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“Oh, my God,” she said, looking in at me. “Oh my, my.”

She looked so confused and flustered, I half-expected her to suffer heart failure. Her pallid face was beet red, her lips twisting. Then, finally gathering her wits, she told me to stay where I was and rushed off. I finished fixing my clothes and walked out of the room. Ashley was nowhere to be seen, and neither was Mrs. Fassbinder. After I splashed some water on my face, I wiped it with a towel and returned to the remedial reading room.

“How are you?” Mr. Cody asked when I entered. “You look a little flustered yet.”

“I’m all right,” I said, and then noticed no one else was in the room. “What’s going on?”

“It’s your lunch hour, Phoebe.” He pointed to the clock. “Be back at one-ten. You know where the cafeteria is and all, right?”

“I’m not hungry,” I said.

“Well, you still have a long day ahead of you, Phoebe. You should get something in your stomach, unless the nurse has said otherwise, of course.”

“That’s right. She said otherwise,” I told him.

“Well, I’m just off to lunch myself. You can sit here or go outside as long as you don’t leave the school grounds, okay?”

I nodded, and he left. The truth was I was still shaking, the trembles rattling my very bones. I flopped into my seat and lowered my head to my folded arms. I think I fell asleep for a few minutes because when the door was opened and I heard my name, it was almost one o’clock.

A tall, dark-haired man wearing a tie and a shirt with no jacket stood in the doorway, holding the door open. His shirtsleeves were rolled up to his elbows. He had a firm mouth, a cleft chin, and two brown eyes under thick, dark brown eyebrows.

“Phoebe Elder?” he said again.

“Yes.”

“Come with me,” he said.

“Who are you?”

“Dean Cassidy,” he said. “Let’s go.”

“Where am I going?”

“To my office, young lady. Move it. I don’t intend to have a conversation with you in this doorway,” he said sternly.

I rose and walked out.

“Keep going,” he said, remaining a foot or so behind me. “Just past the guidance department,” he added, and I turned into an office doorway.

The secretary turned from the filing cabinet and looked at us. She had short, auburn hair and was dumpy with a round face. Her eyes narrowed as she shook her head.

“Send for Ashley Porter,” Dean Cassidy ordered, and she moved quickly to the phone on her desk.

“In here,” he told me, holding a door open.

I entered his office, which wasn’t much bigger than the outer office. On the paneled walls were all sorts of commendations, plaques, and awards from a variety of community organizations, congratulating Dean Cassidy for his work with the youth of the community, as well as his college degrees in gilded frames. I saw pictures of a pretty woman and two little girls on his desk.

“Sit,” he commanded, pointing to a chair in front of his desk. He didn’t go to his chair. Instead, he went to the window and looked out. He stood there without speaking so long, I assumed he was waiting for someone else, but finally he turned and glared down at me.

“I’ve been here for almost ten years now,” he began. “I’ve dealt with many things, insubordination in class, truancy, theft, fighting, smoking, vandalism, but this is the first incident of something as sordid and disgusting as this.

“And then, on top of that, to have such a thing involve a student that hasn’t been in my school two full days!”

I turned away from him and stared at the wall.

“I don’t know whether to have you sent to a church, a mental institution, or a prison,” he hollered so loudly it made my ears ring and shook my insides, but I didn’t cry and I didn’t cower.

Slowly, I turned my head back to him and looked up at him. He was frozen with his back bent, his face glaring, his arms out.