been dismissed from my school, my secretary told me I had a call from the high school principal. I figured he wanted to discuss tonight’s meeting, so I picked the call up as quickly as I could.

“Josh Currie here,” I announced, in my best professional voice.

“Josh, I know you probably still have things to do,” the principal stated, “but I really need you to come over here as soon as you can. I have some things we need to discuss and clear up.”

“Sure, no problem,” I agreed. “I’ll be over in a few minutes. Will that be okay?”

“Yes, Josh, and thanks. I’ll see you shortly,” he replied.

I put the material I was working on away, said good night to my secretary, paged my younger boys to meet me at the van and then drove to the high school. I told the boys they could play outside while I went directly to the principal’s office. As I entered the waiting area, I waded through a collection of male students seated there and let the secretary know I had arrived. She greeted me and escorted me immediately into the principal’s private office. That’s when I discovered the first of several surprises. All my high school boys were there, waiting for me too. The next surprise was their appearance. Their clothes were messed up, some of their garments were torn, their hair was disheveled and there was dried blood on some of their faces, arms and clothing.

“Josh, come on in,” the principal greeted me. “I’m sorry I had to call you over like this, but we’ve had a bit of a problem here and it seems to involve your sons.”

“Oh! How so?” I asked, as my mind ran rampant with reasons to explain what I saw before me.

“There was a fight in the parking lot after school and your boys were involved,” the principal stated, quite succinctly.

“I think I can have guessed that much, just from their appearance,” I replied somewhat sarcastically, while eyeing my sons. “What was it all about?”

“Although there are conflicting stories about how it started and exactly what happened,” the principal explained, “it appears your boys and another group had some sort of disagreement. A fight ensued and security and several teachers went out to break it up. Regardless of how it started or who the instigators were, all the participants will be suspended from school for one week. The suspensions will be acted upon at tonight’s Board meeting and, I would suspect, approved by them at that time.”

“I understand. I know the school’s policy on violence and fighting,” I assured him. “I will take my boys home to discuss this further and I will let you know if they will also face more punishment at home.”

“Thank you, Josh. I only hope the other boys’ parents will act as responsibly,” he confirmed.

I signaled the boys to head out to the Suburban, but the principal, a couple of security guards and I all kept a close eye on them as they passed by the other students still seated in the waiting area. Nothing happened, other than a few icy glares and some body posturing, and I eventually got them loaded up and ready to head home. The other boys began to ask questions about what was wrong and why the boys looked as they did, but I told them I didn’t want to hear anything until we got home and then we’d discuss it there. I followed the Suburban home, to make sure they knew I was right behind them and be certain they didn’t try to take a detour, so they could put this confrontation off until later. That didn’t happen, but even from a distance, I could tell their vehicle was as quiet as ours.

When we got home, we went inside and I asked the high school boys to meet me in the family room, before instructing the rest of my sons to allow us some privacy. I could literally feel the tension as I entered the family room and it was so quiet you could have heard a pin drop, even on the carpet. I looked at each of them, partly expecting someone to blurt out a defense or complain it wasn’t fair they were going to be punished twice, but no one challenged my authority. After a somewhat lengthy pause, I asked the boys who among them wanted to explain to me what had happened at school. After looking back and forth at each other, Danny took the floor.

“Dad, we were only trying to keep those other guys from beating up on this other kid,” he informed me. “We didn’t start the fight and we didn’t intend to fight, but we had to fight to defend ourselves and this other boy.”

“Okay, let’s back up here,” I told them, as this was exactly what I was expecting to hear. “Why don’t you start at the beginning and tell me exactly what happened.”

“There’s this guy at school, he just moved here this year,” Danny began. “He played soccer with us, so you might remember him. His name was Shannon.”

“The left halfback?” I asked, which caused the boys to all look at me oddly. I guess they were surprised I’d remember someone I hadn’t been introduced to formally.

