May Contain Wine (SWAT Generation 2.0 5)

Because, sadly, dislocating his shoulder was a whole lot easier to do now that he’d dislocated it once. It’d apparently happened three other times since the first.

“I’m sorry, correct me if I’m wrong, but you’re not actually the boss of the staff. You’re the boss of the students,” Louis drawled, slowing his words down to sound lazy and uncaring when I knew that he wasn’t uncaring at all. “And, what we were doing was far from ‘inappropriate.’ It was actually quite tame compared to what we could’ve been doing.”

He was pissed.

Then again, Carruthers had fucked him over good in middle school. I remembered that clearly now. There were definitely some hard feelings there.

Carruthers narrowed his eyes.

“If it affects my students, actions like this, then you bet your behind that I’ll be doing something about it,” Carruthers snapped.

“Randy,” Louis said. “I don’t want any hard feelings. I’m just here trying to get her to go out on a date with me. We’re not doing anything wrong. She has no students in here right now that need her. The moment that changes, I’ll leave.”

‘Randy’ apparently didn’t like being called Randy.

“It’s Mr. Carruthers,” he growled, looking pissed.

Great.

Another principal that hated me.

Exactly what I needed.

Not that it was entirely Louis’ fault. I was well on the way to having him dislike me myself. And it’d only been one morning.

“Whatever,” Louis said. “Something tragic happened here a few weeks ago. We’re all on edge. I’m just here to make sure that she’s all right.”

And that was the truth.

That really was why Louis was here.

He may have had an ulterior motive—asking me out—but ultimately, he was here because he didn’t want me to be here alone all day stewing in my own bad thoughts.

“I know exactly what happened,” Carruthers snapped. “Which is why I’m trying to make this as seamless as I can for my students. Seeing police officers here right now, after one held one of the students hostage, isn’t what I think they need right now.”

Carruthers had a point.

Toomey, the man that’d held one of the students, Slone, hostage, had been only aiming for Slone. There were some things that I was still a bit foggy about—mostly because I didn’t want to ask for any more information than I already had—but from what I’d been able to piece together, Toomey had convinced himself that Slone’s child was his. Mostly because Toomey had been sleeping with Slone’s girlfriend.

There really was a whole lot more to the story that I didn’t know about, but since I knew that Slone, Ares, and Hayes would’ve told me had they wanted me to know, I chose to keep my mouth shut.

“What they need is to see positive police interaction,” Louis challenged Carruthers. “When I was here, I loved my school resource officer. He was awesome. When he retired the same year I left, we threw him a huge going away party. Even had a pep rally for him. The students need that.”

Especially nowadays.

With the way the world was going, I would feel much safer in the school—and I knew the students would, too, as well as the parents—if there was an officer in the school just in case something ever went wrong.

In case the worst happened and some gunman were to enter the school.

Then that resource officer would be able to hopefully protect them in the event that they ever needed it.

“When you were here, they were different times,” Carruthers said, much more softly this time.

That was when I realized that Carruthers’ defensive posture had changed.

“True,” Louis agreed. “But that’s not to say that we can’t get back there. This school at least. Maybe if we did, the students wouldn’t be so bad. You got your work cut out for you, Carruthers. I sure hope that you have what it takes to fix what Bailey broke.”

Carruthers looked down at his hands. “I do, too.”

Things were silent after that for a long few seconds as everyone digested what had been said.

“I don’t mind that you are here,” Carruthers finally stated. “I would hope that you keep it PG for my students’ sake. I would also like you to make sure that you are conscious of how your behavior affects the students here. I know that you’re not doing anything wrong now—but in the future.”

I nearly rolled my eyes.

“Yes, sir,” I said. “I wouldn’t do anything that would make these students think less of me. It’s hard enough to control them as it is.”

His eyes narrowed slightly. “What do you mean by that?”

I shrugged. “I mean that I’m a small person and that the students walk all over me. They’re getting worse and worse as the years go by. I have one student that comes in every single day and refuses to leave most days. If it wasn’t for Louis, he’d likely still be in my office.”