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  Chris is too smart for us to get him to “disclose,” and his mother is too scared. I suspect the father is the creator of the nightmare in the first place, although I’ve never met him. That only leaves the baby girl, who is not going to be saying anything any time soon.

  There has to be another way in.

  “Hi! Sorry I’m late! I’m Bobby’s mom. I had a bit of a morning before I got here, but I’m here now, so let’s get down to it!” A woman about ten years older than I am interrupts my thought when she sits down across from me, plunking a large cardboard box on her lap. Strange noises are emanating from it—scratching and a kind of gurgly squeaking sound. She opens up the top flaps and looks inside.

  “Oh, it’s okay, sweetie. We won’t be long. I just have to talk to Bobby’s teacher and we’ll be on our way. Do you want to see him?” She looks up at me. I’m still wondering who Bobby is.

  “Who?”

  “This is Alvin. Like the chipmunk? Only he’s not a chipmunk, are you, sweetums?” She reaches into the box and pulls out a raccoon. It’s not a very big raccoon, but it’s a live raccoon and not a very happy one. Sweetums has a large, red, oozing, festering wound on the top of its head. I press back against my chair.

  “Oh, don’t you worry. He won’t bite you.” She makes kissy noises in the general direction of the ooze. I try not to gag.

  “I’ll take your word on that. So, we’re here to talk about Cory,” I say, trying a gentle emphasis on his name. I am assuming Bobby is either Cory’s brother or another wounded wild animal of some kind. Either way I’m here to talk about Cory.

  “Cory? Oh right, of course. Cory.” She shakes her head, which makes the raccoon stir restlessly on her lap. I’m pretty sure there are laws against having wild animals in the school, especially the kind that ooze and live in a cardboard box instead of a cage.

  “Yes, Cory. I know the reports aren’t very helpful in telling you how he’s really doing. I am hoping to change that for the second term.”

  She looks at me blankly. “Reports? I don’t remember seeing any reports.”

  “Well, that’s fine. They don’t really say much anyway. Cory is showing some small improvements in his behavior. He is still very wound up much of the time, and it is relatively easy for any of the other boys to set him off, so we’re working on trying to get him to slow down and think a bit before striking out.”

  “He does love to fight, doesn’t he? His father was like that. Always using his fists. I do tell Cory not to be so rough, but he doesn’t really listen, does he, sweetie?” I’m pretty sure it’s the raccoon she’s calling sweetie, not me.

  “There are days that we get the feeling he hasn’t had his meds at home, but he never seems sure when we ask him. Do you know anything about this?” On the days when we think he might be med-free, he’s like the Tasmanian devil from the old Bugs Bunny cartoons.

  “Oh, no. I’m not always there when he’s getting ready for school. That damn cab comes so early, and I work late most nights. So he’s pretty much getting it together on his own.”

  That explains the lack of meds and lack of lunch and the dirty clothes—the overall uncared-for vibe we get from him most days.

  “Well, perhaps we can figure something out. Could you speak with his doctor about the meds issue? Perhaps there’s a way that all of his daytime doses could happen here?”

  “Oh, sure. I can just send the bottle in.”

  “Actually, I would need very clear directions, in writing, from your doctor if we’re changing anything.”

  “Oh, well, I’ll try then. Could take a while though. I’m pretty busy with work and this little guy. I found him in our backyard, all beat up. Poor little thing. I’m good with animals, you know. Bobby is too. He just loves them. Maybe you should get him an animal to look after here.”

  I glance toward the back of the room where Fred is making all kinds of noise on his little metal wheel. If I ever meet this mysterious Bobby, I’ll be sure to introduce them.

  “Well, thanks for coming in. We’ll just keep working away here, and hopefully, I’ll have a better reporting system for you by the end of term.” She gives me an empty smile that matches my empty words. She gives Alvin one last snuggle and puts him back into his box, and they head off into the sunset together.

  I wonder where Cory is today and whether he’s had anything to eat yet.

  I’d bet money that the raccoon had a hearty breakfast.

  Chapter 19

  In the wind

  “Leave me alone!”

  Donny is screaming. He’s having a bad couple of days, compliments of the fact that he no longer lives in the same foster home. He apparently “lost it” a few days ago, verbally attacking his foster mom and then going on a rampage, a small tornado of pain ripping through the house, leaving considerable property damage in his wake. He was removed from the home in the middle of the night and plopped into another one before he even realized what he had done.

  I do understand why his foster mother felt she couldn’t cope with him. I admire the fact that she took him on in the first place. I don’t know if I could do it. Take in a child who is so filled with anger and pain that it might spill over onto my family. Or worse, take in a child that I might fall in love with, only to have him returned home or sent away somewhere else. I can’t imagine it. I can’t even walk into an animal shelter without wanting to take them all home forever.

  But at the same time, the system seems so cruel once a child ends up trapped in it. The inalienable right of childhood should be the understanding that home is home and that the people there love you unconditionally—that no matter how big the temper tantrum, you’ll still be loved. Most of us couldn’t stretch our imaginations far enough to understand what it would feel like to so suddenly and irrevocably lose your home. And in many cases, to believe that it’s your own fault that you had to move on.

