Wish Me Tomorrow. Karen Rock

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СКАЧАТЬ his tense shoulders and started down the short, dim hall. Which room was the principal’s? After all these years, it was his first visit to the private office. Becca had never gotten in trouble and was a straight-A student. His eyes narrowed. At least he assumed so. When had he last seen her report card? Keeping up with Becca’s and Tommy’s lives was his priority. But somewhere, he’d let things slip.

      “Welcome, Mr. Roberts,” said a diminutive woman when he reached an open door. He recognized her cropped black curls and red, square-framed glasses from last fall’s open house. Since he’d been too tired to wait out the eager parents surrounding the new principal, he’d left without saying hello. Now he wished they’d spoken, met under better circumstances. She strode around an imposing wooden desk and extended a hand. “I’m Principal Luce. It’s very nice to meet you.”

      He suppressed a sneeze at her cloying perfume, shook her hand and nodded. “Likewise.”

      “Please have a seat.” She was all business in her navy suit and heels.

      He sat on the edge of an upholstered chair, his fingers forming a steeple. He couldn’t take his eyes off the open folder in the middle of her green blotter. Did the top sheet say “Becca Roberts. Disciplinary Referral”? Impossible. This must be a mistake. Leather squeaked and he glanced up to meet Mrs. Luce’s steady brown eyes. He ignored the cell phone buzzing on his hip.

      “Mr. Roberts, please accept my apologies for calling you in without notice.” She inclined her head. “But the seriousness of the situation called for our immediate attention.”

      He shot to his feet. “Where’s Becca? Is she okay?” So help him if anything had happened to his little girl—

      “She’s eating her lunch in the study room.” The principal stood and paced to a water cooler beside her bank of windows. “How about something cool to drink?”

      “Sounds good.” Relief filled his head like helium. Maybe Becca had forgotten an assignment. It didn’t sound critical enough to drag him here, but still, this was one of SoHo’s best private schools. They took their students’ academics seriously.

      After taking the proffered foam cup, he sat. “Thank you.” He drained the cold liquid. “If I’d known she’d gotten behind on her work, I would have—”

      “I’m afraid it’s more than that,” Mrs. Luce cut him off smoothly and returned to her seat. She pressed a button on a round black machine. The sound of calling birds and water tumbling over rocks filled the room, competing with the click-clack of two suspended silver balls knocking against each other.

      Was the machine her attempt to soothe him? He thought of Christie and wondered if she tried this stuff with her patients.

      “There’s more?” Eli echoed.

      “Take a look at this.”

      A jagged piece of paper appeared before him. Becca’s right-tilted handwriting popped from the page.

      “‘Keep it up and you will—’” he read aloud then stopped, the last word too extreme, too improbable, to speak. Eli shoved the note back across the desktop. “That’s not hers.”

      Mrs. Luce raised her eyebrows and lowered her square chin. “I think we both know that it is.”

      “Becca would never write that.” His lips pressed into a firm line. Mrs. Luce needed to understand. She was new. Didn’t know that Becca wasn’t some troubled kid. “She’s never had a disciplinary referral. Ever. If you look at her report card, you’ll see she’s a straight-A student.”

      Mrs. Luce’s nostrils flared. “Have you seen her report card, lately?”

      He swallowed back the rising guilt. “Not recently, but she had a 4.0 GPA last...last...” His mind skimmed back and stopped at Christmas. But that couldn’t be right. Had it been that long? The distance between him and Becca yawned before him, a football field of sullen silences and monosyllabic answers.

      “Semester. Yes. She was one of our top students. But she’s currently incomplete in living science and health.” She handed him the transcript. “And coupled with this recent threat on another student’s life, I’m afraid we will not be able to recommend her for enrollment at our affiliate, Elisabeth Irwin High School.”

      The edges of the paper bent beneath his tense fingers. He perused her grades and double-checked the name at the top. This had to be a mistake. A misunderstanding. Becca would not flunk out of school. Not on his watch.

      “Can we get Becca down here?” He dropped the paper as though it burned. “She’ll clear this up.”

      Mrs. Luce chewed on her bottom lip then picked up the phone. “Please escort Becca Roberts to my office, Cynthia.”

      Escort? He suppressed a snort. Was his daughter a criminal? What had happened to innocent until proven guilty? He and Mrs. Luce stared at each other, the silence stretching to its breaking point. Moments later, footsteps sounded in the hall. The door opened. Becca.

      He strode to the door and opened his arms. Becca must be scared. Would need his assurance. But she took a far seat without acknowledging him, her eyes darting everywhere but in his direction. She couldn’t have looked guiltier. He pulled out his chair and dropped into it. Was she responsible for the note? The incompletes? He rubbed his temples.

      “Becca,” Mrs. Luce began in a stern voice. “Please look at your father and tell him what you told us.”

      Her wide pupils turned her blue eyes black. “I wrote the note,” she croaked. Her fingers fidgeted with the tulle band wrapped around her braid.

      “What?” His mouth fell open. He pointed at the paper scrap. “That’s yours?”

      Becca nodded and studied her crisscrossed flip-flops.

      “Why?” His voice came out hoarse and low. He hated that it had taken a stranger to make him pay attention to his own daughter. “Why would you tell someone they were going to die? You...of all people...after what we’ve gone through.”

      Becca’s ashen face jerked away. “Yeah. What would I know about death? We’ve never talked about it, right?”

      His silence on the subject had been to protect her, not hurt her. The disposable cup bent in his hand. “That’s no excuse to threaten to hurt someone.”

      “Is that what you think?” Becca stomped to the door. “That girl’s a smoker. I was warning her about dying of cancer. You know—cancer? I think you might have heard of it, Dad. I didn’t want her to end up with our sucky life.” He flinched at her bitter tone.

      The metal doorknob rattled in her hand. “May I be excused, Mrs. Luce?”

      “Of course, dear. You may return to the study room.”

      “Thank you.” Becca slipped through the door without a backward glance.

      His hands gripped the chair’s plush arms. This was worse than he’d imagined. Would Becca fail eighth grade? Leave her friends, change schools? He’d fought hard to keep his kids’ lives as unchanged as possible, to maintain the life they’d had before his had fallen apart. Would this event bring everything tumbling down?

      “Mr. Roberts, СКАЧАТЬ