A/N: Sorry this update took me so long! I'm taking a full credit load this semester, and I'm getting hit rather hard with schoolwork and work (I officially hate the smell of McDonald's food now). Anyway, for anybody who is really into this story and was worried -- I will finish it. It's just that until Thanksgiving break and Christmas break – my writing time is seriously limited. So, this is it – Chapter 14: The Man with the Answers.
Chapter 14: The Man with the Answers
Toby sat and observed what was going on in the room, as he tried to push the worry he felt for Emma out of his head. Emma's words and departure had left him with so many questions that he had been unable to answer. The same questions that had been running through his head since that day – the questions he was afraid to put voice to, because he didn't want to think or talk about what happened anymore. He could feel Spinner and Jimmy's eyes on him, looking at him like he knew why Emma had ran out of the room crying. Like he knew what had happened between her and Rick that awful day. Like he knew why Rick had done what he had done. Since that day, everyone had been looking at him like that – like he was the man with the answers to why it had happened. Like Rick had told him what he was going to do. Nobody seemed to realize he was just as confused and as shocked as everyone else was.
Toby heard what they were talking about in the room, and found himself surprised at how much everyone knew about what Emma had done last year. The only reason he knew more about it than Manny's cryptic mistake comment was because Manny had mentioned it to Liberty, who had told J.T., who had, in typical J.T fashion, joked about it to Toby. Toby still had trouble thinking about what J.T. had said–- it seemed almost sacrilegious to him to even try to visualize Emma doing that with Jay. He didn't think any less of Emma because of it, but it was still hard to think about the girl he had always had secret fantasies about hooking up with one of his worst tormentors.
Toby heard Jay speak, and immediately put his full attention on what was being said. Not like Toby really believed he could do anything to stop Jay, but he sometimes liked to feel like he could.
"Not that it's any of your business – but yeah – I got treated. As to the whole Emma at the ravine thing – are you serious? I never saw her there with some random guy." He said, with a smirk. "The rumors you hear…" Jay said, and shook his head in amusement.
To describe himself as shocked at Jay's words seemed to be too mild a description. But Toby couldn't find a word in his vocabulary to accurately describe the level of surprise that Jay's strange defense of Emma had made him feel. All Toby really knew was that if he was an overweight 50 year-old, Jay's response would have caused him to die on the spot from a massive heart attack. Jay had lied, for Emma. He hadn't bragged about hooking up with Emma, or any other typical Jay behavior Toby had expected. It made him wonder what Jay was up to, because Toby knew that people like Jay never did anything without some self-serving reason.
Ms. Sauve was saying something, but Toby wasn't paying attention – he was still looking at Jay and trying to figure up what Jay was up to.
Then Jay spoke again, and Toby started to listen again.
"What truth is that, Ms. Sauve?" Jay asked with a smirk on his face. Toby cringed inwardly at that smirk. That was the look that he knew from experience to be the one Jay gave when he was about to be his most cruel. It was that smirk that Jay gave him before he pushed him out of the way, or stole his backpack, or made some comment about his glasses or his being a geek. It was that smirk that Jay had on his face, as Toby had observed him sitting in the audience at the Whack Your Brain competition, in those fateful seconds before the paint and feathers fell.
"Are you going to start telling us it's ok to cry, now?" Jay was saying to Ms. Sauve. "Because I've heard that lecture before."
"Jay" Ms. Suave said as if in warning.
"No offense, but your sentimental crap is getting on my nerves." Jay stated.
"Jason, that's enough." Ms. Suave said sternly.
Jay just keep going, ignoring Ms. Sauve's warnings, as Toby watched and listened.
"I mean, look at how pathetic this is. Let's see – we have the geek over there – I'm so sad, because my friend was a psycho who died – and we have Wheels here, who is so pissed off at Spinner because he's in a wheelchair and is refusing to admit that he was as much of a big, bad bully as Spin and I. And we have Spinner here, whose constant crying is getting on my nerves – somebody get the big baby a pacifier or something." Jay said cruelly.
Toby knew Jay was just talking – that he was just being the typical jerk he always was – but Toby found a strange sort of truth in his words. Toby was sad because Rick died. Not the Rick who came to school with the gun – but the Rick that played video games and Dungeons and Dragons with him. The Rick who had an innocent list of the most beautiful girls at school. The Rick who had tried so hard to prove to everyone that he had changed. The Rick who had been pushed into a locker, and had got up and acted like nothing had happened. The Rick who had been his friend.
"That's enough, Jay." Ms. Sauve said, angry. "You can leave now, if you can't contribute anything worthwhile to this discussion."
