Page 23 of Demitrius

Now that he had a good list of who they were, David helping him out with the way they were seated, he was ready as he’d ever be with taking the teachers down a few notches. He thought that David, too, was going to have fun. Firing them all is what he’d do, but then he was hard like that. They tried their best to screw over a foundation that was helping them more with class funds than any other school in the country. David stood up, and the room quieted.

“Today we’re here to talk about the latest lists that you handed over to Mandy Erikson when she was here this week. Zander wants to go over some of the things on the list with you.” There was a slight discomfort in the room. They shifted in their seats and suddenly had to look at their shirts or blouses. None of them made eye contact with any of them. “He just wants to make sure that you understand what it is that you’ve requested is going to take up room in your classes. Mrs. Raider, I believe you’re first.”

“Why do I have to be first?” He pointed out that she was the first one in the seats. “Oh. Well, I don’t want to go first. Go on to someone else and let me gather my thoughts on the things.”

“You ordered to have one hundred and fifty cases of water for your room, is that right?” Zander asked her to stand up. “I just wanted to make sure that you understand that’s going to be two or more pallets of water stacked pretty high. Where do you plan to keep the extras until they’re needed? I mean, you only have twenty-four students, and if you count you and your aid, that’s less than a case a day if you only get one bottle. You’re going to be a while before you get to the other hundred-plus cases.”

“I’ll have a storage unit. I was planning on putting things in there that are too many for the classroom.” He asked her where it was, so that they could make sure that things were put there. “Oh, it’s near to my home. That way, I can pick up a couple of cases when I need them. That’s what I’m going to do. I never thought of them being so many and large.”

“I didn’t realize that you’d be paying for a unit. That must be expensive at what? Thirty-something a month? My brother had one, he said it nearly drained him in keeping up with the payments each month.” She said she thought that the foundation would pick up the tab. “No, I’m afraid not. And once it’s put into your storage locker, we won’t have anything to do with it. You’ll be on your own.”

“What do you mean, I’ll be on my own?” He told her. “I never thought of it freezing or getting too hot in the summer. I thought that…well, I don’t know what I thought.”

“Along with the other things that you got, the fifty cases of tissues. Do the kids in your room have a lot of colds? Or perhaps allergies? This would be another pallet of tissues for your room. In total, you would have to rent out three storage units to hold all the extra things that you have on your list.At that price, you’d be paying over a hundred dollars a month for just storage.” She looked confused, and he smiled. He knew that it was his prey-to-predator kind of smile, and he used it all the time in the courtroom. “Here we are trying to save you money and—”

“Mr. Carter told us that you were too stupid to notice how much we were getting and that you’d blindly give it to us. We were told that you’d never check and we could—”

“Me? I don’t know what you’re talking about. I didn’t say anything about padding the list. I simply went along with the rest of you until last evening.” He looked at him. “You got my revised list, didn’t you? None of my things are going to have to be put into storage. I gave them a good list. Isn’t that right, Mr. Erikson?”

“You did. However, I think that things happened just the way that they said. While I have no proof of your wrongdoing, I do believe what they say is true. You were behind all this.” He said he’d better take that back. “I will when it’s proven to me that you had nothing to do with this. And just so you all know, using donated things from a charity for your own personal gain is against the law. Padding these lists sounds like something that you’re doing, like the refrigerator and the microwave. Paint for your room. Pallets of things like bottled water. It all sounds to me like you were doing this for your own personal use.”

It was a free-for-all, all in them blaming Carter and trying to say that they’d take a great deal less than they’d been told to pad their lists with. Even Carter was saying that he’d redo his list again just to prove that he’d had nothing to do with the way the other teachers had done their lists. Finally having enough, David let go of a whistle that rivaled Shipley’s when she was trying to get someone’s attention.

“Sit down and shut up.” They did it immediately, not even in the chairs they’d been in before. “I tell you what is going to happen right now. There will be no more help from the Eriksons for the next ten years or until you quit or I fire you. And yes, you have no idea how close I am to firing each and every one of you for this mess.”

“You can’t fire us for padding something that we were given to list for them.” He told Ms. Applet to watch him. “This is ridiculous. Who will you have teach these brats? The Eriksons? Sure, go right ahead, and I’ll tell the board what you’ve been up to. And even if I have to make it up, you’ll be on the next bus out of town by the time I’m finished with you.”

The board had been there all the time. In the hallway, listening to what transpired in the meeting. After they were introduced to the group, they sat down in the room right behind each teacher. Now things were going to get interesting. Ms. Applet stood up and turned to the board.