  I know how hard Donny can be to deal with in the six hours we have him here in school, and I can only imagine how much more difficult, and dangerous, his behaviors could be in a home setting for the other eighteen hours of every single day. I know it’s an almost impossible situation for everyone involved.

  But he’s still just a child.

  They’re all just children.

  Children who are very close to attacking each other right at this moment in time.

  “Donny. I need you to calm down. Tell me what’s wrong.” My voice is just loud enough to penetrate, and he looks over at me.

  “Mike won’t fucking shut up. He keeps telling me that I’m going to jail because no one wants me in their house and that my mother isn’t ever taking me back, which is a big stupid lie!”

  “Mike. I want you to leave Donny alone.”

  “Did you hear me say anything to him?” Mike’s voice is its usual quiet monotone. Actually it’s very quiet. Sean looks over at me as he slowly moves to our side of the room. We both know that the quieter Mike gets, the more likely it is that he’s about to explode. It doesn’t happen often, but when it does…

  “No, I didn’t hear you say anything. But I don’t think Donny would make that up.” I’m really wading into it here. Either of them is fully capable of lying just to have an excuse for what we not-so-affectionately call a “blow.” Sometimes they’re so desperate to get rid of all the poison inside them that they’ll create elaborate fabrications so they have an excuse to explode. My eyes stray to the volcano that still fills our back wall.

  “But you do think I would make shit up. You always take his side. It’s like he’s your little baby or something. Your favorite.” He adds sarcasm to the last word, drawing it out in a soft but deadly voice.

  “I don’t have favorites. I’m a teacher. I treat you all equally.” I honestly think Donny is the one telling the truth here, but I’m not positive. It doesn’t matter, though—I shouldn’t be
engaging in this argument. I’m doing exactly the wrong thing. Something about this kid always puts me on the defensive, and I forget what little I know about dealing with confrontation.

  “Bull…shit.” And before I even register what he’s doing, he’s on his feet and his desk is flying across the room. It smashes into Donny’s desk, sending him backwards.

  “Fuck you!” Donny screams and launches himself at Mike. Sean steps between them, but it’s too late. Mike has snaked around him and intercepted Donny’s attack, and within seconds the two are on the floor, doing their best to murder each other. Before Sean can separate them, Cory comes out of nowhere and joins the attack. It’s impossible to tell what side he’s on. Mostly he seems to be somewhere in the middle.

  “Cory! Leave it alone!” I have to join in the melee and try to pull at least one writhing body from the mess. I finally took that crisis intervention course two weekends ago, but it doesn’t make me feel any better about this. I am afraid I’ll hurt them or get hurt myself. I’m afraid they’ll know I’m afraid, and that will make things worse. I’m afraid…of everything in this moment.

  I manage to pull Cory off of Mike. He starts kicking out at me instead, and I struggle to remember how to get behind him so I don’t get bruised. I have to get him into a safe hold so I can slow him down. It’s so much easier to do this with a compliant adult in a training session. I wish I were working at the psych hospital where they have two fully trained people in every room so that teachers can just teach most of the time.

  “Cory. You have to stop. This isn’t your fight.” He’s not listening. Cory thinks every fight is his fight. He doesn’t seem to differentiate at all between things that are happening to him and things that have nothing to do with him. He’s always in the middle of everything, a lost soul trying to find somewhere to be, even if it’s someone else’s fistfight.

  “He’s beating on Donny. He’s an asshole.” He’s writhing and trying to head-butt me. I’m dodging his head like an aging prizefighter who’s lost his game.

  “Sean will handle it. See? He’s got Mike away from him now.” Cory slows down to look. It’s true. Sean has managed to extricate Mike and is holding him tightly. Mike is revving up to full foaming mode, and Sean is trying to move him as quickly as possible out of the room and down to time out, where he can attempt to de-escalate Mike before anyone is hurt.

  I need to get to the intercom to let the office know we’re having problems, but I can’t let go of Cory, and I can’t take my eyes off of Donny, who is curled up on the floor crying. I feel like doing the same.

  “Okay, okay. I’m done. Let me go!” Cory has stopped moving.

  “I need to know that you are not going to go after Sean and Mike. That it is really done.”

  “Yes! It’s really done!”

  “Your voice isn’t telling me that. I need to hear that you’re calm.”

  “Okay. I’m okay.” I hold on for another few seconds. It’s almost impossible to know when it’s safe to let go. It’s almost impossible to know when it’s safe to hold on.

  I finally let go, and he sits down at his desk. He doesn’t even look at Donny.

  I close my eyes for a second to regroup and then look around the room. Donny is still curled up on the floor. Cory is talking to Kevin, who seems oblivious to the whole incident. And Chris…is not here!

  “Where is Chris?” I don’t know who I’m asking.

  “Left,” growls Kevin.

