When the Coupler Breaks

By Rosie McCann

When Waylem, a small town in the Northern Midwest loses its thriving industry, drug kingpins start selling their wares and create a whole new market in what was once a bustling, happy home. Parents are desperate for work, and youth are desperate for relief.
Some will stop at nothing to get it.
One high school student loses everything he once loved, and one high school teacher finds himself in the middle of a terrifying lawsuit, all because the legitimate business moved out and the drug business moved in. Their whole lives are about to change in this story of the plotting, destruction, and redemption of those too far gone to know they were lost.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Xlibris US
• Release date: Feb 24, 2014
• ISBN: 9781493176915

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Copyright © 2014 by Rosie McCann.

All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, or by any information storage and retrieval system, without permission in writing from the copyright owner.

This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places and incidents either are the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously, and any resemblance to any actual persons, living or dead, events, or locales is entirely coincidental.

Rev. date: 03/10/2014

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Contents

Chapter 1: Lies (The Teacher)

Catalyst

The First Day Of The Monkey Scandal

Clementine High School

A Teenage David Rush

Chapter 2: Tragedies (The Student)

Me As A Kid

The House

When I Started

Chapter 3: Decisions (The Teacher)

The Groups Of Students

The Public Eye

The Change

The Steel

The Board’s Decision

Chapter 4: Changes (The Student)

Waylem’s New Business

Freshman Year

Chapter 5: Threats (The Teacher)

The Video Cameras Idea

The First Andry/Aslb Meet

The Adjustment

The Attack

The Strike

Chapter 6: Revelations (The Teacher)

Monkey’s Support Rally

The Opinion Of Social Services

The Vote

The Incidents With The Bathrooms

The Lost Family

Chapter 7: Questions (The Student)

Me And The Girl

The Meth

My Deposition

Kathy’s Deposition

The Debt

Chapter 8: Desperation (The Teacher)

My Nephew

The Camera Drama

The Trial Begins

Exhibit M

Post Trial

Chapter 9: Salvation (The Student)

Midnight

An Apology

Gain And Loss

Chapter 10: Strikes (The Teacher)

Strike One—Intervention

Strike Two—Apology

Strike Three—Drugs Out

Chapter 1

Lies (The Teacher)

CATALYST

I can’t remember her name for the life of me, but I think that makes it easier. I remember the story and the details, both the ones I am supposed to know and the ones I’m not. But I don’t remember her name.

But she is why half our teaching staff left the profession for something else with less liability. She is the reason I have six math classes of over thirty-five students. She is the reason I myself almost found my way into some mathematics think tank and far away from any responsibility for minors, which so easily can put someone into the public eye.

But students like David kept me here. And now I am gasping for air in a cattle car of living, breathing, thinking, scheming teenagers all stuffed into one classroom while I’m being told the state math testing scores need to improve. And I stay here with a genuine smile on my face. Because of students like David.

But if it weren’t for David, I would have given up on Generation Z with the first glimpse of the scandal. The power that one teenage girl can wield with a pretty smile and a quivering lip is unparalleled by any since the guillotine.

Forgiveness, though, and the ability to move on comes more fluidly when there is no name onto which the anger can latch. I could probably ask Monkey for her name—there is no way he would ever forget it—but I never will, and no one ever brings it up around him. I like thinking of her as just her.

I could think of a few other words to describe her, but teachers aren’t supposed to think those things about students.

But if I don’t know her name, then I can think of her however I like.

When I first saw her, I thought, oh, my god, she’s beautiful! She was the kind of beautiful that only other women can appreciate because we are the species that spends billions of dollars each year altering our appearances to look as beautiful as this young lady was. We can be caught doing everything from purchasing mascara to saving for plastic surgeries in order to recreate the curves in our hips, chests, and faces. This young lady needed none of that. She was not a generic type of beautiful; no, she was exquisitely beautiful.

She was the kind of beautiful that not only attracted others, but also held their interest past the normal break of concentration in America’s collective ADHD affliction. She was the kind of beautiful that made you believe she was pure and wholesome, the kind that inspired trust and open conversation, and she was only a freshman in 2012.

Transferring from another school just as school was beginning, she seemed conspicuously quiet at open house, as if she were humble and fully unaware of the extravagance of her appearance. I smiled to myself when the family left my classroom at Open House to meet other teachers thinking, those high school boys won’t know what hit them! She’ll have no trouble making friends.

It took me two weeks to realize that it was us teachers who wouldn’t know what hit them. It took her a week to identify, locate, and woo the delinquent group of boys that were repeat offenders of all the worst school behaviors.

She didn’t go for the bad boys, the blue-collar boys who drove loud trucks, liked their beer, and found school annoying. Every girl has a bad boy phase, and many times, bad boys really are good boys deep down.