“I was upset. I didn’t mean that about David. I’ve been accused of taking things for my own personal use from a charity when all I wanted to do was get some nice things for the classroom for the kids.” One of the board members, he didn’t know their names, just then said that she’d called them brats before. Even from where he was sitting, he could tell that her face had turned a dark red in embarrassment. “I feel as if we’ve all been ambushed in this. How were we to know that they didn’t want us to order things for the kids for the rest of the year?”

“Ms. Applet, your list was the most padded. You had on there that you wanted three hundred cases of water, seventy-five cases of tissues, as well as a plethora of other things that we don’t supply to the school at all, like plastic silverware, napkins, paper towels, and paper plates. I also know that at the end of the summer, you and your family have a hog roast that supplies all those things to everyone who comes. You were taking things from us that would have supplied all the extras that you’d need for that, I believe.” She lifted her chin up but said nothing. “Also, there are things on here like tubs—you gave the sizes that you wanted as well.”

“I thought of the kids.” He pulled up her list, naming off all the things on it as well as how many she wanted. “Oh hell. So what? It’s not like you guys don’t have all the money. You can well afford all the things on our lists twice over. I don’t know what you’re bitching about. It’s not like I asked you for the hogs to go along with the other stuff. I’ll admit it, yes, it’s for my own personal use. What are you going to do to me? Fire me? I was looking for another job when I found this one. Go ahead. Do your worst on me. But try to find a teacher this late in the year.”

Mrs. Rider from the board handed her a thick envelope, and she was escorted out by a security team that he’d had no idea had been brought in. After that, all the teachers were escorted out one by one for their month off without pay. It would hurt a great many of them, being off work without any income, but that had nothing to do with him. He’d only been brought in to prove a point, and he doubted any of them got it.

As they were sitting there, talking amongst themselves, he had an idea that David hadn’t known of the layoffs nor that anyone was going to be fired. He looked as poleaxed as he felt, knowing that the town was going to find out about their part in the firing and laying off of all the teachers at the elementary school. There would be a lot of uproar about it. Some backlash as well. But he’d done what needed to be done to keep the charity afloat without being drained by a bunch of people who had decided to take advantage of them.

For the rest of the evening, he decided to go to the football game that was playing at home this week. He’d only been there ten minutes when he was approached by two different people about the rumor that the teachers had been given a month off without pay and that the charity foundation was no longer going to supply things for the teachers.

“I have to tell you, Zander, I depend on you guys to help my family out. I have five kids in the school right now, and without you guys supplying them with backpacks full of the things they need, I don’t know what we’d do. You can bet that they’d not have anything that’s for sure.” He assured the man that the backpacks would still be supplied. But nothing to the teachers who had gotten greedy. “I heard about them lists. Can’t say that I blame the board for getting rid of them. Shameful is what that was. Just shameful. People like them, well, you can bet that I’m not going to be feeling sorry for them. Durn shame that they had to bite the hand that fed them.”

“Thank you for that. I wasn’t sure how the town would react knowing what my part in this was going to be.” He told him that there would be complainers all over the place, but he wasn’t to pay them any mind. “I won’t. Thank you so much.”

He ended up not staying for the game. Zander had to defend himself a couple of times, but mostly everyone was worried about how it was going to affect the backpack donations that they did every year. He’d not realized how many people really depended on that donation to the school. Spending the rest of his evening at home, he was glad for the extra time that he could go over his notes for the upcoming trial for Carrie’s family. They’d hit her one too many times as far as he was concerned.

~*~

Demi was watching the kids while Mandy was working on her classes. She’d been doing them so long now that she was getting really good at them. And he knew that people appreciated her ability at making it easier on them when they learned a new skill. He knew that ordering groceries online had saved them a lot of time and energy.

“What time is Mandy supposed to be home? I have a question for her.” Demi asked if he could answer it. “No, it has to be her. But I have one for you, too. The kids at school make fun of me on account of me not having any parents. Can I call you, Dad? It sure would keep me from being beat up every day.”

“Are you really being beat up every day, Teddy?” He said he wasn’t, but they did make fun of him without a dad or mom. “I don’t care if you call me dad or not, but I want you to want that instead of being pressured into it.”

“Nobody is making me say that. I just want to have a dad that is real. Not like my other dad when he’d beat us—and he really did beat us all the time.” Demi told him he was sorry about that. “Why do grown-ups say that all the time? They’re sorry that my real dad beat me up all the time. If they was sorry, they should do something about it when it’s happening. Telling me you’re sorry is too late to help me.”

Teddy was angry, and he didn’t understand why. Before he could get to the bottom of it, Teddy burst into tears and flung himself into his arms. He kept saying that he was sorry that he didn’t have someone to love him when he was littler. That he was always looking for someone to smack himaround, and how exhausting it was. There were other things, too. He missed his momma and that he didn’t think she did a good job in keeping them safe, not like he and Mandy did. The poor kid was so upset when he looked up at him that it did something painful to his heart.

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