Chapter 16
Where We Begin
The Greensville County High School sat a few blocks off the main road, brick and glass and concrete in that familiar, almost apologetic way—like it hadn’t been designed to draw attention to itself.
The bus turned in slowly, gravel crunching under the tires, and Colin felt the subtle shift that always came when they crossed into a new town. A different weight.
“Emporia,” Trent said, glancing out the window. “Feels… practical.”
Joshua smiled faintly. “That tracks.”
The parking lot was mostly empty—after-school quiet settling in. A few cars. A janitor’s truck. No crowd. No tension in the air. Just a place where kids went every day and tried to figure out who they were.
The bus rolled to a stop near the main entrance.
A man stood waiting on the sidewalk, shifting his weight from foot to foot.
African-American in his early fifties, salt-and-pepper hair, sleeves rolled up like he’d forgotten they were there.
He held a clipboard he didn’t seem to need and a travel mug gone cold.
When he spotted the bus, he straightened, squared his shoulders, then let them sag again.
“That’ll be Mark,” Joshua said.
“How do you know?” Trent asked.
“He looks like a man who volunteered for something and then realized halfway through that it was bigger than he expected.”
The door hissed open. Trent stepped down first, then turned to let Colin and Joshua move past him.
Mark Ellison stepped forward before anyone else could, then hesitated, as if suddenly unsure whether he was supposed to wait. He offered a hand to Joshua first—frm, earnest, just a little too quick.
“I’m Mark. Mark Ellison. History.” He glanced at the bus behind them, then back at Joshua. “I’m really glad you could come.”
“Josh. Joshua Campbell-Abrams,” Joshua replied. “Thanks for reaching out.”
Mark exhaled at that, a quiet release. “Yeah. Well. I wasn’t sure what else to do.”
Joshua tilted his head toward Colin. “My husband, Colin. Our driver is Trent Peterson.” He gestured toward David’s car, which was pulling into a nearby space. “And that would be UVA professors David Gardener-Reese and his husband, Nate.”
Inside, the school smelled faintly of floor cleaner and paper—familiar and oddly comforting. Lockers lined the hallways. They were dented and scuffed, bearing the quiet evidence of a hundred different lives passing through. Mark led them toward the classrooms near the back, his footsteps measured.
“I started the group because kids were already meeting,” he said as they walked. “Not officially. Just… hanging around after school. And that felt wrong. Like pretending it wasn’t happening would somehow make it safer. I just kind of jumped in.”
Joshua nodded. He didn’t interrupt.
“Last week we made it official. Weekly meetings. No pressure. Just space.” Mark huffed a soft laugh. “Which turns out to be the easy part.”
He stopped outside a classroom door and turned to Joshua, finally meeting his eyes fully.
“They talk. Sometimes a lot. Sometimes not at all. And I keep thinking—am I helping? Or am I just supervising the room while they do all the work themselves?” He shook his head.
“They’re asking questions now. Not academic ones.
The kind I don’t have answers for.” He gave Joshua a quick glance.
“I’m trying to understand. But I confess that I’m—I’m still a bit lost.”
Joshua considered him for a beat, then said gently, “Frankly, Mark, I think you’re doing something rare.
You’re a straight, middle-aged guy trying to understand a way of life that has been confusing the experts for eons.
” He patted Mark’s shoulder. “You don’t have to have answers. You’ve got heart.”
Mark let out a breath that sounded almost like a laugh. “That’s… reassuring. I stayed up half the night reading articles,” he admitted quietly. “Trying to make sure I didn’t say the wrong thing.”
Joshua’s voice softened. “You will say the wrong thing. We all do. The key is what you do next.” Joshua studied him for a moment, then reached into his satchel.
“I brought something,” he said.
He withdrew an Outreach Tour Playbook and held it out.
Mark glanced at it, uncertain. “What’s this?”
“It’s just what it says,” Joshua said. “A playbook. Conversation structures. Crisis protocols. How to navigate parent pushback. How to follow up when a kid says something that keeps you up at night.”
He extended it toward Mark.
“It’s not a script,” Joshua added gently. “It’s scaffolding. You’ll find that a lot of the pages are simply questions or suggestions you should fill in yourself, because Emporia will be unique and have its own needs.”
Mark didn’t take it immediately. His eyes flicked to the title again.
“This is for me?”
Joshua nodded. “Because you shouldn’t have to build this alone.”
Mark finally accepted the binder with both hands, as if it weighed more than paper, then flipped through the tabs slowly. “You built all this?”
“Took a while, but yeah.”
Mark let out a slow breath and closed the binder, pressing it briefly against his chest before lowering it again.
