“What are you going to do about it?”
she hissed in that
self-righteous everyone-else-especially-you-is-so-wrong-sheous tone.
Lord how tired I am of aggressive egocentrism
and those who attack others when something, minor or massive,
goes wrong in their world that should, by all that is right and holy, be perfect.
When anything is not right,
well, obviously, someone should feel their wrath.
Anyone with half a brain could understand that.
Medusa Mom stood in the doorway to my office, hands actually on her hips,
in full-on attack mode,
while the object of her protection peeked through one of her crooked elbows
to see what damage his mother’s venom was having on her target.
The reason for this particular attack?
Medusa sent her son to school in full uniform,
including the required rather expensive shoes,
and someone had the effrontery to steal them,
something that the school, that I in particular,
- should have prevented before it happened
(what kind of hooligans are you letting into this supposedly Christian school!),
- should immediately resolve by finding the shoes and punishing the culprit
(death by drawing and quartering would not be inappropriate),
- and should fall into violent protestations of apology before committing hari-kari
before the entire student body in a hastily called general assembly
to be followed by the orderly kissing of Medusa’s ring by all (left alive)
before cocktails and an elaborate dinner.
And I could be personally damn certain that no one would be giving her precious
Little Peek-A-Boo-Boy any sort ridiculous disciplinary action for a uniform violation
because she sure as hell wasn’t buying him another pair of expensive shoes
as long as she was sending him into such a den of little thieves.
Oh joy.
What I know about this situation is:
1 - The shoes aren’t stolen.
That simple.
If we were talking about an ipad
or a pair of those hideously expensive earphones they’re walking around with lately,
there’s a very very very small possibility they might have been taken by another student,
but, really,
we’ve only had a few cases of out and out thievery in the 15 years
that I’ve been the sheriff’s assistant.
Most missing items are simply lost.
These are boys, fascinating little muddle-headed creatures
and they’ve got better things to do with their tiny distractible minds
than keep track of their stuff.
Plus, there’s very little demand on the black market for used school shoes.
I know.
I’ve got several pair in the Lost & Found
and, try though I might, I couldn’t find any buyers to contribute to my paltry 401k.
2 - I do not have a single clue as to where the child’s shoes actually are.
3 -Medusa Mom is going to be hard as Hades to get out of my doorway.
4 - I simply do not get paid enough for this kind of fun.
-
So I bite my tongue and don’t deal with Medusa
in the manner that she really deserves to be dealt with.
(“Lady, you can either back the freak down or get the freak out!
You don’t happen to be the center of the universe.
I DO!”)
I fix eyes on the kid.
He’s one of our new 8th graders, big eyes in a huge pond.
Give him a few months and he’ll own the place but for now it’s pretty intimidating,
not as intimidating as his mother,
but still…
“Jordan, kiddo, when was the last time you had your shoes?”
Medusa objects. “Someone stole them!”
“I know, but I need some sort of a clue at least to investigate.”
I turn back to the kid, “So where did you last see your shoes?”
“I put them with my books when I sat down at lunch.”
“In the cafeteria?”
“Uh-huh.”
“Did you go back and look there?”
“Yes, and someone had stolen them.”
Medusa, having been excessively patient in her opinion, interjects, “You’re interrogating my son as though he’s the criminal here!”
“No, ma’am. As I said I just need some information so I can try and help here.”
Huffily, Medusa allows me to continue,
all of her serpentine eyes holding off turning me to stone
for the minute or so more that her endurance of idiocy will allow.
“What class did you have before lunch? Was it gym?”
“How did you know?”
I want to tell him that I memorize all 700 students’ schedule,
he’d probably believe it,
but Snakehead would not be amused.
“When you dressed out for gym, did you put all your stuff in one of the lockers?”
“There’s too many guys at the lockers.
But I had my shoes when I went to lunch so I didn’t leave them in the locker room.
I didn’t.”
“He already told you that he had them at lunchtime!
You’re wasting our time!
I want to speak with the Dean of Students immediately!”
I raise my hands in surrender and reach for the phone.
Under a glaring gaze, I dial the one number I’m fairly certain can solve the problem.
“Hey Coach Ronson,” I say cheerily, “could you do me a favour?””
Medusa’s seethe turns into steam escaping from her ears just as my boss,
the actual Dean of Students, happens to return to the office.
Recognizing him, Medusa turns on him and begins her tirade anew,
adding my obvious failure to cowtow to her into the general spew.
Mr. Madrigal recognizes a situation best taken out of the general populace
and escorts Medusa and Son into his office as I finish up
the conversation she didn’t hear and hang up the phone.
Five minutes later I thank Coach and knock on Mr. Madrigal’s door.
Without waiting for permission to enter, I turn the knob and walk into mid-rant,
“… at his last school three times and now here. I just can’t believe…“
She stops and near hisses at me.
I hold out the small sized brown shoes to the silent child.
“Jordan, hon. Come see if these are yours.”
Of course, it turns out they are.
Jordan left them in the locker room and went to lunch in the gym shoes
currently on his feet.
It happens all the time.
They’re kids.
They’re scatterbrained and forgetful.
And, honestly, here’s the explanation for the whole show unfolding now,
which would you rather do
- tell your Medusa-mom that you misplaced your expensive shoes
for what sounds like yet another time
or tell Mom somebody stole them again?
I don’t blame the kid.
If that woman’s scary to adults can you imagine what it’s like to be her kid?
Mr. Madrigal, who had been looking a tad green, brightened up considerably.
“Ms. McTeague, where did you find them?”
“Oh, I asked Coach Ronson to check the locker room and, sure enough, there they were.”
You know the rest of the story. Medusa Mom left with Son in tow, without an apology, because, as we all know, she acted completely reasonably,
just as she always knows she does.
Ah well, maybe tomorrow I’ll recount the tale of the senior who came into the office
just when I was all set to leave
to tell me that someone had stolen his car.
Spoiler alert.
The car wasn’t stolen.
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