Katie and I walked down the hallway toward the main office. We walked hand in hand until we rounded the corner and discovered Officer Jackson, James Petry, someone who I assumed was Mr. Petry, and some guy in a suit. I stopped dead in my tracks as the last time that I had seen James Petry, I had pushed him into a wall and also gained a concussion from the encounter. Katie hadn’t realized that I had stopped until our hands disconnected and it was like someone slammed on the brakes. James smirked at me, knowing that he had caught me off guard. Katie grabbed my hand and pulled me into an office that was occupied by the the person that handled collecting fees for the school. I started shaking like a leaf as Katie drug me back through the office, into the nurses office, which had a passthrough to the main office. By the time Katie had gotten me to Mr. Thompson’s office, I was a compete wreck. Normally nothing would shake me, but seeing that smirk on Petry’s face did it. I was worried, and judging by that smirk, I had every right to be. Mr. Thompson looked up from his desk as we burst into the room.
“Katie, Morgan, what’s going on?” Katie gently sat me in a chair, trying to smooth my skirt as she lowered me to the padded surface. Katie turned to him.
“Call my mom, have her get in here as well as Morgan’s mom. Morgan may need Dr. Franklin, before this is all said and done.” Mr. Thompson nodded and picked up the phone.
“What’s your mom’s number?” Mr. Thompson asked.
“555-2034” Katie said. “I’m going to go see who paged us down here, and who we were supposed to talk to.” Mr. Thompson nodded. Katie looked at me and I nodded slightly. Katie left the room and walked around the inside of the office toward the front where the receptionists sat. Katie startled Mrs. Vickers by coming up behind her rather than through the front door as students usually came in.
“Mrs. Vickers,” Katie started, crouching below the level of the back side of the desk so that she couldn’t be seen by Petry’s group in the hallway. Mrs. Vickers jumped about two feet in the air. She instantly understood, why Katie had snuck in on the backside of the office. “My mom, Morgan’s mom and perhaps Dr. Franklin will be arriving soon. We are back in Mr. Thompson’s office. What do they want?” Mrs. Vickers ‘accidentally’ knocked a sheet of paper off the desk. Kaite picked it up and looked at it. It was a temporary injunction barring Morgan from attending school as Morgan, until the courts had a chance to review all of the facts in this odd case. “They filed an injunction?” Katie said. “They can’t do that.” Katie turned, and crouch walked back toward the back hallway. Right as she had turned the corner, James Petry came in the front door of the office and confronted Mrs. Vickers.
“Where are they, they ducked into Mrs. Ewing’s office as soon as they saw me. Little pansies. I want that freak out of this school; him and his pathetic girlfriend.” That was all that Katie heard as she ducked into Mr. Thompson’s office.
“Mr. Thompson,” Katie said to him.
“Hang on, Mrs. Richards, Katie just walked in.” Fred Thompson said, offering the phone to Katie. Katie took it, and closed the blinds
“Mom?” Katie said into the phone. “Ok, it appears that James Petry, his father, their counsel, and a police officer are here to serve an an injunction barring Morgan from attending classes. Peterson is the signor.” Morgan’s head turned slowly toward Katie as she processed the new information. Katie realized that Morgan was on the phone.
“Doctor, it appears that Mr. Petry and company have filed an injunction to get me out of the school.” I said. “Ok, See you in five minutes.”
“Mom, Doctor Franklin is on her way, she will be here in five minutes.” Katie said, relaying what I had just said. “Ok, Thanks, Mommy.” Katie and I hung up the phones almost simultaneously.
“Your mom is on her way, as is Katie’s mom and Doctor Franklin, it appears. I’m going to go out and talk to Mrs. Vickers and see if we can get them into the conference room. If we can, I want you girls in Officer Mullin’s office until the cavalry arrives.” Katie and I both nodded. “Wait here.” Mr. Thompson said, and then left the office. Katie and I looked at each other.
“An injunction to keep me from going to school?” I asked. “Wouldn’t that violate the Johnson ruling?”
“I think it would, but it’s hard saying. My guess is that he’s pissed because he got expelled for something he started, under the hate crimes clause in the student handbook. Our student handbooks had been updated right after the Johnson ruling including increased penalties for any type of hate crime. Mr. Thompson poked his head in and just tilted it toward the door that Katie and Morgan had come in. Katie and I quietly walked out of the office and back through the nurses office. Once we hit the hallway, we went the opposite direction of the way that James and company and come in, and took the long way around the school. I wasn’t concerned with getting caught by a hall monitor, as much as I was running into someone that would tell James where we were. As Katie and I rounded the corner and entered the commons area, we both took off in a run for the far end of the commons, and the doorway that housed what had become Officer Mullin’s office. He was just coming out of his office as we came through the doors that would lead us to the office.
