Alternate Beginnings

Part One – Meetings

I sat on the cold concrete steps next to my Dad. Despite the fact that I was wearing a coat, the breeze cut through me, and I shivered.

"Seriously?" I groused. "Seven o'clock? What's that about?"

Dad put his arm around my shoulders and squeezed. "It's about power," he confided. "Bureaucracy. Force the other guy out of his comfort zone, make him do something he doesn't want to do, and the next time he'll think twice about going against you."

I leaned into him. "Learned that with the Dockworkers' Association, huh?" I asked.

He pulled back the hood of my jacket and ruffled my hair fondly. "No, kiddo," he said with a grin. "Much earlier than that, as it happens."

Before I could ask more questions, another car pulled up next to Dad's beat-up sedan. I thought I recognised it, and when the passenger door opened, I knew I had been right. Madison got out, moving just a little painfully. I had a few bruises and contusions myself, but not, I suspected, as many as her.

She went around to the driver's side door and leaned in the window. I thought for a moment that she was kissing her dad goodbye, but the door opened and he got out. Together they approached the steps where we sat; there was plenty of room for them to go around us, but they came straight to us.

I tensed, but Dad shook his head slightly. He took his arm from my shoulders and stood up; a moment later, I stood up as well.

"Hebert," said Madison's father; his voice was curt but not unfriendly.

"Clements," replied Dad, in almost exactly the same tone of voice.

"Your girl going to cause trouble?" asked Madison's father, in the same sort of tone as if he were saying, Is it going to rain today?

Dad shook his head. "Not so long as yours doesn't start any." Probably not, but you never can tell.

He looked at his daughter. "Madison?"

Silently, she shook her head. She had makeup to cover some of the damage, such as the bruise from where my first punch got her, but she still had a beauty of a black eye and a split lower lip; I had a little bruising around my left eye, and my nose was slightly swollen, but I figured I had gotten the best of it.

Dad looked at me questioningly. I shrugged. "She doesn't pour drinks on my head, I don't kick her ass," I offered.

At that, Madison looked down and away, her father nodded tightly and Dad expelled the faintest breath from his nostrils, as if he were trying not to chuckle.

"Well, that's good enough for me," Dad said. I could tell that he was working to keep a smile off his face.

"Me too, I guess," said Madison's father. He squeezed his daughter's shoulder once, then turned and walked away. Got in his car, backed out of the parking bay, and drove away. He beeped the horn once, in farewell. Madison waved, a little forlornly, I thought.

Good, I thought fiercely. See what it feels like.

I sat back down on the steps. Dad sat beside me. Madison moved over to the far side of the steps and sat down herself, huddling into her coat.

"Wow," said Dad, keeping his voice down. "Did you do all that to her?"

I nodded. "She had it coming," I murmured. "Wish it'd been Emma, though."

He shrugged uncomfortably. "If it had been Emma, chances are I'd have Alan on the phone right now, threatening a lawsuit. You know how he gets when Emma's threatened."

I nodded. "Yeah, I know. Just wish I'd had one good chance to wipe that smile off her face."

He nodded fractionally. "From what you told me last night, I can't disagree with you. But I'm going to have more words with that Blackwell woman. I can't understand why she's working so hard to let Emma and Sophia off."

I sighed. "Popular bullies get all the breaks. I've found that out the hard way."

He bumped my shoulder with his. "As a responsible adult, I shouldn't be saying this. As your father, I'll just say that I'm proud that you stood up to them. You didn't get everything you wanted, but you got to wale on her a bit, and you got her put in detention. I think they might be more careful about messing with you in future."

I bumped him back. "Well, I can only hope." My voice was optimistic. My thoughts weren't.

Another car pulled up then, one that I didn't recognise. The driver got out at the same time as the passenger did. Dad and I both stared.

The driver was a big black guy, somewhere over six feet in height. He moved like an athlete or a boxer or something; light on his feet. But with all that, he couldn't have been more than eighteen. He was also kind of good looking, with muscles that were obvious even under his sweatshirt.

I could do detention with him all day, was my first involuntary thought.

The passenger was a girl, maybe a year younger than me. I thought I vaguely recognised her. She had skin the same colour as the driver – his sister, maybe? – and looks that were cute now but had the potential to be stunning later. Her hair was straight, with one bleached lock that had been dyed purple. She wore a huge jacket that was all fluffy around the collar; it fell to her mid-thighs. Below that, she wore lime-green tights.

