Oh, wait. Jade. “They rang me,” Zane’s sister was saying, “because I’m the kids’ secondary contact, after Nan. Dunno why Zane did that, as I don’t have the first idea what to do. What do I know about kids’ fights? Bugger all. Not that I didn’t get into the occasional barney as a kid, because I’m hot-blooded that way, but as for knowing what todoabout them …”
“Wait,” Skylar said. “Back up. What’s the trouble, exactly?”
“I told you,” Jade said. “Finlay and Scarlett are in the principal’s office. Fighting after school, apparently. First, I’m at work, and second … help.”
55
REPERCUSSIONS
Skylar walked into the office of the intermediate school and explained why she was there. For Finlay, and also for Scarlett. The secretary said, “Nobody on Scarlett’s approved list will be here, then?”
“I’m afraid not,” Skylar said. “Her father is out of the country, her grandmother is in Hawke’s Bay, and her aunt is at work. But I’m, er, her dad’s partner, so Jade asked me to come get this sorted for both of them.”
The principal came out of her office then. “Hello, Skylar,’ she said. “Let me explain what’s happened, and then we’ll send Finlay home with you. Any word from Scarlett’s whanau?” she asked the secretary.
Which meant that Skylar had to explain again. “If you need to talk to somebody on the list,” she said, “you can ring his grandmother, but as for somebody who can actually be here, I’m afraid that’s me.”
“Maureen did suggest that Scarlett could go home with you,” the principal said. “It’s a bit irregular, but needs must, eh, and as we got permission from both Maureen and the aunt, I don’t see a problem.” Nadine Fernley, her name was, and shewas, oddly, less scary than Skylar’s principal. Even though intermediate pupils were surely the most difficult of all, during that time when the most angelic child was suddenly talking back and acting out and being, in fact, the occasional monster. There was a reason Skylar taught Year One.
“But what happened?” Skylar asked. “They were getting along fine this morning. They’ve been getting along fine most of the time lately. The odd squabble here and there, butfighting?Finlay hit a girl? He hitScarlett?That’s hard for me to believe. Though I realize that mums aren’t always the most objective.” She had to add that bit for credibility. Shefeltperfectly objective.
“Oh, he didn’t hit a girl,” Nadine said.“Scarletthit a girl—and a couple of boys, too—but Finlay only hit the boys.”
“I’m completely confused,” Skylar said. “Can we start at the beginning, please? What actually happened here?”
“Suppose I take you in there,” Nadine said, “and let them tell you themselves.”
Scarlett was holding an icepack to her nose. She also had blood on her uniform blouse. Finlay, meanwhile, had an icepack on his knuckles, and another held to his eye.
“You both look like you’ve been in the wars,” Skylar said. “Care to explain?” To tell the truth, she was so relieved that they hadn’t hit each other, it was a bit hard to be as stern as she ought to be.
Scarlett said, “What was I supposed to do when James Wattersley came up to me and told me my dad’s a dirty player? And that he’d probably paralyzed that guy on purpose?”
Skylar didn’t feel a bit like laughing now. “Somebody’s paralyzed?”
“Idon’tknow,”Scarlett said, “because I don’t have aphone.He said so, and Colin Bowers, who’s his best mate and the other biggest bully in my year, said, yeh, he was, and it wasDad’s fault. So I hit James, and then he hit me, and then Mary Hawera, who hates me anyway and is James’s girlfriend, pulled my hair, so I hither,and then?—”
“And then I came out of school,” Finlay said, “and they were all hitting Scarlett, so Ihadto hit them. What was I meant to do, just let them hurt her like that? With all of them ganging up, and kids filming and all?”
“Kidsfilming?”Skylar asked.
“They always film,” Finlay said, “when there’s a fight.”
“Wasn’t there a teacher around?” Skylar asked, mainly because you were meant to ask that.
“No,”Scarlett said. “There’snevera teacher around when there’s a fight. I think they all go and hide under their desks or something. And anyway, they were calling my dad names!”
“It’s true, Mum,” Finlay said earnestly. “They were. If I’d run for a teacher, Scarlett would probably be dead or something.”
“I wouldn’t bedead,”Scarlett said. “I was fighting back. Those boys aren’t very good fighters. They’re just bigger, so theythinkthey’re good fighters. But Finlay hit Colin really hard. I didn’t know you could punch like that, Finlay.”
“I didn’t know either,” Finlay said. “Maybe I have natural fighting talent.”
“If you want to develop your natural fighting talent,” Skylar said,notlaughing, because that would be inappropriate and also detrimental to Finlay’s character development, “we’ll get you lessons. Which will teach you hownotto fight as well. You could have, for example, pulled them off Scarlett.”
“Well, not three of them, I couldn’t,” Finlay said. “And I couldn’t hit Mary, either.”
“Ihit Mary,” Scarlett said. “Her nose bled worse than mine, and I kneed James in the bollocks.Afterhe hit me in the chest. He did that on purpose, so I had to. We would’ve beat them,even though there were three of them and only two of us, but a teacher broke it up, so we couldn’t.”