  “Left? When did he leave? Where did he go?” My voice is loud and panicky.

  Kevin just looks at me. Too many questions.

  I can’t leave the room to look for him. Sean is down the hall with Mike. I have no choice but to call the office.

  “Can you let Mrs. Callahan or Ms. Keller know that I need some assistance down here. Immediately please.”

  “Will do.”

  “Like, right now kind of immediately.”

  “Got it. I’ll get her down there now.”

  It only takes Callahan ten minutes to make the thirty-second walk from her office to my room.

  “Chris is gone. I’m afraid he’s left the building.” I don’t even give her time to ask.

  “It’s a little precipitous to assume that,” she says. “We haven’t even looked for him in the building.”

  “Chris is a runner. He always leaves the building.”

  “Where is Sean? Can’t he go look?”

  “He’s down in time out with Mike. I don’t even know what’s happening there, and I should be checking. But I can’t be everywhere. I need someone to find Chris. He’s gone!”

  She’s not getting it. Chris is gone. He’s a champion runner, and he could be anywhere by now. I don’t even know how long he’s been out of my room.

  “I’ll have Mr. Zeeman and Ms. Keller do a search of the school and the grounds, as well as the nearest backyards to the schoolyard. I imagine he’s just hiding somewhere. Maybe he’s back up in that tree.”

  And she leaves. Just like that. And I’m trapped here. I can’t do anything. The other boys are staring at me, and I realize that I’m making my panic too obvious. I need to get myself under control so they don’t lose theirs.

  “Okay, guys. Let’s get some math done.” I smile brightly, as if math is the most interesting thing in the world. I take a few minutes to get them started on some hands-on math activities. Then I buzz the intercom again.

  “Could you please ask Ms. Jackson if she could free herself up to come down here? I need to assist Sean for a moment.”

  I can’t just sit here pretending to teach math. I have to find Chris.

  My superhero arrives within a few minutes. I explain as much as I can of the situation and run down the hall to the time-out room. I peek in the window. Sean is sitting with Mike who seems to have calmed down. He still looks angry, but at least there’s no blood or foam in evidence. Sean feels me looking and glances up. He gives me a thumbs-up, and I gesture for him to come over to the door.

  “Chris has rabbited. Callahan thinks he’s in the school, but I don’t. She sent Zeeman and Keller to look, but I’m going to check the grounds quickly and the nearest backyards myself. I have a bad feeling that he’s just gone.”

  I run outside, doing my best track time around the school, calling his name. I run over to the row of houses and scan the treetops. Nothing. I run back into Callahan’s office.

  “He’s gone!” I puff the words in her face. “You need to call the police.”

  “We haven’t finished a complete building search. We need to do that first. Just calm down and go back to your class.”

  “You aren’t understanding this. He has a history of running away. There’s something going on in his house. He could have been waiting for his chance to go. He could be anywhere! If you don’t want to call the police, I’ll do it. I’ll take full responsibility.”

  “I have people searching the building and the grounds. I will make a decision about the police when that is done. You are not to call them. I will take care of it.” She looks at me sternly. What is going on now? She was pretty quick on the dial with Mike. Or at least she made him think she was ready to get police assistance. Now that we have a real crisis, she’s Miss Independent?

  I head back down the hall, alternating between fury and panic. I go down to the time-out room to fill Sean in.

  “What are you going to do?”

  “I’m going to have to go over her head this time. It’ll piss her off, but she’s just wrong here.”

  I make my way to the phone and call the board office, looking for Daniel. He’s not available, so I quickly explain the situation to the office admin there. She’s familiar with my program and knows the kind of kids I’m trying to deal with here.

  “I’ll talk to the superintendent and get the okay for you to contact the police. I�
�ll call you right back.”

  As I’m standing there waiting, an announcement comes across the general intercom, asking me to come to the office. I head down quickly, hoping that maybe I was wrong. Maybe they have Chris there and he was in the school the whole time.

  I arrive to find Mrs. Callahan on her feet, looking very annoyed. There is no Chris. “The Mallorytown police just called the director. The director!” I assume she means the Director of Education, our CEO, as he likes to call himself.

  “About?” I ask, although I suspect I know.

  “Your…student…is sitting at the Mallorytown police station.” She drips a lot of disdain onto the word student. My student, not ours.

  “Is he all right?” She looks at me as if I’ve missed the point.

  “Yes. Apparently he hitchhiked from here to there. Fifteen miles. Two different cars picked him up, if you can imagine. The second one was smart enough to take him directly to the police, who then called the board office and informed them that they had one of our students.”

  “Should I go and get him?”

  “We will both go. The police chief wants to speak with us about safety protocols. As does the director.”

  “Sounds like a good idea.” I ignore the look she gives me and follow her out to the car.

  We arrive at the police station after a silent ride. Chris is sitting in a chair, as docile as I’ve ever seen him. He smiles at me slightly. I give him a stern look. Mrs. Callahan goes over to him as if to start lecturing, but she’s interrupted.