The Neighbor

apparently he’d been slugged with the complete set of Encyclopedia Britannica. Holy crap.

Mrs. Lizbet was looking down at him, worry creasing her brow. “Are you okay? Don’t move. We’ll call an ambulance.”

No, he tried to say, but the word didn’t come out. He finally managed to inhale, his chest expanding with a grateful rush. He managed the word better on the exhale, low and pitiful as it sounded: “No.”

“Don’t be stupid-”

“No!” He rolled back over onto his hands and knees, his head hanging down, his skull still ringing. Leg hurt. Face hurt. Chest was better. See, real progress.

He got himself to his feet and became aware of approximately eight dozen wide-eyed teenagers and half a dozen very concerned adults standing around him. Ethan Hastings was being pinned in place by a man who appeared to be the gym teacher. The kid, all hundred and thirty pounds of him, was still struggling furiously, his carrot-topped, freckle-covered face staring at Jason with unadulterated hatred.

Jason put a hand to his face and wiped away the first streak of blood. Then the second. Kid had cut him pretty good, next to his left eye, but it was nothing that wouldn’t heal.

“What in the world…” The principal finally arrived at the scene. Phil Stewart took one look at Jason’s bruised and bleeding face, then Ethan’s rage-filled features, and started snapping commands. “You,” finger at Ethan, “in my office. And the rest of you,” finger at gawking kids, “back to class.”

The principal had spoken. Kids dispersed as swiftly as they had gathered, and Jason found himself following Ethan Hastings down the hallway, Mrs. Lizbet’s concerned hand on his elbow. He was trying to understand what had just happened to him, and doing a lousy job of it.

“Ree?” he asked in a low voice.

“Still in the gym. I’ll have Jenna walk her to the home ec class. They spend half their time baking cookies. That should keep her busy.”

“Thank you.” They came to the nurse’s office. Elizabeth steered him inside, where he met the shocked gaze of a matronly woman wearing cat-patterned surgical scrubs.

“Playing dodgeball at your age?” she asked.

“You know, for a small guy, a computer geek can be awfully quick.”

The nurse stared at Elizabeth. “There was an altercation,” the social studies teacher explained. “Unfortunately, Mr. Jones was attacked by a student.”

The nurse’s gaze widened more. For some reason, this affronted Jason’s masculinity and he felt compelled to add, “He had a textbook!”

That seemed to break the spell and the nurse got busy, fussing over his cut eye, giving him ice for the rapidly growing knot on his head. “You need to take two aspirin,” she informed him, “then sleep for eight hours.”

He wanted to laugh. Eight hours? He needed to sleep for eight days. But it wasn’t going to happen. Wasn’t going to happen.

He staggered his way out of the nurse’s office, back to admin, where he was sure the adventures were just beginning.

Jason found Phil Stewart sitting behind a massive oak desk, the kind of furniture meant to inspire awe in students and adults alike. A small flat-screen monitor occupied the left-hand corner of the desk, accompanied by a complicated-looking phone. The rest of the desk contained nothing but a desk blotter, and Phil’s clasped hands.

Ethan Hastings was sitting in a chair in the proverbial corner. He looked up when Jason entered, and for a moment, it appeared as if he might launch a fresh attack.

Jason decided to remain standing.

“I have called Ethan’s parents,” the principal announced crisply. “As well as the police. An assault by a student is a very serious matter. I have already informed Ethan’s parents that he will be suspended for the next five days, while an expulsion hearing is scheduled in front of the superintendent. Naturally, Mr. Jones may pursue criminal charges with the police.”

Ethan blanched, then fisted his hands mutinously and stared down at the carpet.

“I don’t think that will be necessary,” Jason said.

“Have you looked in a mirror?” Phil asked dryly.

Jason shrugged. “I understand how high emotions might be running at a time like this. For Ethan and for myself.”

If he was hoping for a relationship with the red-headed boy, it wasn’t happening. Ethan shot him another threatening look, then the office door opened and Adele stuck her head in.

“Police are here.”

“Send them in.”

The door opened wider, and Jason had the unpleasant shock of seeing Sergeant D.D. Warren and her sidekick, Detective Miller, enter. Wouldn’t uniformed officers normally respond to this kind of petty incident? Unless, of course, the detectives heard about it on the radio and connected their own dots.

Jason glanced ruefully at Ethan Hastings, understanding now that the pummeling had been nothing compared to the damage the boy was about to inflict.

“Sergeant D.D. Warren,” the female detective introduced herself, then Miller. They shook Phil’s hand, nodded at Ethan, then regarded Jason with the kind of flinty stares most cops reserved for gang-bangers or serial killers.

Grieving husband, he reminded himself, but didn’t really feel like playing anymore today.

“Heard you had an incident,” Warren stated.

Phil gestured to Ethan, whose head was ducked between his bony shoulders. “Ethan?” he asked quietly.

“It’s his fault,” the boy exploded, head coming up, finger stabbing at Jason. “Mrs. Sandra warned me about him. She warned me.”

D.D. gave Jason a look, still cool, but with an element of smug. “What did Mrs. Sandra say, Ethan?”

“She married young,” the boy said earnestly. “She was eighteen. That’s not that much older than me, you know.”

The adults didn’t say anything.

“But she didn’t love him anymore.” The boy sneered, staring boldly at Jason. “She told me she didn’t love you anymore.”

Did the words hurt? Jason didn’t know. He was in his zone, and when he was in his zone, nothing could hurt him. That was the point of the zone. The whole reason he had developed it when he had been too young and too weak to do anything else to stop the pain.

“Sandy told me she was working with you on a project,” Jason said softly. “She said you are an excellent student, Ethan, and she enjoyed working with you very much.”

Ethan flushed, ducked his head again.

“How long have you loved her?” Jason pressed, aware of D.D. stiffening beside him as Phil Stewart’s eyes widened in shock.

“No-” the principal started.

“You don’t deserve her!” Ethan burst out. “You work all the time. You leave her alone. I would treat her better. I’d spend every second of every day with her if I could. I’m helping her with her teaching module, you know. I go to the basketball games, just for her. Because that’s what you’re supposed to do if you love someone. You’re supposed to stay with them, talk to them. You’re supposed to be with them.”

“How often were you with Mrs. Sandra?” Sergeant Warren asked now.

“Every day. Free period. I was teaching her all about navigating the Internet, how to explain it to the sixth- graders. I’m very good with computers, you know.”

Crap, Jason thought. Holy crap.

“Ethan, did you and Mrs. Sandra ever go out together?” Warren asked.

“I saw her every Thursday at the basketball games. Thursday nights are my favorite night of the whole week.”

“Did you go to her house or maybe someplace else?”