In the background, he could make out words.

“You’ve had it out for him, even though—”

He sighed.

“If what goes around comes around, then you guys are really going to hurt for the way you’ve treated me, the past few years.”

“You don’t really believe that.”

He didn’t.

But he measured out another smile. Getting back at her would be satisfying, but he’d learned that it was an empty kind of payback. A fast food kind of thing, empty and not so good for him in the long term. It was the same if he got her to show her true face when his parents were so close by. Empty fast food satisfaction.

Like this? If he just gave her a smile that might be the last thing she saw of him? She’d know. She knew that she’d lost, all of them had lost. They hadn’t beat him.

The door to the principal’s office opened. Ryan had a fleeting glimpse of the old woman’s expression, doubt, that expression he’d adapted to like a person in London learned to live with fog and rain, or how a person who lived in Lyon learned to live with Endbringers kicking their shit in.

“Let’s go,” his mother said.

“What’s going on?” he stood.

“We’ll talk about it later,” she said.

He rose from his seat. There were no parting words from the bald old principal or Mrs. Parrish as he left with his family, walking down the hall toward the front doors. He knew they followed behind, because his dad shot a look back in that direction.

He wouldn’t give them the satisfaction of looking back. He was pretty sure he was done here. Done with this school, with old teachers who had long since stopped caring about anything except being shitty and getting on his case.

They were just past the doors when his dad put a hand on his shoulder. Ryan stopped, turning. This was it. The test.

“Did you hurt that girl?” his dad asked him.

Ryan’s thoughts flashed to the confrontation in the parking lot. Christina’s friends cornering him, one of them with tears in her eyes. Emotional and violent.

“No,” he lied with sincerity.

His mother put a hand on his shoulder, leaning over to kiss him on top of the head. He knew the doors were glass, and that his old principal and homeroom teacher were probably still looking.

He didn’t steal a glance. Even a glance could be fast food. Fast food was better than a tantrum, but the long play was even better than that.

⊙

“Amanda?”