Читать книгу The Jealous Son - Michele Chynoweth - Страница 18

THE SLIGHT MARKS on Cameron’s arm—impressions from his father’s anger that Christmas morning—healed quickly, but the bruises to the ten-year-old boy’s ego didn’t. Cameron stayed silent for a week, not bothering to talk to the rest of his family.

Several months later, Eliza was called into Mr. Dunleavy’s office again, but this time not for good news. Her fear from the first time, that Cameron was in trouble, was now being realized.

She sat once again across the desk from the lanky principal as he relayed the episode.

“I’m afraid Cameron was bullying another student, Mrs. Trellis,” he said in his authoritative, nasal tone. “The students were on the playground, and Cameron and another fifth grader, Donny Slade, approached a younger boy who’s in fourth grade, Bobby Montrose, and asked him if he had any money to lend them. When Bobby said he did but refused to give it to them, they shoved him into the rock-climbing wall, and his glasses fell to the ground and broke. They pushed him hard enough that he has bruises on his face and shoulder, according to his mother. They also emptied his pockets and took the dollar’s worth of change he had. I am suspending both Donny and your son for one week for assault and petty theft. Cameron will have to make up the schoolwork on his own time.”