“OK,” he said. Not overwhelmed. Not panicked. Just steadier. “Thank you, Josh.”
Behind them, Colin watched the shift happen—the way Mark’s shoulders settled, the way his stance changed from bracing to anchored. Not rescue. Reinforcement.
Inside, the classroom was simple. Chairs pulled into a loose circle. A whiteboard with PRIDE GROUP—WEDNESDAYS written carefully in dry-erase marker. No slogans. No posters. Just a room.
“They’ll be here in a few minutes,” Mark said. “A handful today. It’s always a little different.”
“That’s okay,” Joshua said. “We’ll meet whoever walks through the door.”
Mark nodded, relief softening his posture. “That’s exactly what I was hoping you’d say.” He hugged the playbook and shot a quick glance at Joshua. “Wish I’d had this yesterday.”
“You’d have been up all night,” Joshua quipped, nudging his arm. “You’ll do fine.”
Mark set his travel mug on the desk and stared at the chairs he’d arranged into a circle, then nudged one with his foot and immediately nudged it back again.
Joshua watched him for a moment, then stepped in quietly.
“You don’t need perfect,” he said.
Mark let out a breath he hadn’t realized he was holding. “That obvious?”
Joshua smiled. “A little.”
Mark rubbed a hand over the back of his neck. “I keep thinking I should have… something. A plan. A topic. Rules written down.” He gestured helplessly at the whiteboard. “I don’t want them just sitting here staring at each other.”
Colin recognized the look on Mark’s face—he’d worn it himself–the one that came from wanting to do the right thing and being afraid you were already failing.
“They might,” Joshua said. “That’s not failure.”
Mark blinked. “It’s not?”
“No.” Joshua pulled a chair into the circle and sat. “Silence is still participation. Especially for kids who don’t get a lot of safe silence.”
Mark absorbed that, nodding slowly. “OK. So… how do I start? Or… maybe you should lead it today.”
Joshua didn’t answer right away. He thought for a beat, then said, “No. Today is about training the trainer. You lead the group. I watch and maybe suggest during breaks. My first suggestion”—he pointed to the thick Playbook binder— “and it’s in there too. Start the same way every time.”
Mark frowned. “You mean—”
“Consistency,” Joshua said. “You don’t need to know where the meeting is going. You just need to know how it begins and how it ends.”
He ticked it off on his fingers.
“Opening check-in. One question. Always the same. Something like ‘How’s everyone feeling today?’ One-word answers are fine. Passing is fine.”
“That’s it?” Mark asked.
“That’s enough,” Joshua said.
Mark’s shoulders lowered another notch.
“And if nobody talks?” he asked.
Joshua met his eyes. “Then you thank them for showing up, and you let the silence sit for a minute. You don’t rush it. You don’t fill it. If it stays quiet, you move on.”
Mark nodded. “I can do that.”
“You can,” Joshua said. “And then you offer one thing to do together. Not therapy. Not fixing. Just something that lets them put thoughts somewhere else.”
The door opened behind them, and Nate slipped in, arms full of notebooks. David walked behind him, carrying a large box.
“Thought I’d bring a few notebooks,” Nate said cheerfully. Then, seeing Mark’s face, softened. “For today. And for after.”
Mark looked at the notebooks like they might bite. “I don’t… teach writing.”
“You don’t have to,” Nate said. He set the stack on a desk and turned to Mark. “This isn’t about writing well. It’s about getting stuff out of your head and onto paper.”
He glanced at Joshua, then back to Mark.
“If they write one sentence, that counts. If they draw, that counts. If they sit and stare at the page, that counts too.” He gestured to the box in David’s arms. “Art supplies. I’ll leave some of them with you.
They can draw, cut messages or images out of magazines to paste into the notebooks…
anything that gets thought out of here”—Nate pointed to his head—“and into here.” He lifted one of the notebooks. This isn’t learning… its living.”
Mark let out a short, surprised laugh. “So, you’re saying I don’t have to grade it.”
“Please don’t,” Nate begged.
Trent appeared in the doorway, looked around, and nodded. Satisfied.
David took in the room with a practiced eye. “This works,” he said calmly. “Circle’s good. Door stays open. If anything comes up that crosses into safety or mandatory reporting, you say so clearly. That’s not a betrayal. That’s honesty.”
Trent pulled a chair into the circle and sat without ceremony. He didn’t say anything. He just settled, solid and present.
Footsteps echoed in the hallway. Voices. Laughter that sounded half-nervous.
Mark looked at Joshua. “I’m still not sure I’m doing this right.”
Joshua stood. “You’re doing the most important part,” he said. “You showed up. And you asked for help.”
“Are you sure you don’t want to run this thing?”