Chapter twenty-five Waylaid in the Hallway
Chapter twenty-five
Waylaid in the Hallway
áINE
"Are you coming in with me?" Sadie asks.
Of course I'm going in with her. I want to make sure that those boys that attacked her are not at school today. If they haven't been expelled or at least suspended for their behavior, I'm taking Sadie back home with me.
School's ending late in June this year and there are only a few days left.
That's the way it goes in New York. When there are too many snow days taken off in the winter, classes go later in June to make up for them.
It won't be the end of the world if Sadie has to miss them though.
It will make me furious, and every member of the board will hear about it from me, but I'm not risking anything happening to her.
"Yes." I slide out right after Sadie.
Dagda steps into both of our paths. "Where are you going Aine?"
"Into the school," I state the obvious.
"The boss didn't give me instructions for that."
"Let’s get something straight, here." I jut my chin out and stare Dagda down. "Kieran may be your boss, but he's not mine. I do not have to get his permission to go anywhere, least of all my daughter’s school."
"I'll feel better if Mom walks me into the building." Sadie gives Dagda a look that only a heart of stone could dismiss.
Two weeks ago, my daughter would have been appalled if I wanted to walk her into the building. Now, Sadie must be practicing what she talked to her therapist about. Being willing to ask for help when she needs it. Help I'm determined to give her. I’m proud of her.
Dagda frowns, but nods. "I’ll come in with you."
"No," I say immediately. "You can't leave the car there in the drop off line. Other parents are getting frustrated as it is."
Which might be a bit of an understatement. Several parents in cars further back in the line are glaring. One woman yells angrily asking what the holdup is. Pretty soon, there will be honking and that would embarrass my preteen.
"They can wait," Dagda dismisses.
"No. They really can’t," I say firmly. "Watch us walk inside if you have to, but get back in the car while you do it and then get it out of the way, so the other parents can leave. I’ll text you when I’m done and I won’t come outside until you text me that you’re waiting for me. Okay?"
It's more of a compromise to my independence I would have considered making any time in the past five years, but if my daughter can adjust, I can too.
All of this security stuff is way more complicated than I thought it would be. And it feels like Kieran has really gone over the top with it. I understood having guards with us at Disneyland. Mostly. I mean, who even knew we were there?
But having a guard outside our door and driver take us wherever we need to go is going to take getting used to. And this? Is just plain silly. It's not as if there are any mobsters waiting in the halls for me and Sadie to show up. They wouldn't dare.
I don't know what happened at that meeting the night before we flew out to Anaheim, but I do know that Kieran had busted skin on his knuckles.
I'm working on the assumption he got his point across to the parents of the boys.
Just like he did with the parents of Neeve's classmates, only that time with less violence.
Dagda doesn't get back in the SUV, but he doesn't try to follow me and Sadie. I only hope he pulls out of the drop off line before a minor riot starts.
As soon as we're inside, I tell my daughter, "I want you to come with me to the office. If the boys are at school, then I'm taking you back home with me."
"Okay, mom. But Kieran told me that the boys wouldn't be here."
I wish he'd told me that. "Let's just make sure, okay?"
It's not that I don't trust Kieran's word, but this is my daughter and it's my job to protect her.
"Yeah. That's a good idea."
I don't know why my daughter wanted me to walk her inside if she was confident the boys wouldn't be here today.
Maybe like me, she's operating on the principle of trust but verify.
Maybe she's nervous about how the teachers and office staff will react to her.
Whatever her reason for wanting me with her, that's where I'll be.
Even if it means trailing her from class to class all day.
When I ask about the boys at the front desk, Alice, the school secretary, tries to give me the run around, citing privacy laws and school policies.
"Let me speak to Mr. Bentley. " There's steel in my voice the secretary would be a fool to ignore.
After a moment of indecision, she calls him and asks if he will see me and Sadie. I'm not in fact sure if I want my daughter to witness a conversation between me and her school principal. However, it's not Mr. Bentley who comes out of his office a moment later, it's Vice Principal JoAnn Young.
She smiles. "Good morning. It's good to have you back, Sadie. I hope your vacation was a pleasant one. I hear you went to Disneyland?"
"We did." Sadie grins with the resilience of youth. "It was fire."
