CHAPTER SIXTEEN #2
“So, I said that the only reason he can get away with anything at the school is because his grandpa is the principal. That he’s a bully, his grandpa is a bully, and his whole family is made up of bullies.” Tears welled up in her irritated eyes. “He’s just so awful. I know what I did was wrong—”
“Like fuck it was,” Raina said. “You did nothing wrong. You called a spade a spade. About damn time.”
I nodded and cupped Sam’s face too. “What did Principal Pickford say to you guys?”
“He called us a family of unruly heathens. That the reason we all behave this way is because we don’t have fathers.
That our mothers should be doing a better job to teach us discipline and that if he ever hears any of us say a mean thing about his family again, we’ll be expelled.
” Laurel exhaled deeply through her nose. “He can’t actually do that, can he?”
“Not without a fight,” Gabrielle said, her voice taking on a deep, angry growl.
“Did you guys rinse out your eyes?” Naomi asked.
The girls nodded.
“But my hair is full of sand too,” Sam added. “Can I go shower?”
Her cousins both said, “Me too.”
“Of course,” we all said. “Go wash away the day.”
“What are you going to do?” Austin asked, already on his second cookie. Then he bobbed his brows. “Raise a little hell?”
Naomi reached for another cookie too. “If it wasn’t the truth, I’d tell you to watch your language.”
“Naomi, you get to calling other like-minded parents. Hit that phone tree like it’s the best bottle of merlot you’ve ever tasted.
Not a drop left behind,” Gabrielle said, going into boss-lady mode.
“Raina, you rally the McEvoys, since we know they feel the same way about Pickford as the rest of us. They’ve had issues with him too, and we can use their strength and pull. ”
Raina nodded. “On it.”
Then Gabrielle met my gaze. “You and I are going to go have a little chat with the Pickford-Whalley family and make sure they know they’ve messed with the wrong people.”
Normally, I avoided confrontation like it was the Bible.
I’d had enough of both to last me a lifetime.
But when it came to my kid—to my family—I’d pull up my boring, beige, big-girl panties and do what had to be done.
And with Gabrielle there with her fighting spirit and gift for rhetoric, I knew I could basically just stand back and let her tear a strip off them one side and down the other.
A little prickle of giddiness trilled through me at the thought of getting to witness her in full fighter-mode.
It rarely came out of her anymore. And certainly not since she started dating Maverick.
He’d tamed and subdued her to an almost unrecognizable level.
It was good to know the “bitch” was still in there though, when we needed her.
She pointed toward the front door. “To the bus!”
I glanced at Raina. “Please let this be a normal field trip.”
Raina snickered. “With the Gabs? No way.”
We pulled into Pickford’s driveway at the same time a familiar, handsome figure carrying two big buckets of potted yellow and pink tulips emerged from the woods.
“Do you think he subconsciously knew you were coming at the same time?” Gabrielle asked.
Heat filled my belly. “Shut up.”
She chuckled and parked her SUV. “He really is a very nice-looking man. A silver fox.” She glanced at me. “Do you know how old he is?”
“Forty-eight. At least that’s what his online bio said. And he’s got a son in his twenties.”
She made a noise in her throat. “Oh god, he’s old enough to be Maverick’s dad.”
That made me chuckle.
“Age is just a number. Age is just a number,” she repeated, before climbing out from behind the steering wheel. “Mr. Barone, what brings you here?”
Tom’s eyes were on me, curiosity and excitement burning hotter than the sun. But because he was polite, he transferred his attention to Gabrielle. “My donkey ate Signora Pickford’s tulips yesterday. I am here to replace them.”
“I see you made sure to get the yellow and pink ones,” I said, which earned me a lip twitch of a smile from Tom.
“Si. No garish or whorish red and purple.”
“I believe purple is for harlots,” I corrected.
Gabrielle’s head swiveled back and forth between us. “What the hell?”
“Why are you here, may I ask this question?” Tom said, stepping past us to place the tulips on the small mosaic table near the front door.
“Clyde kicked sand in the girls’ eyes today on the playground,” I said. “Then Pickford took just our kids into a separate room and threatened them.”
His jaw dropped. “May I stay?”
Gabrielle’s head reared back a little. “Uh, sure.”
He nodded and came to stand beside me. “I am sorry Sam and her cousins were treated this way. It is not okay.”
“Thank you,” I whispered as Gabrielle went to the front door and hammered her fist against the wood loud enough to wake the dead.