He had a few words with her; she gave him the finger. I nearly giggled. He took her by the arm and marched her over toward where we sat.

Dad and I got to our feet as he approached. Dad was taller than him, but not by much; this was obvious, even when he was standing a few steps lower than us.

"Excuse me, sir," he said, in a rich baritone that sounded like dark chocolate tastes. "Are you the teacher in charge here?"

Dad shook his head with a half smile. "Sorry, no. Just keeping my daughter company till it's time to go in." He put out his hand. "Danny Hebert. This is Taylor."

The guy shook Dad's hand. "Brian Laborn. This is my sister, Aisha." He nodded to the sulky-looking teen. "Would I be able to ask you a big favour?"

Dad raised an eyebrow. "Depends on the favour."

Brian nodded. "That's fair. Well, Aisha here has a habit of ducking out of anything she doesn't want to do. Could I ask you to keep an eye on her, and if she leaves, give me a call? I've got my number here somewhere."

Dad shook his head. "Sorry, I don't carry a mobile," he said. "But I can pass on word to whoever shows up, if you want."

Brian tilted his head slightly. "I guess that's good enough," he said. "Here." He passed over a scrap of paper with a number written on it. "I've got to get going, but if you can keep an eye on her, that would help me out a lot."

Dad accepted it, read it, and tucked it away. I kind of wished that I'd had a look at it. I wasn't the type to ring boys out of the blue – or even at all – but Brian looked like a nice guy.

Okay, so he was a nice hunky guy.

Brian turned to Aisha. "You duck out of this, it's video game privileges for a week," he said severely.

She mumbled something back that sounded vaguely like 'go die in a fire'. He shrugged, nodded to Dad and I, and then took the steps two at a time down to ground level. I watched him cross the parking lot and get in the car. He started the engine, backed on out, and then drove out of the parking lot.

I looked at Aisha, and she looked at me. Then she looked at Madison, and back to me. I saw the look come over her face, of mingled disbelief and glee.

"Holy shit," she said, a grin spreading across her face. "Have you two been fighting? Is that why you're in detention?"

I nodded and shrugged and half-grinned in return. "Sort of," I admitted. "She's here because she and her friends dumped juice and soda all over me in the bathrooms. And I'm here because I beat the shit out of her for doing it."

Aisha cackled out loud - literally cackled. I blushed. "High five, sister!" she crowed, holding up her hand.

I could not recall ever having high-fived someone before in my life. I did it now; it felt kind of cool. Madison, I saw out of the corner of my eye, glared at us both.

Dad cleared his throat and nudged me with his shoulder. I glanced up at him. "Well, I did."

"And you also swore, repeatedly, in front of the teachers," he reminded me.

"Do you blame me?" I asked bluntly.

He hesitated, then shook his head. "I felt like swearing a couple of times there, myself.". Then he put on a stern look. "Which doesn't mean that I condone it, young lady."

Aisha watched the byplay between us, eyes bright. From being sulky and resentful, she seemed to have transitioned to being alert and interested. I offered her my hand. "Taylor Hebert. You're Aisha?"

She nodded, and shook my hand. She had a surprisingly strong grip. "Yeah. Nice to meet someone else who doesn't take any shit from bitches."

I was saved from an awkward reply by the next arrivals in the parking lot.

Three cars pulled up, one after the other. Two of them, I wasn't really sure about; the third, I was fairly certain, belonged to Mr Gladly.

Mr Gladly, who urged his students to call him 'Mr G'. Mr Gladly, who strove to be the 'popular teacher'. I was sure that he carefully did not see the actions of some of his more popular students, especially the girls, when it came to bullying me. After all, I wasn't popular. I wasn't anyone.

And if he didn't notice what was going on, he didn't have to do anything about it, and risk becoming the uncool teacher who actually enforced the rules.

However, he was also the least senior member of the faculty, and so it had fallen to him to while away his Saturday in overseeing our all-day detention. I hoped he'd brought a good book.

On second thought, I hoped he'd brought a crappy book.

I had brought a good book. Several, in fact. If the others would just leave me alone, I could spend the day reading, and count it as not a total loss.

I didn't know which way it would go, yet. Aisha seemed to be fairly cool, if just a little over the top; I was reasonably sure she wasn't going to give me any grief. However, Madison was popular enough in her own petite, cute way. If she could bend the last two arrivals to her ends, this could turn out to be not such a great day after all.