“Yeah, that’s him,” Danny agreed. “Well, earlier today a rumor started going around the high school that he was gay. I guess somehow some guy from his old Boy Scout troop found out he was living here and told his new scoutmaster that Shannon liked boys. The rumor was that the Scouts were going to kick him out and it was the scoutmaster’s son who was the one that started telling everyone about him.” I nodded my understanding, but still didn’t see how this involved any of them, but I remained quiet and continued to listen to what Danny had to say.

“Well, after school we all headed out to the Suburban, as we always do, and we noticed something going on in the parking lot when we got there,” he continued. “There was a group of guys surrounding Shannon, pushing him around, calling him names and asking him things – like if he wanted to suck their dicks. We decided we should stop what they were doing to him, so we went over and told the other guys to knock it off. It was the big-mouthed scoutmaster’s son that kept things going.

“Next he started calling Brandon and me names, saying things like, ‘hey, a couple more fairies are here to protect their little fag friend.” Danny began to choke up and couldn’t continue, so Dustin picked up the story from there.

“That’s when Frankie stepped forward and got in that kid’s face,” Dustin explained. “He told the mouthy bastard that if he didn’t shut his face, grow up and go away, he’d make him eat his words. The kid laughed at Frankie and threw a punch at him, but Frankie blocked it and then decked the kid. You should have seen it. It was awesome!” Dustin beamed, indicating how proud he was of Frankie’s prowess at defending himself.

“Frankie buried his fist in that kid’s nose, I think he broke it, and the SOB went flying backwards and landed on his ass on the blacktop,” Dustin continued. “He was covered in blood at that point. That’s when his friends went after Frankie and the rest of us jumped in to protect him. So you see, they started it, one of them threw the first punch and then kept it going, and we were only trying to get them to leave Shannon alone. Those assholes deserved everything they got.” All of the boys were nodding their heads in agreement, confirming his story and affirming Dustin’s final claim.

I didn’t say anything for a few minutes after the boys had finished telling their story. I just sat there, absorbed what I had heard and thought about how I should approach this. When I finally knew what I was going to do next, I began to ask them questions. “So, what happened to Shannon? Did he get hurt?”

“I think he only got a few bruises and some small cuts,” Brandon responded, while looking at the others to see if they had more information than that, but no one did.

“Well, I don’t remember seeing him when I arrived,” I announced, so were did he disappear to?

“No, they split us all up, once they dragged us off to the principal’s office,” Kevin informed me. “They put US in his office, probably because he knew you’d get there first, but they put Shannon in the nurse’s office and you saw the other guys out by the secretary.”

“Yes, I did notice them,” I confirmed. “I just didn’t know how they fit into this situation.”

“Well, they deserved everything they got when the Currie boys kicked their asses,” Ricky announced, boastfully. “We didn’t start it, but we sure did finish it.” He faced was glowing when he concluded his proclamation.

“Yeah, Pop, you should have seen us,” Nick added. “We were really awesome. I thought some of those guys were going to cry, we roughed ‘em up so bad.”

“Yeah, I was really proud to be a Currie today,” Brent announced. “I bet those guys won’t be bad mouthing any gays again soon.” He started to laugh after making that comment.

“I wouldn’t be too sure of that,” I cautioned him. “This might just make them even more determined to hate gays even more, so much so that now they’ll want to find a way to get even for what you did to them. I’m sure they feel you embarrassed them in front of the whole school and will try to find a way to save face.”

“You really think so?” Cole asked. “Why would they think they could bully gays, when they got their butts kicked by a bunch of them? And if they start something else, we’ll just beat the crap out of them again. That’s no problem.” All the boys started to laugh, high five each other and carry on in other typically macho ways.

“Oh, they’ll play it down with anyone they talk to and make up stories or excuses for why thy got beat,” I countered. “They might claim they were outnumbered or it was the straight Currie boys who did the major damage, while protecting their gay brothers. That way they won’t have to admit they got beat by the very guys they detest.”

“But that’s not so,” Trey announced. “I was the only one who didn’t fight. The rest of them were really great. The gay and the bi boys did just as much damage as the others.”