“Morgan, Katie, shouldn’t you girls be in class?” He asked, as we passed him and went into his office and sat on the chairs that were there in case he needed to have a chat with a student. The office was sparsely decorated, mainly having binders of papers on the walls.
“Yeah, but we got called down the main office for some reason and when I saw James Petry, I just froze…” I said. Katie grabbed my hand and squeezed it, this action not going unnoticed by Officer Mullin.
“James Petry is in the building?” Officer Mullin said. “He got expelled for that little stunt he pulled, he shouldn’t be here.”
“Yeah.” Katie said. “He has an injunction signed by Peterson to get Morgan out of the school. His father, counsel, and a police officer are with him.”
“Morgan, who was the officer, do you know?” Officer Mullin asked.
“Yeah, it was Jackson.” Officer Mullin furrowed his brow and sat at his desk. He picked up the phone and dialed a number.
“Lieutenant, It’s Mullin. Can you swing by, we have an issue.” Katie glanced at me. Officer Mullin hung up the phone.
“What class is Jen in right now?” Katie whispered in my ear.
“Are you guy’s parents on the way?” Officer Mullin asked.
“Yes, as well as Doctor Franklin.” Katie said. “Can you pull Jennifer out of class and get her down here with us?”
“Yep,” Mullin said, picking up the phone again, and dialing the office. “Susanne, could you page Jennifer Smith to come down to my office, please? And try to be discreet.” Mullin listened for a few moments. “Yes it is relating to that issue. Thank you.” He hung up the phone again.
“Officer, Why is he doing this?” Katie asked. It suddenly dawned on me that in the last three days of classes, I had spent more time with Officer Mullin than in classes…
“I have no idea, Katie.” Officer Mullin said. “But, I suspect that it is because he got expelled even though he knew the consequences of his actions. That has been in the handbook since the Johnson ruling came down from the court system… Everyone in the building had to sign a piece of paper saying they had read the handbook and would abide by it. I sighed, ready to start crying. I was just being me, I wasn't’ hurting anyone and I was getting beat up over it. Katie noticed this and held me close. There was a knock on the door and I curled up into Katie, afraid that it was James Petry on the other side. Officer Mullin opened the door, and Doctor Franklin stood on the other side. She came into the office and sat on the side of me that was opposite of Katie.
“What’s going on?” She asked. “Other than this stuff about an injunction, which frankly, You have a doctors excuse to be here so that just got shot down. I have prepared a brief for the judge that signed that order so that we can overturn it. He’s not going to get his way and kick you out and get back in here.” Dr. Franklin said. “I’m waiting on Mrs. Richards to get here so I can turn it over to her, so that she can file it.” I nodded.
“It really scared me to see him standing in the hall way. I just froze.” I said to Dr. Franklin. “I’ve never done that before.”
“It’s ok.” Dr. Franklin said, pulling me close. Just that second there was another knock on the door. Officer Mullin reached over and opened the door, and Jennifer walked in. Jennifer took in the situation in the room and figured out that something was seriously wrong.
“What’s going on?” Jennifer asked.
“James Petry is in the building. His fathers counsel has filed an injunction preventing Morgan from attending to school. A judge signed it, although I’m not sure why. I personally think this is Petry’s way of striking back against Morgan for getting expelled for something that he knew he was going to get expelled for.” Officer Mullin said. A few seconds later, there was another knock on the door and I noted that the little office was starting to fill up with bodies quickly and I wondered where the next body was going to fit. Officer Mullin opened the door up and looked up at Susan Richards.
“Hi Mommy.” Katie said, vacating the spot she was sitting in.
“Ok, so what we have is an injunction filed by their counsel to prevent Morgan from attending school, signed by Judge Peterson.” Susan said aloud. Katie, Dr. Franklin, and I all nodded. “Peterson was the judge on the Johnson ruling. I wonder if he’s aware that this very injunction would end up holing the school district in contempt of the previous ruling…”
“Sue, I have a brief regarding my diagnoses of Morgan that could be filed to stop the injunction.” Dr. Franklin said.
“Ok. Where are these clowns?” Susan said, standing.
“In the conference room, in the main office.” Katie said. Susan nodded and opened the door.
“Alright, lets go for fight number two in this school… I’m getting tired of this…” Susan said, leading the group out of Officer Mullin’s office and back toward the main office. As we got to the doors that were actually at the front of the school, mom was walking in. Susan stopped her and we gave her a quick run down on what was going on.
“Jackie, Mr. Petry’s counsel has filed an injunction that will stop Morgan from attending classes. I presume that he is trying to get back at Morgan for getting expelled, which is the punishment outlined in the student handbook for a ‘hate crime.’ We are getting ready to go meet their counsel.”