Chapter 6
"You will stay here until I find a way to deal with you, you selfish and terrible child!" my mum screams. "I didn't know I raised such a monster!"
The basement door slams shut and I only have the darkness and dusty articles about me to content with as my companions. I sink to the ground with tears of desperation rolling down my cheeks as I think back on the fateful day's events.
After Samantha and Tom pulled me off, I was marched to the principal's office and interrogated as if I were a war criminal. I told the teachers that Cato provoked me and tried to hurt Tom and Samantha, but Cato's goons yelled and made a hubbub about me molesting Samantha and trashing both Cato and Tom up. I don't know if the rule is 'tell the truth and it will set you free' or 'the louder you scream, the better'. The principal started listening to those bullies instead of me and my friends, despite the facts that we were the victims and that Cato had at least ten records or so on his disciplinary charts. The worst thing I had done before was forgot to bring a book to class.
No matter how much I pleaded and voiced up, the principal demanded me to stop telling lies and to admit the truth. "Truth?" I sputter. "What truth? THIS is the truth! Cato and his friends ganged up on me and my friends. He hit Tom, molested Samantha and forced me into a fight. I know that to throw punches at him was wrong, but he could do worse things to them!"
"Shut up!" the principal growls. "We will check the evidence on CCTV cameras soon. In the meantime, we will assume that YOU caused a gang fight and YOUR friends were your accomplices. Stay in for detention today after school." "But, but-" Tom tries to speak up. "Don't challenge me, or you will be suspended effectively. Just because you all are smart A grade-students doesn't mean that you can act like hooligans as you like. You are dismissed."
I don't know how I got through detention without breaking down. Detention is oddly simple and time-wasting, the procedure being you sitting in an empty room for an hour, not allowed to do anything. And if you do, the moderator, the principal himself will see to it that you spend an hour longer. The silence in the room was killing me and the sheer embarrassment of being some kind of criminal nearly suffocated me. Of course if I really were a bully, I wouldn't care about it. I didn't see Tom and Samantha come in to join me in this unfair punishment, because I hid my face in my hands for the whole hour, cursing Cato, the unfair policies of the school, the wretched bureaucracy of school policies and whatnot.
Actually, detention only lasted for half an hour as the teachers got word back from the support staff in charge of the CCTVs. Turns out I was right. They had just punished innocent students and made marks not only on his record but his reputation and his emotional being. I couldn't control myself and roared my rage, "You just sent us for detention just because you thought we were the real troublemakers?! With no evidence. What kind of school is this? Detention first and questions later?" "It's just a procedure." one of the teachers try to calm me down. "we need to..." "To what? Stifle aggression?" I thunder. "Believe me, I have had my violence quota overdone for today." Then I stalked out of the door.
"Abel, wait!" Samantha hurries after me. I stop for a while and asks, "What is it?" "The principal says that he'll deal with the bullies correctly. It's just that Cato's parents are big shots. They are government officials and the main sponsors of the school." "Forget about sponsors, rules are rules!" I say. "I remember that he promised to make it up to us, but this kind of rubbish is unacceptable! To listen to bullies and not to productive students is stupid! If this is the kind of principal that is running the school, I might as well call it quits. That is, if I didn't go to school for nothing. Just," I force myself to inhale to calm my nerves and say, "Samantha, Cato's not going to stop at nothing to do more things once he's found out. Just avoid him and have nothing to do with him. Tell Tom too. Take care."
When I arrived at home, my mum was already waiting at the doorstep with a baseball bat. Cato stood by the door, grinning at me. He looks surprisingly fine except for a black eye and a missing tooth. "How now? I told your mum." he says. "Good luck." Cato pats me on the shoulder and leaves.
I am forced to endure a merciless beating and a more merciless cursing from my enraged mother, who was fed with lies from Cato about her vicious son, beating him for no reason. Parents should be more sensible, but this one being on the verge of insanity obviously isn't. Now I am locked up in this dismal basement, left to myself. I wonder how terrible can this day get, when the door bursts opens and my brother, Brandon gets thrown in. "You got out early for good behaviour." mum shrieks. "Now let's see if you will do the same!"
"Fought a bully at school, huh?" he smirks to me. "Yeah, but he was about to kiss Samantha." I say. "Ya a gentleman, you know that?" Brandon says. "Just to tell you, sometimes school authorities are a pain in the ass." "I know right." I complain. "At least they acquitted me."
"Oh no, they won't." Brandon says. "Everyone's gonna treat you like a criminal from now on. Whoever enters the principal's office becomes worse off than a nigger in the old days."
After a brief silence, I say, "Brandon, I can't take it any longer. All this suffering and all this pain. I feel like no one cares about me"
"Just bear it, OK? Hell, who am I talking to? You still have four years or so and I have two before we become eighteen, then we can get out of here and do what we want." Brandon scowls, trying not to look depressed.
"I want to just disappear, and have no one to look for me."
"You mean run away?" Brandon bursts out laughing. "Christ, no. Let me tell you something. A friend of mine called Raymond ran away from his religious family. They joined the Church of Scientology apparently. They tried to forced him into Sea Org, some space navy, he said. Who knows that the Sea Org was a ruse to get youths like him to do sad back-breaking work like cleaning a whole ship from stern to stern or some kind of shit. So he ran away as the people there were like the Gestapo. They would punish you for any mistake, and invade your home and pressure you if you tried to leave. Raymond lived on the streets, eating from dumpsters and washing at public toilets, but the Sea Org guys tried to kidnap him. He was almost caught five times and almost raped by two gays. Raymond ended up committing suicide to escape another Sea Org attempt to get him back."
"Come on, I have no stock in that junk." I say. "Well, just to say that out there in the streets, there will be gangsters and rapists all out for your blood. Hell, you could end up selling crap just to save your skin. Where would you live? What would you eat? And most of all, how do you stay free? If you are going to disappear, mum's gonna call the cops and everyone across the US is going to look for you. Abel, you better think properly if you want to run away, cause it's gonna change your life for good or for worse. And most stories turn out bad. You either get caught alive to be sent to some reform camp like me, or dead and cold like Raymond."