Page 19 of Precise Justice

By now, Stephanie had retrieved the book and placed it in front of Robbie. Again, Robbie looked back without responding.

Alex reached down, picked up the book and tossed it on the floor next to Robbie.

“Pick it up, Pretty Pansy,” Alex said.

Robbie sighed then let out a breath of air indicating his annoyance as he stood. When he bent down to pick up the book, Alex made a huge mistake. She reached down and grabbed Robbie by his hair and yanked him up.

Both Alex and Kevin were sophomores, a year older than Robbie. Over the past year, despite the puberty blockers, Robbiehad grown three inches and put on fifteen pounds. On top of that, Robbie was still a boy. Alex was still Carla, the girl.

Pulling his hair the way she did hurt Robbie. He let out a short howl, then thousands of years of male evolution took over.

With his left arm, Robbie knocked Alex’s hand off of his hair. Reflexively, Robbie turned and before he realized what he was doing, landed a perfect right jab squarely onto Alex’s nose.

The punch flattened her nose, made it burst into a bloody mess and knocked her flat on her back. Robbie found himself standing over her with both hands as fists. It took two or three seconds before Robbie realized what he had done.

“Bitch,” he said looking down at her.

By now everyone in the study hall was standing, watching the confrontation, including the study hall teacher/monitor, Ms. Gillian. Debra Gillian was a twenty-two year old social justice teacher fresh out of Macalester, a liberal arts college in St. Paul.

Horrified by what she had just seen, something she had never experienced before, she froze. With Robbie standing over Alex, fists clenched and a fierce look on his face, everyone froze. These things simply do not happen at The Wheaton Academy.

The silence lasted, maybe, three seconds. At the exact same moment, everyone in the room, except Ms. Gillian, let out a cheer. Alex/Carla had bullied quite a few of them. She was not about to receive any sympathy.

Do somethingwas the recurring thought running through Debra Gillian’s head. While the cheering was still going on, Gillian finally got moving.

A half-hour later, Alex was still lying on a cot in the nurse’s office. She had her head back and a towel covering her nose. The nurse had wanted an ambulance. Alex insisted that her mother be called.

Meanwhile, a frightened Robbie and Ms. Gillian were in the chancellor’s office. Fortunately for Robbie, quite unfortunately for the wounded Alex, Ms. Gillian had witnessed all of it.

“Is that what happened, Robbie?” Chancellor Warner asked.

Debra Gillian had told the true story to the chancellor. Of course, he wanted to know where she was and why she did not stop it.

“It happened so fast,” she replied. “I was shocked and it took a few seconds for me to realize what happened. But Alex was the aggressor, no doubt about it.”

Also in the chancellor’s office was the vice-chancellor in charge of discipline, Grady Sinclair. Sinclair was a hire from the public school system in St. Paul. He was a high school math teacher and one-time Marine. Having become totally fed up with the non-discipline coddling of students in America’s public schools, he went to Wheaton and never looked back. Sinclair also had a master’s degree in education.

“Robbie, would you wait out in the reception area please?” Chancellor Warner asked.

“Sure,” Robbie said, relieved to at least get out of the chancellor’s office.

Robbie left and Chancellor Warner turned to Sinclair.

“Grady?” was all he asked.

“That’s what happened?” Sinclair asked Ms. Gillian.

“Yes, there are thirty students up there who saw it. They’ll tell you the same thing,” she answered.

“These two, Alex and Kevin, the girls transitioning to boys, they’ve been a problem,” Sinclair told Warner.

“How so?”

“Mostly little things. They’re becoming boys and bullies. Especially toward younger, smaller kids. If it was up to me, they would both be gone and that would be the end of it,” Sinclair said.

“All of the other students in the study hall cheered when Robbie hit her,” Gillian added.

“They did?” Warner asked.