But she completely skipped over those boys, not even giving them a second glance. She headed straight for the jackasses. There was nothing to which these boys wouldn’t lower themselves to make a scene or simply to cause general destruction. Those boys in that little clique were destructive to others, and the girls were destructive to themselves.

To the leaders of this group, Dick Nuseman and David Rush, our gorgeous new addition attached herself like a leech. This leech, however, wasn’t sucking life-giving blood from its host to further and improve its life cycle, no. This one was knowingly sucking poison from its host, and the host was happy to share, especially with so beautiful a parasite!

Unlike her behavior at the open house with her parents only two weeks prior, now she was demonstrating that she knew precisely how beautiful she was, and she knew how to use that beauty to attract anyone she wanted. Society looks down upon women that use their physicality for their personal advantage, but this was a whole different type of woman. She used the attraction she knew she could wield to incur upon herself personal harm, taking others down with her as she went.

THE FIRST DAY OF THE MONKEY SCANDAL

In my mid-level math classroom in the fall of 2012, we had moved past graphing basic parabolas and were learning to graph more complex equations when Rachel Turner, a 4.0 student and captain of the volleyball team, suddenly slumped to the floor. I called the school nurse, she came and sat with Rachel until she woke up, the nurse called Rachel’s parents to come get her, and the school day continued as normal.

This was yet another occurrence of the narcoleptic symptoms of Rachel Turner. The normalcy of it struck the teachers as very abnormal, and as such, was subject to a large amount of questioning and criticism from us older generation folk that simply didn’t see those kinds of things in school on a regular basis when we were kids.

I feel like she’s faking it. Who has random cataplectic attacks that only happen in school and not in volleyball practice or when she’s out with her friends? Arty Poppins, a very attractive, single history teacher who worked out every day had commented skeptically. Oooh, the teacher is using big words, I don’t think I can handle it, and I have a free pass to take a nap.

Oh stop, Arty! She’s a good kid; who’s to say she’s faking it? I was annoyed. I, for one, believe her. Okay, well maybe I don’t entirely believe her, but I’m at least going to give her the benefit of the doubt for right now.

Sophie, my best friend and roommate, piped in, speaking right over Max Justice, the silent teacher who said maybe three words in his life to me even though we taught the same subject. He was sort of a fixture in any room. But the students seemed to really like him and he always turned out good test scores, so there had to be some measure of depth in him. But he made no remark as an eager Sophie leaned over his sandwich to share the gossip. Well, you guys know her story, right?

I looked down and sighed. No, but I fear another sad one coming. Our town had too many of those in this past decade. And Sophie knew a lot of them.

Arty looked cross at us, but he was still interested. Well?

Arty, her Mom died when she was in first grade, and her dad lost his chemical engineering job when the Andry Steel Company moved. He was offered a position moving with the company, but with having lost her mother so recently, he didn’t want to uproot Rachel from her home, too. They lived rough for a while, and he still hasn’t found an engineering job. He’s working on telephone lines now.

She looked down at her leftovers from our dinner last night. This whole thing started when he lost his job. It’s all some psycho-babble about being so young and dealing with so much stress at once. Sophie shook her head. My biggest concern is that she hasn’t broken out of it in all these years. But then Sophie toted a suspicious smile and added, Maybe she just needs a surrogate mother. Maybe her dad needs to get married again. Whaddaya say, Erin? Save a girl’s health by marrying her dad? She winked.

Um, Soph, how old is he that he has a 16 year old daughter?

"It’s not weird if the man is older, you goof! At least then you know he’s established and has good priorities."

I threw her a mock grimace. I don’t need the high school Business department finding me love, but thanks for the offer. Sophie had worked marketing for Andry Steel right out of college, but had ended up having to become a business teacher for the same reasons that Rachel Turner’s dad had to start climbing telephone poles. But Sophie really was an exceptional teacher. Always positive and friendly, and she had endless patience. Not a characteristic I shared.

Arty had a snide grin on his face as he piggy-backed on Sophie’s comment. You need someone to do it! You’re not having much luck on your own! Math teachers are nerds, and you’re getting old!

I threw my Tupperware lid at him and grabbed another bite of leftover chicken. I am not even thirty yet, you bastard!

Sophie knew I was likely to be a little defensive about my lack of luck on the love scene, especially knowing that I really had a thing for Arty, so I wasn’t really looking anywhere else. He supposedly had a thing for me as well, but we still hadn’t moved out of the flirtatious friends stage. Sophie quickly regretted that she started the teasing and changed the subject, still determined to defend Rachel’s honor. "Arty, Rachel is not faking it. Her hypocretin levels drop dangerously low and she really does enter into a REM sleep half the time she has a narcoleptic attack!"