I watched as they got out of their respective cars. Two fathers, two sons. Mom didn't see fit to come along in either case, I saw.

They converged with Mr Gladly – I refused on principle to call him Mr G – and then the fathers went back to their cars, and Mr Gladly approached the steps with the boys in tow.

I thought I recognised them. Jason was half Korean or something; his dad ran a convenience store downtown. He had a red and green bandanna tied around his left bicep. I frowned; I knew exactly what that meant. He was an ABB recruit.

Eddie I had met in passing a couple of times, outside of school. His dad was a dock-worker, and my dad had found him work a few times. But the shaved head was new. I knew what that meant, too. Empire Eighty-Eight. Joy.

So not only were we going to be stuck in detention all day, we were going to be stuck in detention with two guys who were undoubtedly there for more or less the same reason that Madison and I were there, and who were unlikely to leave their issues at the door.

What moron had decreed that these two gang members should serve their detention at the same time, in the same room? I had an idea that I knew; Principal Blackwell was quite good at entirely missing the point of student interactions.

Well, I told myself, at least there's one silver lining. Madison won't be able to goad both of them into picking on me at once.

Jason and Eddie were giving each other wary looks as they followed Mr Gladly to the steps. Dad and I were still standing, so Dad took a few steps down to meet the teacher as he came up.

"Gladly," he greeted the younger man, bluntly.

"Danny, how are you?" replied the teacher, all smiling and good humour.

Dad held up a finger. "Can we have a word, for just one moment?" he asked, tilting his head to the other end of the steps, away from where Madison sat.

Mr Gladly frowned, not sure what the situation was, then shrugged and followed him.

Jason and Eddie were left behind, still bristling and glowering at each other, but it seemed to me that they were doing it more for form's sake than for any particular deep loyalty to their respective gangs.

"Jason, Eddie, how you doing?" I asked them. I could have cared less about the answer, but it prevented what would otherwise have threatened to be a very awkward moment.

Jason shrugged; Eddie went to do the same, visibly changed his mind, and said, "Eh. Fuckin' detention. Am I right?"

I nodded. "Can't say you're wrong," I agreed, slightly surprising myself. I would never have started a conversation with a boy I hardly knew, before yesterday. But pulling Madison back into that bathroom and laying some well-deserved punishment on her had given me a much-needed dose of self-esteem and self-confidence.

Off to the side, I could just hear my Dad speaking in a low tone to Mr Gladly.

" – and a half fucking years, Gladly. She was bullied that long. Then the locker thing. You put your hands on your fucking hearts and promised to keep an eye on her. And now, you've finally caught one of the bullies because she stood up for herself – "

" – she started a fight in the school," Mr Gladly protested.

" – and caught one of the bullies. And got in fucking trouble for doing by herself what all of you have fucking failed to do over the last eighteen months. So she's doing detention. I'm not fighting that. But you'd better keep a damn close eye on it. If she comes home and says she was bullied when all you have to do is keep your eye on five fucking kids, then I will be having words with you. And one more thing. You haven't earned the right to use my first name. For you, it's 'Mr Hebert'. Got it?"

"I don't much like your tone –" Mr Gladly's tone was defensive.

Dad seemed to be looming over Mr Gladly. I thought he might hit him. "Right now, I don't much care." His finger shook in Mr Gladly's face. "Do. Your. Fucking. Job."

Abruptly, he turned and strode back toward where I stood with Aisha, with Jason and Eddie a couple of steps lower down.

"I'll be back this afternoon, okay, kiddo?" he said with a smile.

"Sure thing, Dad," I said with a return smile. He gave me a brief hug, nodded to Aisha, then took the steps down to the parking lot two at a time, much like Aisha's brother had done. I suspected he was hurrying to ensure that he didn't come back and say something else to Mr Gladly.

He turned and waved as he got into the car; I waved back. The battered old sedan started with an asthmatic cough, and rattled out of the parking lot. I watched it go.

When I turned around, Mr Gladly had the front door of the school open. Everyone else was filing in; Mr Gladly was looking at me with an unreadable gaze. "If you'd like to join us, Ms Hebert?"

I nodded. "Certainly, Mr Gladly." I picked up my bag and followed them in. The door swung shut behind us.

