The School Bully by Fiona Wilde Page B

personally. She had a good circle of friends and even enjoyed dating and had even had a couple of almost-serious boyfriends. She planned to stay where she was, and would have had her father not died. It was sudden, a heart attack. It left her mother a wreck and Anna – ever dutiful – decided to come back to Langford.
    The only problem was finding a job. Even with her stellar credentials and references, she could find nothing in the public school system. The tough economy had led to a hiring freeze and the only jobs available were at Bridgestone Academy, which had undergone a staff shakeup the year before after a scandal involving the headmaster and a nubile senior student. The scandal had hit the paper, rocking the ivy-covered structure to its foundation. Bridgestone went into full damage control mode; the entire upper administration was fired, along with a number of instructors who were personal friends with the headmaster. Some locals called it a witch hunt, but the board was eager to salvage the school's reputation.
    Anna's homecoming coincided with the school's head hunt. She had only reluctantly dropped off her resume and was surprised when her cell phone rang just moments after leaving the school. The board was interested – no, eager – to meet her. They apologized for not yet having a new headmaster and hoped that they'd trust the board to appoint a new administrator who would be worthy of her loyalty and respect.
    It amused Anna to hear the board member being so solicitous to a former student that had never been celebrated, that had never made head cheerleader or filled the trophy case with awards. It gratified her to be accepted on merit, to be finally taken seriously in a town she'd always considered shallow.
    She took the job. When school started after Labor Day, she'd be the new eighth grade teacher. Anna planned to spend the year teaching her mother to be more independent. She'd make more in that one year than she'd make working three years in the public school system. After that, she told herself, she'd leave. She knew that the administration would be disappointed, but after the years of pain she'd suffered at the school she figured taking the money and running would even the score.
    Anna was confident she could handle a year at her hated alma mater. So it unnerved her a bit to find all the feelings of fear and apprehension rushing back as she looked in on the classroom where she'd spent so many unhappy hours. Her old home room where now, instead of avoiding eye contact with the class, she'd be facing them, teaching them. She wondered how many of her new students would be like the students she'd known – the petulant antagonists who dared the teachers to call mommy or daddy.
    “Take a deep breath,” she said to herself, and walked up to the teacher's desk. Her desk. The former inhabitant had apparently not bothered to clean her desk. Paper clips and confiscated gum and notes littered the bottom of the top drawer. The file drawer was filled with lesson plans, a log book and mimeographed test sheets. Anna took out the log book and perused it quickly, noting which students had been written up. There had been quite a few; some had been sent to the headmaster multiple times.
    “PADDLED.” The word, scrawled in red, by one problem student's name caught her attention. Anna was genuinely shocked that the school still used corporal punishment. She remembered students fearfully whispering of that particular penalty. Always administered by the headmaster, it was seen as the ultimate humiliation. She'd never seen the paddle, but had heard of it. It was long and thick and hung in the headmaster's closet. She remembered one or two students – burly rugby players, both – who had been called to the office for that particular punishment. They had been caught smoking. The boys had left the classroom with smirks on their faces and had returned walking stiffly, their faces flaming with embarrassment and their eyes