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The school counselor’s my age.
He’s leading me down a hall. Frankie follows, and Caroline brings up the rear. I don’t know where we’re going.
When I got here, these three were waiting outside the office, Caroline in the middle of a conversation with the counselor that died as soon as I walked up.
The school’s deserted. They’ve been here awhile—talking, I guess, dealing with whatever this is. Waiting on me while I told my boss I needed an emergency day off and tore across town to get to the school.
“Here we are,” the counselor says.
His name’s Jeff. He can’t be my age—not for real. He’s got to be old enough to have a bachelor’s. But he doesn’t look any older than me, and between the pleasant smile, the soft handshake, and his purple tie, I can’t bring myself to trust him.
“Why don’t you three take a few minutes in here to talk privately?” he asks. “And Mr. Leavitt, when you’re ready, I’d like to have a brief word before you leave.”
The door closes, and then it’s just the three of us standing around a table in a room the size of a walk-in closet. It smells like janitorial supplies—sweet and woodsy, laced with chemicals.
Caroline pulls out a chair for Frankie and takes the seat next to her. Frankie reaches out for her hand.
“Want to tell me what happened?” I ask.
My sister shakes her head no.
“Great. That’s just fucking perfect.”
What I know from Caroline’s phone call is that Frankie launched herself over a desk in an apparently unprovoked attack, sat on some kid named Clint, and hit him repeatedly in the face until the teacher and an aide pulled her off.
Frankie’s never done anything like that. Not once in her whole life.
“Caroline?” I ask.
“It’s better if she tells you.”
Frankie’s staring at her feet like someone nailed them to the floor.
I pace back and forth behind the chairs. Every time I walk behind my sister, her shoulders draw tighter until they’re up by her ears. She looks like she’s afraid I’m going to hurt her, but I’m the one who holds her when she wakes up from nightmares. She’s got no fucking reason to be scared of me, not one.
“Start talking,” I bark.
Frankie scoots her chair away from where I’m standing, burying her face in Caroline’s armpit.
“West,” Caroline says.
“What?”
“Calm down.”
“How?”
It’s an honest fucking question. I wish she’d tell me where the handbook is for this. I’d memorize the whole thing if I thought it might help me out here.
I squat down next to Frankie. Pitch my voice as low as I can, as calm as I can manage. “In a few minutes, that counselor’s coming back in here. He’s going to ask me what happened, and I’m supposed to tell him you’re catatonic? You think that’s going to go over well?”
“I don’t know what that means,” she mumbles.
“It means you’re practically in a coma.”
“I’m not catatonic. I just don’t want to talk to you.”
“Well, who do you want to talk to, huh? The social workers who show up at the apartment when they decide I’m not fit to take care of my sister who’s beating kids up at school? Unless I missed something, we’re on the same team, Franks.”