The fluorescent lights in the library flickered into life as Mr Gladly swiped his hand down the bank of switches. Indistinct, gloomy caverns became brightly lit aisles, filled with book spines.

Some study desks had been set up near the front of the library; I didn't know whether this was on purpose, or if it had been random chance. Mr Gladly directed us to sit there. I sat at one end; Aisha plunked herself next to me, and promptly put her trainers up on the desk. Eddie gave her a glare; she didn't seem to notice. He and Madison went and sat at the far end of the desks. Jason shrugged and sat in between.

Mr Gladly fussed around at the librarian's desk, opening drawers, finally managing to produce a laminated document. He looked up, and saw the soles of Aisha's shoes.

"Ms Laborn, kindly put your feet on the floor," he snapped.

Aisha popped gum. I hadn't even known she had gum.

"And get rid of that gum!" he added.

Slowly, insolently, she reached into her mouth, pulled out a wad of pink gum, and placed it neatly in the middle of the sole of one of her shoes. Then she started to put her feet on the floor –

"Wait!" Gladly's shout stopped her.

She paused, shoes hovering above the floor. "What, put my feet on the floor, or not put my feet on the floor?"

"You can't put your foot on the floor! You've got bubblegum on it! Take the bubblegum off your foot and put it in the bin!"

"But I was saving it for later," she protested.

"On your shoe?" he asked, incredulous.

"I got clean shoes," she told him smugly.

"Just – take it off, all right?" he snarled, sounding aggravated. I could feel a grin creeping across my cheeks. Aisha seemed to have a knack for irritating people.

She shrugged. "Okay, no skin off my nose."

What he didn't see, and I did, was that she was surreptitiously unwrapping another piece of gum under the desk. She bent her leg, pulled off the piece of gum stuck on her foot, and palmed it, while popping the fresh bit into her mouth. With every evidence of enjoyment, she began chewing on it.

That got a reaction.

Mr Gladly's jaw dropped. Madison and Eddie, just as taken in by her stunt as Gladly was, nearly fell off their chairs in surprise. I suspected that Jason had also picked up on her sleight of hand; he barely reacted. I shared a grin across Aisha with him.

"Oh god!" choked the teacher, coming to his feet. "Ms Laborn! Spit that gum out right now! Give it to me!"

He could have chosen his words better. She spat it into her hand … and threw the piece that she'd peeled off of her shoe. Her aim was very good, or very lucky. The wad of freshly-chewed gum caught him more or less between the eyes.

Absolute, dead silence fell.

Silence broken only by the sounds of five teenagers trying desperately not to burst out laughing. And by the sounds, or so I presumed, of blood vessels popping in Mr Gladly's temples.

Reaching up, he explored where the wad of gum had impacted, then wrenched it off. With a convulsive effort, he hurled it straight down into the trash can that sat behind the librarian's desk. The metallic clang echoed throughout the library.

"Miss Laborn!" he shouted. His voice also echoed, somewhat more loudly.

"Shh!" Aisha's entire attitude was cheeky. Her finger was across her lips.

He came storming up to her, and swiped her shoes off the desk. Her feet hit the floor with a thud. "Don't you 'shh' me, you little …"

I cleared my throat. "Uh, Mr Gladly?"

Fuming, he jerked around to glare at me. "Don't you get in on this, Ms Hebert!"

My voice was mild. "I just wanted to point out that you might want to lower your voice a little. We are in the library, after all, and we're sitting right here. You don't have to shout."

His glare intensified, switching from Aisha to me.

Unexpectedly, Jason raised his hand slightly. "She's right, sir." He pointed at the very prominent SILENCE sign on the wall. "Let's have some respect, sir." Amazingly, he even managed some reproach in his voice.

"Yeah," Aisha chimed in. "Library. Like they said." She threw horns with both her hands at once – the fresh gum concealed in one hand – and added, "Respec', mon," in what was supposed to be a corny Jamaican accent.

Mr Gladly looked from one to the other of us, obviously fuming. And then Eddie spoke up from where he sat near Madison. "What she said." He indicated me. "We can hear you good. You don't have to shout."

And wonder of wonders, even Madison chimed in with an "Uh huh."

Was she joining in because she'd had a change of heart, or because everyone else was going that way? I didn't know, and I didn't really care. They supported us, and that was what mattered.