The commotion on the other side of the door, along with the three vehicles parked in the driveway told us the house wasn’t empty. The question was, would they open the door when they saw through the peephole who was on the other side?
“I want to open it,” came the demanding, grating voice of a child. Well, “child” was a generous term. A “demon in a child-like form” was more accurate.
“I want to open it!” Clyde screamed.
The door swung open to reveal Clyde and Principal Pickford standing there. Otto looked properly surprised, and Clyde looked immediately bored.
“Who are you?” Clyde demanded. His gaze landed on Tom. “You’re the donkey man. Is your donkey back?” He poked his head out a little to swivel it around and check to see if Pinata was back wreaking more havoc.
“No, he is home,” Tom said calmly.
Clyde rolled his eyes. “Boring.” Then he turned around and ran down the hall, screaming like a firetruck at the top of his lungs. I resisted the urge to plug my ears.
Otto was a tall man with a big gut, and the fact that he was a step up into his home gave him even more of a height advantage on us, but Gabrielle didn’t seem to care. She stepped forward and looked him square in the eye. “Did you threaten our children today, Otto?”
“It’s Principal Pickford.”
“Answer the question, Principal Pickford. Did you threaten to expel our children today?”
“I warned them that if their behavior continued, there would be consequences.”
“What ‘behavior’?” Gabrielle asked.
“Their lies. Their bullying.”
“And what ‘lies’ and ‘bullying’ are you speaking of? Examples, please.” She crossed her arms over her chest.
“They said Clyde kicked sand in their eyes, which is just not true.”
“And that is grounds for expulsion?”
“Then your daughter,” he directed this next bit at me, “the disruptor, the problem child, she called Clyde and my entire family bullies. That’s bullying.
Those are lies. And they will not be tolerated at my school.
All of your children are just …” He shook his head.
“This is what happens when kids are raised by single mothers. When they don’t have a father figure around to set some boundaries, some rules, and lay down the law. ”
Gabrielle smirked. “Right.”
“And ever since your cousin and that McEvoy brother took up together, it’s only gotten worse. Both of your families are full of troublemakers. Disruptors.”
My cousin crossed her arms over her chest and lifted a brow.
“So, let me just get some facts first, Principal Pickford. Your grandson, Clyde, kicked sand in the eyes of several members of my family. Then, you proceeded to isolate these children in a room separate from their teachers, and did not feel the urgency or responsibility to call us—their parents—then proceeded to threaten them, berate them, and insult them? Is that correct?”
“Clyde didn’t kick sand in their eyes. He is a good boy. It’s your children who are the problems,” Pickford said, his nostrils flaring.
Gabrielle was so calm, so collected, as she nodded her head slowly. Inside, I was a volcano ready to erupt, and I think Tom knew that because a second later, I found his fingers laced through mine as he gave my hand a gentle squeeze. I squeezed it back, but didn’t let go.
“Okay. Let’s just say, for hypothetical sake, that our children are lying. Why would they make this up though? Why would they say Clyde kicked sand in their eyes?”
“Because they are troublemakers. Disruptors. To get Clyde in trouble.”
“But he’s your grandson. So it’s virtually impossible for him to get in trouble.
This is something they’ve already witnessed through his countless other indiscretions toward them.
Their words, their pleas for help go unanswered.
So why would they make it up? Why bring attention to themselves like that if it wasn’t true? ”
Color filled Otto’s already red, patchy cheeks, which just matched the redness of the burst capillaries on his nose. “I don’t know. I don’t know what goes through the heads of children.”
“But you should have some idea. Given that you are an administrator. You are a principal.”
“I don’t know what goes through the heads of your children. The fatherless heathens.”
“Probably that they want to be safe and heard when they’re in a learning environment. They want to get along with their classmates, and have those classmates learn acceptable and unacceptable behavior from an unbiased administrator.”
Otto sputtered and shook his head; the man was getting more ruffled by the second. “Clyde is a good boy.”
“Is he though?” Gabrielle asked. “Or are you trying to convince yourself that because any other narrative paints your daughter out to be a bad parent, which then reflects poorly on you?”
Understanding—and rage—dawned in Otto’s eyes. “How dare you!”
“I do dare. I believe in pointing out injustices when I see them. I believe in exposing biases when they affect people in a negative way—and particularly, when I care about those people. Or when those people are minors who have no voice.”