Superintendent Johnson sat at a large wooden desk. In his suit and tie and pocket square he looked like a fat-cat politician or maybe a bank president, not a school administrator. He took a slow swallow from his University of Central Florida coffee mug and carefully centered it on a mirrored coaster to his side. I’ve never seen a desk so clean. Just Roy’s file, a desk phone by the right-hand corner and that coffee cup. A computer console sat behind him, equally tidy, or sparse as the case might be.

I mentally compared this space to my own office. Paper records stacked as monuments to half-finished projects awaiting input from a third party or a second wind from me. And dozens of document boxes in line to be hauled into storage just as soon as the oldest boxes in storage are hauled to shredding. I do the hauling. It’s been a couple of years since I felt up to it.

Johnson’s sterile office said to me this is a guy who got his work done. Or more likely, a guy who didn’t do any work at all. Regardless, his spiffy office sucked the fight out of me.

Roy slouched in his seat, sending the opposite message I hoped. He fidgeted with a click pen, trying to spin it through his fingers like the computer hacker in The Cyber Job. Every time he screwed up, he clicked the pen five times in a row, and then once more to put the point away—just like the actor did. We waited on Principal Dewey.

Johnson cleared his throat and smiled. “Royal, do you think the Pythons might go all the way to state this year?” Roy scoffed. He looked towards me and rolled his eyes. He dropped his pen and it bounced under my chair. I slumped in my seat stretching to the floor. I strained my shoulder as I reached for it like I always do. Shamed by Roy’s silence, I mumbled something lame like, “Strong D and bullseye passing. I wouldn’t doubt it” I gave Roy back his pen with a strong look that I hoped said “pull it together.” He rolled his eyes again.

I laughed when Joanne told me about Roy’s prank. She scowled and told me to grow up. “This is serious, Dan. A better father would have nipped this in the bud ages ago.” The world has changed. If I did this in high school, Mrs. Marks, my school librarian, would have given detention. A few afternoons shelving books instead of soccer practice. It would have been a nice break. Not really a punishment at all. It wouldn’t make the newspaper, that’s for sure. 

He knows how to push buttons, that kid. He told the reporter hiding porn books on the library shelves “was a protest against a fascist regime.” Roy told me he meant the governor, but the school board, Principal Dewey and a dozen letters to the editor interpreted it as a swipe against Dewey. Now Dewey held Roy’s fate in his hands. Principal Dewey was already ten minutes late.

Johnson adjusted in his chair looking like he was about to take another stab at conversation. Just then, Regina Kahn knocked on the door jam. She’s the attendance secretary, and she plays tennis with Joanne sometimes on Saturday mornings. I don’t know much about her. She’s thirty-ish and fit and wears her hair with squared-off bangs reminiscent of a college girl from the sixties. I mentioned her to Donna at work once, and Donna said “Oh, I know her, she’s known for affairs.” Regina held a sealed envelope. Superintendent Johnson looked relieved at a break in the room’s tension.

Regina handed the envelope to Mr. Johnson. She turned to me and nodded “Dan.” She said it in a way I didn’t like, somehow inserting a world of sarcasm into that one word. She gave Roy a tired, sympathetic smile. He smiled back which lifted my spirits. When Regina walked out of the room, I couldn’t help but watch. Johnson read the letter to himself as Roy and I exchanged worried glances.

“Mr. Dewey won’t be joining us. You can go to the school and clear out your locker today at three o’clock. Mrs. Kahn will meet you in the office. If no other district principal will accept you as a student, and I doubt they will, you’ll need to go to a private school or continue your education through a cyber classroom. Your tenure as a Python is over.

Roy and I swung by Burger King on the way home. As we left the office building, tears streamed down his face, his cocky demeanor washed away. In the car, he hugged his sides, curled in on himself and sobbed. He reminded me that at fourteen, he’s more child than adult. As much as I wanted to lecture, tell him he had it coming, take him home and lock him in his room for a month, I couldn’t. Expulsion was punishment enough. Joanne would launch into me when we got home, launch into both of us. Me for rewarding Roy with Burger King. Roy for embarrassing the family. Plenty of time for that later. A lifetime of that later. First, I wanted to eat a burger and fries with my kid.

Written in response to the prompt: Well, that was a meeting.

Photo by Justin Wolff on Unsplash