Gladly gave us all a general glare, quite removed from the laid-back, unflappable 'Mr G' persona that he liked to project. He drew a deep breath, then turned to Aisha.

"You've just earned yourself another Saturday detention, young lady," he promised her, lowering his tone of voice.

"Eh, whatevs," she said, disinterested. She unzipped her jacket, and it fell open to reveal what she was wearing underneath.

Which was not, to be honest, all that much. I blinked; Jason frankly stared.

She had on a strapless top which I would have hesitated to wear as underwear, doing its best to cover an endowment that was somewhat more prominent than mine. Her ripped denim shorts were scandalously short. And the entire remainder of her ensemble consisted of the lime-green tights, and the trainers.

Mr Gladly's eyes bulged, and his face reddened all over again. I began to wonder about his blood pressure.

"Miss Laborn!" he snapped. "Cover yourself!"

Aisha rolled her eyes, and popped her gum. Gladly didn't even register it, this time around. He was waiting for a response from her, and she wasn't giving him one.

"I said," he told her, "cover yourself!"

"I heard you the first time," she said absently, digging through one of the capacious pockets of her jacket.

"That's an order!" he insisted.

She looked up at him. "I don't take orders from my brother, much less you. Which he will kick your ass if you so much as lay a hand on me. The school doesn't have a uniform, and I'm covered up. So bite me." She pulled her hand out of her pocket, and gave him the finger with it.

It was around about now that I began to realise the truth about Aisha Laborn. She had a problem with authority figures. All authority figures.

"That's another detention!" he shouted.

All five of us – we couldn't have planned it this well – said "Shhh!" simultaneously, with our fingers to our lips. Aisha used the finger she'd just shown him.

Mr Gladly glared at Aisha, then at the rest of us, then stomped back to his desk. He retrieved the laminated document.

"'This detention will run from seven in the morning until five in the afternoon,'" he read out loud. He lowered the document, and looked at us all. "However, due to the disruption that some of you are intent on causing, this will run later."

I raised my hand. "Sir?" I interjected. "That's not fair. I was here before you were."

"And so?" he asked.

"And you made me wait. On the steps. In the cold wind. If you'd gotten here earlier, we could have been inside and started on time."

Madison raised her hand. "Me too, sir."

Aisha popped her gum. "Yeah, me too. Gonna give yourself detention for being late?"

Gladly had apparently decided to ignore her. But he couldn't ignore the rest of us. Maybe he didn't want another face-to-face chat with Dad.

" … fine," he gritted. "Seven until five. But don't push it."

"Wouldn't dream of it," Aisha interjected cheekily.

He continued to ignore her. "'No electronic entertainment devices may be used. Library computers may not be used. Phones may not be used.'"

Madison jerked upright in her seat, and even the two boys looked unhappy. "What?" she interrupted him.

He raised his eyes to regard her sternly. "Miss Clements, please limit your outbursts."

"But … no phones?" she wailed. "What am I supposed to do?"

He shrugged elaborately. "Read a book," he suggested. "Do some study. It's not my problem. I really do not care."

"But –" she began.

"But nothing," he cut her off. "I hear one electronic beep, one ringtone, one ping, I see one earbud, one bluetooth earpiece, one piece of electronics that should not be there, and it's confiscated till Monday."

His tone was firm; Madison subsided, looking stricken.

I didn't own a phone; I never had. But I couldn't help but feel just the slightest bit sorry for her, then.

"Are we perfectly understood on this?" asked Mr Gladly.

No-one spoke.

"I said, does everyone understand about this?" he pressed.

There was a general mumble of agreement, and he nodded, satisfied that he'd cowed us.

"Good," he said. "Now, I'm just going to be down the hall, in my office, with the door open. I hear one strange noise, I will be coming back in here, and you don't want that."

Without further ado, he exited the room, hooking the door open as he went. There were some flies in the room; one rode out on his back.

Madison and Eddie were conversing in low tones, while Aisha and Jason commiserated with each other over how much of a douche Mr Gladly was.

I got up and tiptoed over to the door, and peered out. It was all an act; I knew exactly where Gladly had gone. He was heading for the teachers' lounge.

All four had fallen silent, watching me. I turned to them.

"It's all good," I said in a normal tone of voice. "He kept going. He's probably heading to get a cup of coffee."

Aisha stretched, and cracked her knuckles, as she grinned wickedly.

"Excellent."

End of Part One