“I don’t doubt that,” I responded, “but that’s probably not the story they’ll be spreading around town. I’m sure it will be quite different by the time you boys hear what’s being said.”

“Then we’ll just have to correct them,” Brandon announced, forcefully. “I want the school to know what really happened.”

“Well, let’s just wait until we see what happens at tonight’s meeting,” I suggested, “before we decide what we do or don’t want to do. I also want you boys to stay together as much as possible. These boys or their friends may try to single you out to get even.”

“We will, you can count on that,” Frankie answered, before asking a question. “Would it be all right if we went with you tonight to the meeting, in case there’s any questions about what really happened?

“It might be best if you didn’t,” I informed them. “Your presence at the meeting may just aggravate the situation. You are facing suspension and members of the community might think it’s not appropriate that you show up at the meeting where it’s discussed.”

“So, we can’t show up at our own trial?” Dustin asked, but not in a smart-ass way. He was really being sincere about it.

“Well, this isn’t exactly a trial,” I stated. “The board is most likely just going to give their stamp of approval to the high school principal’s request. It’s a formality to ensure school rules have not been bent, legal issues have been considered and appropriate actions are being taken.”

“Dad, I don’t mind getting suspended, but I think we were right in doing what we did,” Danny informed me. “Don’t you think the school board should know WHY we did what we did?”

“You do have a valid point there,” I agreed.

“Yeah,” Ricky added, “and I think those guys should get a worse punishment than we do, because of what they were doing. They were ganging up on just one boy. It won’t be fair if we all get suspended for the same amount of time and we were just defending Shannon and ourselves.”

“I agree, but remember what I’ve always told you,” I stated, and immediately noticed the wheels turning in their heads as they tried to figure out what I was referring to. However, I continued before I saw all the lights come on. “Rule number one is that life’s not fair.”

“But shouldn’t we try to make it fair if we can?” Dustin wanted to know. “I mean, just because it usually isn’t, doesn’t mean we shouldn’t try to make it fair, does it?”

“And don’t you think we should stand up for ourselves?” Frankie asked. “We’ll tell them we’ll accept the suspension for fighting, but they should know there are bigger problems than just the fight. Those guys were being prejudice and I know what I’m talking about, cuz I used to be the same way. Remember?” The other boys looked at Frankie after he said that, knowing it took some guts to admit it, even if it was just to them, so in one form or another they let him know he had more than made up for his past errors.

“Okay, you’ve convinced me,” I announced. “Those who want to go may, as long as you sit with me and don’t speak, unless you are asked a question directly or I give you permission to say something. I don’t want this to turn into another brawl.” They agreed to my stipulations and I was only mildly surprised when each of them let me know they wished to go with me.

“Okay, Dad,” Ricky continued, while bouncing uncomfortably in his seat, “what punishment are you going to give us? I can’t take the suspense any longer.”

“Yeah,” Kevin added, “we just need to know.”

“From what you boys told me, I think your actions were justified and you only did what you had to do,” I told them. “Therefore, you won’t be getting any additional punishment from me, other than having to work with Pat’s tutors and keep your studies up during your week’s suspension. I’ll call the tutors and let them know they will now have a few additional students for a few days.”

The cheers that first erupted when I announced I wouldn’t be punishing them for their actions soon turned into groans, after I announced they would be working with Pat’s tutors and not allowed to just goof off. I believe they actually might have thought for a minute or two that this would just be like an extra week’s vacation. Silly boys.

After the groaning subsided, I started dinner preparations, while they went to work on the homework they had brought home with them. I informed them I would take their assignments with me in the morning and drop them off for their teachers.

After dinner, I had the boys finish cleaning up and then get changed, since they were a bit of a sight after the fight. I wasn’t going to take the younger boys with us, so left Dion and Graham in charge of the others while we were gone, although I didn’t expect any problems on the home front.

Once the high school boys were ready, I led them out to the van, loaded them inside and drove down to the administration building, wondering what type of response we were going to get.