Page 7 of Grin and Bear It

And now I wouldn’t be able to.

The boys were just lashing out wildly, without too much thought as to the consequences of their actions, more intent on making others feel the pain they didn’t dare face than anything. But the implications of what they had done took my breath away. I could be reported to the education department for breaching the social media guidelines at the very least and at worst… A younger female teacher handing out scantily clad photos of herself to male students? My hand went to my mouth, bile rising in my stomach.

I could become a registered sex offender.

Meg watched me walk past and her brows furrowed as she saw my expression. She fobbed off one of her kids as she walked to the door, then hissed at me.

“Hey, what the fuck?” She looked at me intently. “You look terrible. What’s going on?”

Meg was across everything in the school. She’d helped me find my feet when I first arrived and she used her permanent teacher status for good, sticking up for me and the other contract teachers. To my horror, I found myself choking back a sob. Her eyes filled with concern and she stepped closer, wrapping a wiry arm around my shoulders and shielding me from any prying teenage eyes.

“What’s wrong? Did June, the bitch, storm into your class and start throwing her ovaries around again?”

“No.” I croaked that out, then swallowed hard, not willing to break down yet. “The Walker twins—”

“Those little shits?! I get they’re suffering and, damn, I’m willing to fight hard to get them more time with the counsellor, but right now they’re making sure the rest of us suffer too,” Meg said. “So what did they do?”

I sucked in a breath and looked her square in the eye and told her in as few words as possible.

“Fuck…” She went pale, then her jaw squared and I could see her mind ticking over. “Don’t say a thing when June gets to you, not until the union rep gets there. Don’t say or agree to anything, got me?”

I’d never been a huge fan of the union, finding their tactics overwhelming and low-key paranoid a lot of the time, but for now I was glad for my colleague’s reassurance. I nodded in agreement and she gave me one last squeeze before pulling away.

“Hang tight. Help is on the way.”

Chapter4

And so, there I sat in the assistant principal’s office like a naughty girl, with my phone in hand. It was an odd experience, because while I could be a total space cadet, as a student I’d never done anything to warrant being sent to the principal’s office. So being here as a teacher felt doubly weird. The office ladies had all watched me as I’d slunk my way into June’s office, and I’d wondered if they knew. And then a bunch of other questions plagued me.

How long had the twins had that photo? What other social media did they have access to? Shit. I fished my phone out, opening Instagram and scrolling through my friends list, looking for anything untoward. All of the profile pics looked familiar: friends from uni, people I’d known from high school, my family… Nobody who I could imagine passing on photos of me to teenage boys. Then there were the shots themselves.

I could almost feel the heat on my skin, hear the hush of the waves, and my brain latched onto those memories; anything to stop from thinking about what had just happened. I hadn’t even started the day and the boys had… Why would…? What would…? I got lost in a spiral of questions and self-recriminations, feeling like I was dropping down, down, down into a state of panicked frustration at myself, at the job, at the limitations… Then the bell went and my body jerked upright at it, the conditioned burst of adrenaline that came each time I heard that sound, except today my body primed itself for a class I wasn’t going to get to teach.

“Ah, Ellie.”

My real name was Eleanor Jennings, but everyone shortened it to Ellie or El, although my nickname sounded weird in June’s mouth. Particularly when she walked over to her overstuffed office chair and flumped down into its plump depths to stare at me steadily and grimly.

“So let's get this all sorted out, shall we? I had a chat to the boys and—”

“Not including me in this meeting?” We both turned to see Michelle Harrison standing in the doorway. She shot June a cat-like smile. “Tsk tsk, June.”

“I hadn’t even had a chance to ask Ellie if she wants a union rep with her,” June replied tightly, right before her gaze dropped down to me. “Do you want one present?”

It was as if she was offering me her first-born child. Like I could take them if I wanted to, but really, was I that much of a monster? My focus shifted to Michelle who nodded just slightly.

Right, yes it was.

“I’d prefer it,” I replied. “This is a pretty straightforward situation but—”

“Don’t say anything further,” Michelle whispered, taking a seat beside me. “Let’s see what June has to say first.”

“So.” June’s posture was now stiff as well as overly still. “As I was saying, I spoke to the boys—”

“Which boys were they?” Michelle asked, tapping out notes on her phone.

“The Walker twins.”

“The ones whose parents died?” Michelle asked me. “They had that whole weird family life thing, didn’t they?”

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