Chapter Thirty-Five
James
The following morning, I went into Nell’s room and woke her up for school. She was extra grumpy this morning, and she wasn’t even talking to me.
“Nell, if you don’t start talking to me, you are going to be in trouble,” I said to her. It didn’t seem to deter her in the least. I couldn’t understand why she was being so defiant. It wasn’t fair to me at all. I wasn’t the one that told her to beat up other children. I wasn’t the one that got her suspended.
“Listen, we have to go back to your school today and talk to the principal because the principal doesn’t like having somebody who’s a bully at her school. The principal can’t tolerate someone at her school that starts fights.” I said all of this in the nicest way possible, trying to explain to her the consequences of the actions she had chosen to take. I wanted her to know how serious this was. She couldn’t go through her life just hitting people that made her upset.
“Come on, we have to go,” I said to her. We walked outside, and I helped her get into the car. Once she was buckled, I drove off toward her school. She avoided looking at me the whole way. Every time I glanced in the rearview mirror, she would be staring out the window.
“You have to talk to me at some point, Nell.” I wanted her to open up to me. I needed to know what was going on. I needed her to know that I could help her when she had problems going on in her life, but she had to open up to me. I wanted to show her that we could solve this thing together. But for some reason, she kept her wall up. She wouldn’t let me in.
We pulled up to the school and got out, then the two of us walked to the office. I let the front office people know that we were there to see the principal, and they asked us to take a seat. Nell and I got settled in to wait. She still wasn’t talking to me, and wouldn’t even look at me.
“James, Nell, I’ll see you now,” Trisha said. She seemed a little nicer today. Maybe she’d just been having a bad day last time. I had to give her the benefit of the doubt since she did run a school full of crazy children. If even the kindergarten students got into fights, I could only imagine what her day was really like. Fighting on top of everything else she had to deal with every single day. It was probably a lot.
We walked into her office and both sat down in the same chairs we’d used the other day.
“I think Nell has something to say,” I said, looking at Nell.
Nell looked at the principal, “I’m really sorry, Ms. Williamson,” she said.
“Nell, can you tell me what happened?” she asked. Her voice was a lot softer today, and Nell’s whole demeanor seems to change with the tone the principal was using. Maybe that was my problem. Maybe I should have spoken to her with a softer tone more often. Maybe she would have told me what was going on. Maybe we could have avoided this whole mess.
Or maybe Rachel, the adult, should have told me.
“Some kids are bullying me. They tease me because I—because I don’t have a mom,” Nell said, then burst into tears. My stomach dropped when she said it, and my heart broke for my little girl. I put my hand out and rubbed her back as she cried into her hands. She didn’t want us to see her face.
“Nell, sweetie. I need you to tell me the names of the students that are bullying you. If you don’t tell me, I can’t help you,” she said.
Nell cried for a minute longer and finally calmed down enough to list off the names. I felt so awful for her, and so inadequate as a parent. I had no idea this was going on. I didn’t even know that bullying could be a thing at this age. How could kids be so mean? I never understood it. They bullied my little girl because she had lost her mother. Who would do that?
“Nell, I am so sorry. This is why you need to talk to me, sweetheart. We could have handled this a different way,” I said to her.
“And now, you can always talk to me, too. This way we can avoid hitting kids and getting into trouble. I see why you did it though,” Trisha said to Nell.
“They were just hurting my feelings so much. Rachel told me to stand up for myself,” Nell said.
“Who is Rachel?” asked Tricia.
“Rachel is my, uh, sort of girlfriend, I guess you could say,” I said. I wasn’t sure what to say because I didn’t know what we were at this moment. We weren’t speaking right now. She had run out and didn’t even say goodbye. Nell said that she’d been crying when she walked out the door, and now I wondered if maybe that was why Nell was so upset with me.
“I don’t think she meant for you to hit another child. I think she meant that you need to stand up for yourself by telling the other child to stop talking like that. But you should also tell a teacher,” I said to her.
Nell reached over and hugged me, and as I held my daughter, she cried even more. She was so distraught, and I didn’t even know why. Yet these children were saying awful things to her. Now the whole parents’ dinner thing made sense. This was why Nell wanted Rachel to come along so badly. Now I knew what they were talking about the other night. It made me wish I’d been more involved. Man, looking back, I wished that I would have demanded to be involved in the conversation they’d had.
“I know it’s tough for any child to grow up without a mother. And then to get bullied for it is absolutely horrible, and unacceptable. You know, Nell, I lost my mom when I was in elementary school,” Trisha said. “Here’s what we’re going to do: you may go back to class, and we won’t take any action against you. But I think, for the other child, we may have to do something more serious. We have a no tolerance policy on bullying. But Nell, I would like you to speak with the school counselor sometimes too. It might help you learn to work through your emotions,” she said.
