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“Yeah,” the boy said softly, pulling the ice pack from his eye. The man turned an angry glare on the other boy, and Addie saw Nick actually shrink away. The man didn’t say anything, which had Addie breathing a sigh of relief. The last thing she needed was an outraged parent taking matters into his own hands.
She walked to the door and stood waiting for a gap in the softly spoken conversation. “Mr. Skylar,” she finally said. “Won’t you come in?”
* * *
“I DON’T UNDERSTAND.” The tall, dark-haired man paced in front of Addie’s desk. “Ryan has never been a problem. He’s never gotten into trouble.”
Addie watched Marcus Skylar shove his fingers through his thick hair again.
“He’s never gotten into a fight.”
Addie made herself focus. “From what he’s told me, he has been through a lot.” Her heart still ached for the boy. “He’s had a lot to adjust to.”
“I guess.” Marcus suddenly sat on one of the chairs facing her. “It’s been one hell of a year,” he whispered. “I’m not making excuses.”
“I think we need to give Ryan a break.” She leaned forward, trying to look like she was in charge here. She knew what she was doing, but this man set her on edge and she didn’t know why. “Have you considered counseling?”
She expected him to get angry. Half-expected the man who was very near the edge himself to rise up and rail at her. Instead, he silently looked at her, then leaned forward, putting his elbows on his knees, and stared at the carpeting. “I have. And we did. For a bit.”
He wasn’t like anyone she’d ever met. Nothing like her brothers, who would have already blasted her about psychobabble and being able to take care of themselves. She waited while he sat there, staring, seeing something he wasn’t sharing with her.
“Mr. Skylar, our school has a no-tolerance policy. I have to give Ryan, both boys actually, a week’s detention for fighting.
Marcus sat silent for a long moment. When he finally looked up at her again, his gaze was clear. “I understand. He’ll be there.” He waited a moment before shooting to his feet. “Guess, I’ll...” His voice faded, and he turned toward the door. Now he looked more like she expected. “Sorry to have taken up so much of your time.”
Pausing in the doorway, he curled his fingers around the knob until his knuckles showed white against his tanned skin. “Have a good afternoon, Ms. Hawkins.” He pulled the door open and, through the opening, she saw Ryan look up at his dad. “Come on, Ry,” she heard him say. “Let’s get you home and cleaned up.”
She stared after him. He wasn’t angry. He wasn’t yelling at his son, like so many other fathers would be doing. He actually looked...she tried to find the right description...beaten?
What battle was he waging? Against his son? Against himself, and his own grief? He’d lost his wife the same time Ryan had lost his mother. “Mr. Skylar?” She hurried around the desk, stopping in the open doorway just as he turned to look at her.
“Yes?”
“Is...” What was she thinking? What was she even doing? “Is there anything I can do to help? You...or...” She looked at Ryan. “You, Ryan?”
“Thank you.” Marcus straightened his already impressive shoulders. “But we’ll be fine. Come on, Ryan.”
With his hand on Ryan’s shoulder, he headed out the door, and she heard their footsteps echo down the empty hall. It was a lonely, nearly painful sound. She’d have to keep an eye on them. On Ryan, she reminded herself. She was a principal. The father was not her concern, unless his actions affected the boy.
Then all bets were off.
* * *
MARCUS DIDN’T LET go of Ryan’s shoulder until they reached the car. The boy was silent as he threw his backpack in the rear and slammed his backside into the passenger seat. He pouted, crossing his thin arms over his equally thin chest. Only once he was settled behind the wheel did Marcus speak.
“You want to explain what happened?”
He didn’t yell at Ryan, though he wanted to. His own father would have already blistered his ears with accusations and curses, but Marcus knew how it felt to be the boy who’d made a mistake he couldn’t take back.
“No.”
“Well, here’s the deal.” Marcus started the car and steered out of the parking lot. “You can either tell me what happened, and I’ll figure out what your punishment will be from that. Or you can remain silent, and I’ll go with what the principal and the other boy say.”
“That’s not fair.”
“Fair?” Marcus clenched his jaw. He would not lose his patience. “That’s not the issue, son. The issue is whether you’re going to be the one in control, or if you’re going to let someone else have that honor.”
The silence in the car was thick with the hot afternoon air and a teenage boy’s simmering anger. “I didn’t start it,” he finally said, quietly staring out the side window.
“I didn’t think you did. Tell me what happened.” He tried to use the voice that had worked so well for Carolyn in coaxing their son into opening up. Times like this he really missed her. Missed the mother she’d become the day they’d adopted Ryan.