"I'm glad to hear that," JoAnn says with apparent sincerity. "How can I help you, Mrs. Gallagher?"
"It's Mrs. Veseli now," I correct her. "I want to confirm that the boys who attacked my daughter are not coming to school, and nor will they be allowed on school premises for the remainder of the year."
"I told you––" Alice starts to say.
But JoAnn talks right over the school secretary without even a hint of apology. "They have been pulled from classes for the rest of this year, and it is highly unlikely they will be allowed to return next year."
Alice gives Joanne a reproachful look which the vice principal ignores.
"I'm glad to hear that."
"It is my understanding that all four boys have been sent to stay with relatives out of state," JoAnn adds, surprising me not only with the information but her candor.
All four have been sent out of state? A stone settles in my gut. That's not a euphemism for dead, is it? Even Mick Fitzgerald wouldn't kill a child. Would he? Kieran says not, but can I trust his assessment? If I can't, I made a terrible mistake when I said I do in California.
"Jasper went to live with Fitz's grandparents. I didn't know they were related," Sadie says in the silence I can't make myself break.
"He did?" I ask her.
Why does my daughter know this and I don't? Fitz must have told her. That doesn't make me feel any better about the fact that my new husband didn't show me the same courtesy.
"Yeah. Fitz is excited because that means his cousin Eoghan can come stay with them."
I'm not sure how that works, or why that works, but the fear curdling in my belly starts to disappear.
"I see," JoAnn says, looking almost as perplexed as I am.
"So, none of them are here?" Sadie asks. "Not Kenny Jr., PJ or Billy either?"
"Correct," the vice principal confirms.
Sadie's lets out a pent up breath. "Fitz said, but I..." She bites her lip. "I should have believed him and Kieran, but…" Her voice trails off again.
"You needed to be sure. So did I," I tell her with a smile. "I'm glad we both know now."
"Me too, mom. Almost as glad as I am you married Kieran," she says with a cheeky grin and a side eye for the school secretary and vice principal.
She wants them to know she has more backup than just me. Or is it she wants them to know I have backup now?
Either way, I'm happy to make it clear to the women. "Me too."
"Congratulations on your marriage, Mrs. Veseli," JoAnn says warmly.
"áine please. And thank you." I've never called the vice principal Mrs. Young because the first time I met her she told me to call her JoAnn and she's always called me by my first name too.
Is she calling me Mrs. Veseli now because of what happened with Sadie?
"My new dad is a really good guy," Sadie says with pride in her voice.
"His name is Kieran Veseli." Sadie definitely wants to get the word out that Kieran is part of our family now, and when neither Alice, nor JoAnn, react to his name, she adds, "He used to be Kieran Lleshi.
Him and mom both changed their name at the wedding. Isn't that lit?"
Does she think they should know who he is? Should they? He works for the Shaughnessys. He's not one of them, but he's some kind of management in the organization, or Ellie wouldn't work for him. I need to ask her what that means exactly.
"Am I to take it that Mr. Veseli is the man who insisted on giving some of Mr. Wrye's students and their parents a lesson in vocabulary last week?" JoAnn asks with a spark of amusement in her eyes.
"You heard about that?" I ask.
"Oh, we all heard about it. I have no doubt that after the upcoming emergency board meeting St. Patrick's Preparatory will be instituting a more aggressive antibullying campaign and training just like the elementary school."
She's probably right.
"He won't be the only one demanding change." He wasn't when it came to Neeve's school either.
But he was the one with the connections that made those demands a reality.
"No, he won't," JoAnn says with firm conviction.
So, she's not happy with the way bullying is handled here either.
JoAnn gives Sadie a worried look and I assure her quickly, "None of our children will be with us."
Sadie doesn't need to hear what will be said, nor will I allow her to be put on the spot, having to go back over what happened to her for the edification of an administration and school board that should never have allowed it to happen in the first place.
"Good." JoAnn glances toward the still closed door to Mark Bentley's office. "Adults failed in this situation and it is our job to make sure it never happens again."
The tension in Sadie's shoulders I didn't realize was there releases. I realize for the first time this morning how absolutely on edge my daughter has been. Mom guilt assails me because I didn't see it. She did such a good job hiding her stress, I was worried she was taking things too well.
She needs to know that it's not her job to pretend everything is okay when it's not.