Page 10 of Bend Him, Break Him
It was scary, the way Isaac locked his eyes onto Colton, the way his teeth filled his face, the way the light from above cast shadows on his features and added a glint to the many piercings on Isaac’s face.
“So spectacular, in fact, I just knew it couldn’t be yours.” Isaac nodded affirmatively. “What does one do when they suspect cheating? Well, they search the web for lifted materials, they run the text through AI analysis software, they do all the things to check off their list of copied work.”
“It’s not plagiarized.”
“Really?” Isaac scratched his chin like he was deep in thought.
Colton suspected Isaac was, in fact, not thinking deeply.
“One might think that, especially if they looked as thoroughly as I did and came up with nothing,” Isaac continued. “But there was something off about it. None of the words matched your style remotely. Your prose is sloppy but decent. This was too eloquent, yet also tastefully watered down in sections, almost intentionally simplifying itself to go undetected.”
Colton only understood about half of what Isaac said at this point.
“It was also very familiar in this gnawing sort of way.” Isaac tapped a button and pulled up a digital copy of the original essay.
Colton scrunched his face. How did Isaac have the essay Colton’s cousin had turned in?
“Now, I don’t have the original,” Isaac explained. “But I bet if I called good ole Ms. Farmer, she probably still has it filed away somewhere. She used to horde student projects to keep siblingsfrom recycling each other’s work. Or, in your case, cousin’s work.”
“How did you…” Colton stared at the giant screen of the two essays side by side, not requiring Isaac to scroll through them. He’d only added a few new quotes so he could include on-campus resources, which he mostly fudged to begin with.
“Who do you think did the essay to begin with?”
“What?” Colton stared wide-eyed.
“It can’t be a surprise,” Isaac said. “I used to do your work all the time. Granted, the only thing I got in exchange was a dick down my throat, but most of my clientele offered pretty nice payments for a solid B paper.”
“It wasn’t really plagiarizing. It’s not like I stole it from some published work,” Colton said, mostly reassuring himself.
Isaac pulled up a new screen to display a few of the academic guidelines and definitions in the student handbook.
Plagiarism, in its most basic form, was an act of theft without providing proper credit for someone else’s ideas or work. Using his cousin’s words—his cousin’s paper—was the same as looking at someone else’s test and writing down their answers.
“I have a friend who is part of the student disciplinary panel.” Isaac tsked and shook his head. “They say you’re quite the troublemaker, always just barely escaping the chopping block.”
Fear washed over Colton, making his body warm and queasy while a cold wave of terror trailed along his skin, giving him goosebumps.
“Fighting, drinking, academic dishonesty.” Isaac clicked through his slideshow, letting the words pop up in bold bubble letters. “Quite the list it took to land on academic probation. Hell, half of this alone would get most students suspended.”
“It’s not what…” Colton struggled to speak, to defend himself, to argue against the truths Isaac gleefully hurled.
“But plagiarizing in Professor Howard’s course will not be swept away. The woman’s a force of nature and doesn’t let athletes—or anyone, quite frankly—walk over the academic integrity of her department.”
Colton couldn’t move, couldn’t think, could barely fathom the basic function of breathing as dread seemed to close his throat.
“Even if the school doesn’t enforce the expulsion policy because of the plagiarism, Professor Howard will enforce the automatic zero and write up for it. This is the final exam. It’s your whole fucking grade, which means you’ll fail this class.”
Colton didn’t need the explanation, understanding his situation all too well, but he suspected Isaac took some sadistic pleasure in beating Colton over the head with the details.
“That breaks the rules on your academic probation.” Isaac began counting off on his fingers. “Not eligible to play sports ball games, GPA too low for academic standing, and the grace period on your probation running short means you’ll be kicked out for that.”
“You’re just gonna destroy my whole life, and for what?”
“For what?” Isaac nearly ran up on Colton, stopping short of slamming into the jock. “Don’t you dare turn me into the villain of this story. This isn’t villainy. This is justified. You’re the fucking criminal who broke me, ruined me, humiliated me, and got away with it.”
“I’m… I’m…” Colton choked on his apology as he had a thousand times before when rehearsing it. “What happened was awful, but you came back stronger. If you do this, it’ll destroy my chances at any school. You don’t just walk off an expulsion.”
“You think I just walked off what you and your buddies did?” Isaac glared. “You think I had a little therapy and talked about my feelings and got over the fact I was stripped and beaten and thrown out naked for the school to see?”