Toby watched, as Jay stormed away. He listened to Ms. Sauve's parting words to Jay, before Jay slammed out the door. Toby observed as Ms. Sauve looked at the door for a moment, before turning her gaze to him – to all of them left in the room.
"Well, it looks like it's just the four of us left." Ms. Sauve said, giving a small smile. "What were we talking about before that little interruption?" she inquired.
"We were talking about the rumors that were going around about Emma." Jimmy said.
"That's right, and I said that rumors were just rumors, didn't I?" Ms. Sauve asked.
"Yeah, they are." Toby spoke up quickly.
Ms. Sauve turned her probing gaze to him, and gave him a small smile. Sometimes, the cynical part of Toby wondered how sincere Ms. Sauve really was. Did she really care about the students, as she seemed to? Or was it all just an act, because caring about the students was the job she was paid to do?
"But if they weren't rumors – what would you do if a friend was really in that kind of trouble?" Ms. Sauve asked.
Toby knew the answer she expected. It was the answer adults always expected from teens in those one-sided conversations about how to help a friend who was in trouble. Those conversations always ended in "Tell an adult." But would that be the truth about Toby would really do? Those rumors were true – Emma really was acting out in ways that showed she wasn't dealing with the shooting – but here Toby was, lying about what he knew to protect Emma. But was he really protecting her by not telling the truth? Ms. Sauve might be able to help her, if she knew. But Toby couldn't tell her. Because that cynical part of him knew the truth. Adults always say, "Tell an adult", but then the adults don't listen. They never listen to what the kids have to say.
Toby looked at Ms. Sauve for a moment, before he spoke honestly to her. "You want me to say, tell an adult, like that would solve the problems. But Rick tried to tell an adult what was happening – no one listened. No one listened, and no one cared. The teachers knew what was happening, but they didn't take it seriously. He tried to talk to Raditch, but he was ignored. So don't tell me I should tell an adult when a friend is in trouble. Because I know that adults don't listen." Toby said.
Ms. Sauve looked at Toby for a moment, surprised by his outburst. "Some of us listen Toby. Some of us care." She said sincerely.
"Yeah right." Toby said skeptically.
"I do agree with you Toby. A lot of what had happened was the fault of the entire school system, even of the entire government itself. No one listened, because there is no time to listen. The teachers are overworked, the school is overcrowded, and there is not enough money available for the necessary social programs to help troubled kids and to teach the teachers how to recognize the signs of troubled kids – to recognize the signs of something like this happening. But some of us do listen, and some of us care. You just need to keep talking, until someone pays attention." Ms. Sauve said.
"And by then, it's too late." Toby said, letting his cynical side have free reign over his words – voicing all of the anger he had inside in him since that first moment, back in 5th grade, he had learned that it was useless to tell what was happening.
He remembered going up to Mrs. Andrews, with his mud stained pants and stomach growling. He remembered telling her about what had happened, about the biggest boy in his class, whose name was Matt, and how this boy had taken his lunch box, and when Toby had objected to the theft, Matt had proceeded to push him into the mud puddle. He remembered the annoyed look Mrs. Andrews had gave him, as she looked up from the papers she was grading, with the lights glinting off of her glasses, and he remembered her response. "I don't have time for this, Toby. Just get a school lunch today." She had said, as if he hadn't told her that Matt had pushed him and stole from him – as if it was all right for Matt to take his lunch and push him. Toby also remembered what had happened after that day – how it had gotten so much worse, because word had gotten around that he was a "squealer." It was that day that Toby learned it was so much easier to take it than to fight back. He had learned it was useless to say a word.
"He's right." Jimmy said. "No one paid any attention to what was happening to Rick."
"And some people were adding to the problem." Toby replied, and gave Jimmy a look. "Some people were throwing Rick into to dumpsters and threatening him in the hallways." Toby said, and wished he could take that comment back. He didn't know why he felt this sudden anger at Jimmy – Jimmy had paid a horrible price for what had happened, but that didn't stop Toby from feeling angry at him, deep down inside. Jimmy had been made into a martyr by the entire school, while he had been just as guilty as the rest of them in his treatment of Rick. Meanwhile, Toby had been made out to be the man with the answers. The person who had to know why Rick had done it. The person who everyone, deep inside, thought could do the same thing that Rick had done. Because Toby understood what Rick was going through – he understood the anger, hurt, humiliation, and loneliness that Rick felt. But nobody understood that he didn't know why Rick had done it – why Rick chose the route he had taken. Toby didn't have any answers, and he was tired of everyone acting like he did. He was tired of everyone treating him like he was going to be the next kid to bring a gun to school, just because he was Rick's friend.