“We were having a discussion in lit class.” Silence grew.
Lit class? What book was he reading in that class? Marcus shook his head. It didn’t matter. Ryan did.
“Nick said—” Ryan’s voice cracked. “Nick said my real mom didn’t like me and that’s why she gave me away.” His broken voice faded to a whisper before he finished.
CHAPTER THREE (#u8b75dc5e-5d60-5802-9914-eee9436e0f88)
WHEN MARCUS HAD been Ryan’s age, his father had come home on one of his infrequent leaves from who knew where. James Skylar had offered to help a buddy fix his deck and had subsequently volunteered Marcus to join them. Somewhere in the process, something went wrong. Marcus couldn’t remember much since he’d gotten a concussion from a wooden beam that fell on his head.
He felt like that now, sitting next to Ryan at the stoplight.
“Care—” He cleared his throat. “Care to explain?” They’d never hidden Ryan’s adoption, but they’d gotten him when he was three days old. It had been a closed adoption. His birth mother had wanted it that way, and they’d respected her wishes. The reality of the situation seldom crossed his mind anymore. Apparently, it did Ryan’s.
With Carolyn’s death, he probably should have expected this. But he hadn’t even thought about it.
“We’re reading some short stories for lit class,” Ryan said, breaking into Marcus’s thoughts. “Mr. Hudson has us discuss them. One is about a bunch of kids in an orphanage.” Ryan shrugged and turned his gaze from the passenger window to stare out the windshield. “Nick made a crack about kids whose birth parents gave them away—said their mom and dad didn’t like them.”
Marcus took a deep breath. “You know that’s ridiculous, right? We’ve talked about this before, remember?”
“I remember. I know it’s not true. It’s just—” Ryan went silent for a couple of blocks, and Marcus didn’t push him. “It’s just that...” He shifted in his seat. “I wasn’t mad for me so much...”
Ryan turned to look at Marcus. They pulled into the drive, and Marcus killed the engine.
“I was mad for...for my birth mother,” Ryan said. “He had no right. He doesn’t know why she gave me up.” His indignation came across loud and clear.
Marcus took another deep breath before saying anything. “I’m proud of you for wanting to stick up for her, for caring, but it’s not something to fight about.”
“I know.” Ryan reached for the door handle and pushed it open. “But what he said was so wrong.” He slammed the door closed with a bit too much force.
Marcus followed him, grabbing his own backpack from the rear. He watched Ryan walk inside. His son was growing up so fast, and their conversation brought back memories of when they’d first brought Ryan home. Good memories.
Had that really been thirteen years ago?
Inside the kitchen, both backpacks hit the kitchen table with a loud thud, and Marcus watched Ryan head to the fridge. It was a routine Carolyn never would have allowed, but one they’d fallen into since moving here.
Carolyn. He thought of his wife, and, while his heart still hitched at her loss, it wasn’t nearly as bad as it used to be. He thought about his conversation with Principal Hawkins—
—who wasn’t anything like he’d expected from a school principal. She was young and pretty—the first woman to pique his interest in a long time. And while she hadn’t smiled much during their meeting, he got the impression she normally did.
He’d told her that they’d gone to counseling, and they had. Not just after Carolyn’s death, but for months before. Hospice had been a godsend as he’d tried to deal with her impending death, as well as Ryan and his reactions.
“Can I have the rest of the lasagna?” Ryan’s muffled voice came from inside the fridge.
“For dinner?”
“No, now. For a snack.” He turned around, the take-out container in his hands, his expression hopeful.
“Uh, no. I’ll make dinner in a bit.” Another skill he’d picked up after losing Carolyn.
“I’ve got an idea.”
Marcus nearly groaned. Those words always meant that Ryan was up to something. He smiled. How had he managed to raise a son who was a con artist at heart? Marcus leaned back against the edge of the counter and crossed his arms over his chest, waiting. “What?”
“I can eat the lasagna now and get started right away on my homework.”
“And?”
“And I’ll be done in time to play in a Castle Battle tournament tonight at seven.”
“Ryan, it’s a school night.” Video games were normally off-limits except on the weekends.
“It’s the tournament of the year. Come on, Dad. I’m really good at it. I could win.”
Marcus looked at his son. The bruise around his eye was going to be dark by morning. “Put ice on that eye tonight.” Principal Hawkins’s words came to him. Did Ryan deserve a break in this? As it was, he’d be spending the next week in detention after school. Was that punishment enough? It wasn’t as if Ryan regularly got into trouble.
