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“Luke who?”
“Luke Jones.”
Sarah didn’t know the name, but that wasn’t all that surprising. There were over two hundred children in Owen’s year. “Is he new?” she asked, and he half-shrugged, half-nodded. She took it as assent. “Is he a friend?”
“I dunno…”
“You don’t know?”
Another shrug.
Sarah decided to press; this was the most forthcoming Owen had been about the bullying incident since it had happened. “Whose idea was it, Owen, to push these boys around and take their money?”
He ducked his head. “I dunno…” he mumbled again.
It was the easy choice, Sarah knew, as a parent, to decide it was this Luke’s. He was the unknown element, the potential scapegoat. But what if ithadn’tbeen his idea? Maybe it had been Owen’s, or Ben’s, or both. She didn’t want to be the kind of mother who refused to believe the unpalatable truth about her child, as much as she loved him.
“Owen?” she prompted. “If it was you, I won’t be angry, but I’d like to know. I’d like to understand what happened.”
“Why do you care now?” Owen burst out. “It’s, like, ancient history.”
Two weeks was not ancient history, but Sarah knew he had a point. “I’ve been a bit distracted these last few weeks,” she admitted, “but I’m asking you now.” She finally felt strong enough to grasp this particular nettle.
“Are you and Dad getting divorced?” Owen asked abruptly.
Sarah took an even breath. “Your dad and I haven’t discussed it.”
“Yes, but are you?”
“I don’t know,” she admitted, deciding she needed to be as honest with her son as she wanted him to be with her. “Like I said, we haven’t discussed it, but… I hope we’re not. But we are going through something of a rough patch, and we need to sort things out.” If they could. “Now.” She levelled him with an encouraging but firm look. “Tell me what happened with the bullying.”
“It wasn’t bullying.” His voice was low, insistent.
“Okay, then, tell me what it was. What would you call it?”
He shrugged, hunching his shoulders, suddenly looking impossibly young. He’d had a growth spurt recently, and his school blazer no longer covered his wrists. His arms and legs looked too long for his body; he still had to grow into himself, both physically and emotionally. In that moment, Sarah’s heart ached for her son, for the confusion he had to feel on so many fronts.
“It was just messing around,” he mumbled. “We didn’t… we didn’t mean anything by it.”
“I can appreciate that,” Sarah answered carefully, “but at some point, you must have realized the other boys weren’t viewing it in the same way.”
Owen shrugged, looking down as he scuffed his feet.
Was there any real point in rehashing this episode? Sarah wondered. She was pretty sure her son knew it had been wrong. And yet… he hadn’t said as much.
“Owen,” she told him gently, “once upon a time, I feel likeyouwould have been one of those boys, the boys you took the money from. Do you remember in year seven, how you felt a little out of place, at the start? You were having trouble making friends—”
He looked up, his expression turning mutinous. “Wow, thanks a lot, Mum!”
“I’vehad trouble making friends,” she told him quietly. “And so has Mairi, and Jess, and Ellie. Loads of people do. I don’t actually think it’s a bad thing. It can make you more… empathetic.” Not that that was an adjective she’d use to describe her thirteen-year-old son right now. “I’m just reminding you because I’m a little surprised you’re on the other side of that equation.”
He blinked at her for a few seconds, and then he said, in a mumble so low she strained to hear it, “It was my idea.”
Sarah absorbed this, doing her best to keep her expression neutral and not condemning. “It was?”
He nodded, and a look of something almost like relief passed across his face. It felt good, Sarah knew from experience, to admit to things. “Yeah. We were just goofing around, and Luke was saying how these guys were, like, total weirdoes, and so I… I just… I don’t know, I just pushed one of them, sort of like a joke, but then he got angry, and I don’t know what happened, but it just kind of… got out of control.” He stared at her unhappily. “I didn’t mean to take their money. I know that sounds stupid, but they were holding it, just a couple of pound coins, and I dunno, I just grabbed it, sort of like a joke, but then it became thisthingand they said I’d stolen it, but I gave it back to them after school.” He looked miserable, and almost near tears. “I’m not a bully!”
“Oh, Owen…” There were no words, Sarah thought, to make it better, and so she simply wrapped him in a hug, grateful when he put his arms around her, his head burrowing into her shoulder.