“Thank you,” Nell said. But we could barely understand Nell because she was still crying. I was relieved that they weren’t going to take any action against Nell, and I sort of felt bad for the other kids, but they had to learn. Bullying kids about losing family members was cruel and had to be dealt with.
Nell started crying harder than ever.
“Nell, sweetie what’s wrong now?” I asked her. I figured she should’ve been doing better now. The principal was going to deal with the other students, and Nell wasn’t in trouble anymore. So what was the problem now?
“You got all mad at Rachel, and it wasn’t her fault. I love Rachel, and you made her leave us,” Nell sobbed into her hands.
I felt like a complete shit about everything. I couldn’t believe the way I handled it. I lost my temper and hurt both Nell and Rachel by being such a jerk. I should have given Rachel the benefit of the doubt. I bet she was just protecting Nell’s secret because Nell didn’t want to talk to me. But maybe I should’ve stepped in and had a conversation with both of them. All I knew was that I felt like crap. I said goodbye to Nell so she could get to her class, and then I went on to the gallery. I wondered if Rachel was even going to be there, and I stopped to pick up her favorite coffee, just in case.
I know I shouldn’t have expected anything, but couldn’t help the disappointment that filled me when I realized she wasn’t there. I figured she wasn’t coming in if she wasn’t there by now. I thought about calling to ask her to come in, but finally decided it might be best to just let her be. I didn’t know how to fix this and honestly, I was still reeling from my trip to the school.
It was quiet, quieter than usual. Nell wasn’t there, and neither was Rachel. I had to admit I really missed her. I missed her greeting me when I came in. I missed her thanking me for the coffee. I missed watching the smile on her face every time she looked at me. I missed just looking at her and knowing she was there.
Sitting down at her desk, I put my head in my hands. I didn’t know what to do with myself now. I was so stressed out about everything. I knew that I’d handled everything so horribly, and I had no idea what I was going to do.
A couple hours later, I was still sitting there when Derek walked in. He was just randomly stopping by the way he did periodically.
“Hey, man,” he said.
“Hey,” I replied. I should have said more, but I didn’t know what else to say to him. I wasn’t happy at all, and really just felt sick. I wasn’t even going to waste my time trying to hide it.
“Where’s Rachel?” he asked.
I looked up at him and exhaled. I wasn’t really ready for this conversation, but he was asking, and I wasn’t going hide anything from my best friend.
“She’s not here,” I said, not really knowing what else to say.
“Why not?” he asked.
“Well, because she told Nell to stick up for herself,” I shrugged.
“Seriously? I don’t get it? What you mean by that?” I could tell he was confused by what was going on. Hell, I was even confused by what was going on.
“Well, Nell was being bullied at school. I had no idea about it, but she spoke to Rachel, who told her that it’s always best to stand up to a bully. Nell took her at her word and hit the kid that was doing it.”
“Damn, that’s awesome!” Derek said, cutting me off.
I gave him a dirty look, “That’s not the point. The point is, Rachel gave her that advice, and Nell ended up hitting a kid over it. Rachel overstepped, man. She’s not a parent, and Nell is not her kid. She had no right to do that.”
“So, you fired her?” he asked.
“I didn’t fire her. I told her that she wasn’t Nell’s mother and that she’s not a parent so she has no idea what to do. And then she just took off,” I said to him.
“Oh boy,” he said with a whistle. This was usually an indication that he had more information.
“What?” I asked him.
“So, I’m kind of seeing her best friend, Sadie. And she told me that Rachel has been pretty torn up since she lost her child two years ago,” he said.
“What? Are you serious? Oh God, what have I done? Damn. I had no idea. I would never have said anything like that if I would have known.” I was sick and had no idea what to think. I knew I’d broken Rachel’s heart and hurt her terribly. I couldn’t imagine the pain of losing a child, let alone hearing her boyfriend, the father of a little girl she’s been nothing but amazing with, remind her that she’s not even a parent.
I thought I’d felt awful before, but now I felt like a complete ass.
“I had no idea,” I repeated. “I’m such a jerk.”
“Yeah, but if she never told you, it’s not all on you, man. But dude, I think maybe you should go talk to her,” he said.
He had a point. But I wasn’t sure that Rachel would even talk to me. I wouldn’t have coped very well myself after something like that. I was at a complete loss as to what to say or do, and I’d never felt like a bigger brute in my whole life.