Ryan’s earlier explanation almost made Marcus proud of his son. Proud of his convictions, anyway.
But Marcus also knew Ryan. He’d learned over the past few months how to deal with Ryan’s “ideas.” He could “outdeal” him, or accept the proposition. Carolyn had been so much better at this than he was.
He didn’t have the energy for dealing tonight. “I want you off the computer by ten. Lights out by eleven.”
Ryan did a fist pump and shoved the plastic container into the microwave.
“But—” Marcus knew better than to let Ryan think he was totally off the hook.
Ryan slowly pivoted on his heel. “But what?”
“Tonight you get the tournament. Tomorrow we’ll discuss your punishment.”
The boy’s smile melted. “I’m sorry you got called, Dad.”
“But you’re not sorry for the fight?”
Ryan had to think a minute. “Not really.” The microwave’s timer sounded, and Ryan grabbed the hot dish. “Gotta go. Got homework to do.”
“We will discuss this,” Marcus yelled over the sound of Ryan’s footsteps on the stairs.
“Sure, Dad,” Ryan yelled back, his footsteps crossing the ceiling overhead.
Marcus sighed. To be young and so resilient. “Sorry, Carolyn,” he whispered, “I’m trying.” But the life she’d tried to help him build, the one with the family that came home and had dinner together every night, just wasn’t meant to be.
Marcus glanced at the kitchen table. It was covered with his backpack, books and laptop. They wouldn’t be eating there anytime soon.
Besides, it wasn’t as if he had a lot of extra time. Today was the deadline for the midterm essays. It could be an awfully long night.
* * *
EVERYONE ON THE teaching staff took a turn monitoring detention. While it wasn’t the norm for Addie to take a rotation, she was happy to step in since Lindy was out of the rotation right now. It was swim season, and between coaches and club sponsors, options were few.
Today there were four kids seated in the desks where, normally, Mr. Hudson taught English lit. Addie knew all four of them. She’d been the one to assign them detention.
Ryan was already seated in the back, his work out in front of him. Two other boys were here for fighting as well, and a girl, Melissa Hopper, had cut history class one time too many. Nick was nowhere to be found. Why wasn’t she surprised?
“Afternoon, everyone.” Addie put her own stack of work on the teacher’s desk. The irony that she was in detention, something she’d never gotten in school the first time around, wasn’t lost on her.
There were a few mumbled responses. The door slammed open then, and Nick came stomping in. He slumped into the first seat he came to, dropped his backpack and propped his feet on the chair in front of him.
“Good of you to join us, Mr. Holden.” She stood and walked over to him. “You can work on your homework for the next hour.”
“I don’t got none.”
“You do know I can call your teachers and check, right?” She really tried to give him the benefit of the doubt.
“They already went home.” Defiance came across loud and clear.
She debated arguing with him. Part of her was tempted to let him sit there and be bored for the next hour. It would serve him right. She owed it to her staff to encourage him to get his work done.
“You ain’t my mother, you know.”
Thank God. “No, I’m not. I’m your principal. Almost the same thing.” As a teacher, she’d often spent more time with some of the kids than their parents did.
He glared at her and, with a heavy sigh, reached for the backpack. The rasp of the bag’s zipper was loud in the quiet room.
“Thank you,” she said and returned to the desk. The other kids were watching, a fact she didn’t acknowledge. Ryan’s eyes were wide, though, when Nick pulled out his phone. “You know the rules, Nick. No phones. Put it away. Now, or it’s mine.”
“But I don’t have anything else to do.”
“Sorry, that’s the way it is. Kindly, put it away.”
Ryan watched closely as Nick sullenly shoved the phone into a side pocket. She could see Ryan wanted to get up and help her out. Thankfully, he didn’t. That protective streak. She wondered if he’d gotten that from his father.
Marcus Skylar’s face came to mind, and she found herself curious about him.
He’d done a good job with Ryan. The boy was a good kid. She’d done some investigating after they’d left her office. Paul Hudson had been more than happy to fill her in on what he knew. He’d defended Ryan, but didn’t know the complete details. She’d get them, she knew. She just had to find the right person to tell her. If it wasn’t for the school’s no-tolerance policy on fighting, she wasn’t sure Ryan would be here right now.
The hour dragged by. Even Ryan ran out of work to do and started fidgeting in his seat before it was time to leave.