Arty took the bait and shrugged. "Okay, I believe you. It’s just one of so many problems that it’s hard to believe all of these kids have all these issues. I mean, in a high school of six hundred, I think we have almost twenty-five percent of them diagnosed with some kind of depression, anxiety, panic, or stress issue, and each kid is convinced theirs is the worst case."

I nodded. I may have thought he was being harsh about Rachel, but he was right about the plague of mental issues barraging the school. I had at least two kids with anorexia, a few with bulimia, and at least six that got special concessions when test taking because of some vague form of anxiety. We also sent work home for students that were so anxiety-ridden, they couldn’t come to school. Could they all possibly be real? It seemed unlikely; last I checked, mental issues were not communicable pathogens. But who were we to say?

But soon, student anxiety would be the least of our worries in the teacher lunch room.

It was a blustery November day in 2012, almost half a school year since she arrived, and two months after she started dating David Rush. It had been abnormally warm that month, until a sudden cold front brought the usual wintry temperatures from which we had escaped to descend upon us in a gusting wind and cold cloud cover. I escaped to the teachers’ lounge from a particularly crabby group of students with whom I was quickly growing agitated. But no cold front or teenage consternation would compare to the incoming assault we were about to experience.

I sat next to Arty and we resumed our normal, juvenile banter and I found myself wondering when the hell he would ask me out when Monkey, a history teacher in the same hallway as Arty, came in the room unusually quiet. In a few seconds, I had forgotten forever whatever it was I was talking with Arty about, and I had never forgotten anything Arty and I had ever said to one another.

As Monkey heated up his habitual HealthyMan microwavable dinner, he stared at the wall, not hearing or seeing any of us. After the three minutes and thirty seconds of his own personal silence, perfectly timed with the ding from the microwave, he let out a ferociously wild roar and launched his fork across the lounge at the wall! Soph was so surprised she fell out of her chair, Jeff, a handsome physical education teacher, stood up and lunged for Monkey in an aggressive-defensive reflex, and I dropped my yogurt cup in my lap and didn’t even notice the cold, viscous liquid seeping into my pleated slacks.

Everyone else just stared, dumbfounded, as Monkey’s fork was only split seconds ahead of his cell phone and keys. A small dent appeared in the dry wall from one of the objects; which one will never be known because at this moment Jeff had reached Monkey and tried to restrain him, but Monkey grabbed him by the shoulders and shoved him back into the closer wall. With Jeff’s size, this was no small feat. It was only at this moment that Monkey’s facial expression lost its savagery and looked defeated instead. Monkey broke down into tears and slid to the floor, mumbling what Jeff took to be an apology, though I could not understand even a syllable.

Family of his though I was, I was far too frightened to be the first to speak a response to his infantile sobs. Jeff took it upon himself to help Monkey up to a chair. I clumsily popped out of my chair to grab him some water. Sophie shared a nervous and apologetic glance with her student teacher, whispering that she could excuse herself if she felt too awkward. The girl didn’t move; I think she was too taken aback to think. Max Justice, of course, said nothing, though his eyes had grown ever so slightly in size.

After a few moments, the tears dried, and Monkey looked more like himself, though the skin on his face was stretched far too tautly to disguise his tension. Jeff, again, was the brave one. Wanna talk about it, Monkey? Or should we just forget the past seven minutes and move on with life? Monkey looked like he was making the hardest decision of his life, but he finally squeaked out a sentence that sounded like a shrieking, pre-pubescent boy.

Goldburn told me a few minutes ago that the district received a lawsuit notice today.

We waited.

It’s David and his little prima donna.

We waited longer.

It finally came:

It’s about me.

He breathed in the breath of a man who had been underwater too long, shaking and sucking in so deeply that he coughed when releasing it.

I realized that I had been holding my breath when I heard the rattle in his. I know it was a ridiculous remark, but it was the only thing I could think: What? Are you sure?

Jeff asked a more intelligent question: Why are they suing, Monkey?

Monkey could have been auditioning for a horror movie as he let out the most unnerving laugh I’ve ever heard, his close-cropped, peppery-brown hair bouncing up and down with his head. "David claims assault and that manipulative little… thing is suing me for a supposed attempt to approach her sexually."

Jeff let out a primal bellow of his own and probably would have thrown things to add to the dent in the wall if he’d had anything in his hands. Monkey continued:

"They claim that when they stayed after school to get help on their history papers, David left to go to the bathroom. While he was gone, I apparently approached her. Apparently I cornered her and backed her up to a wall and tried to expose myself to her, telling her if she didn’t eventually give me what I wanted, I’d rape her. At this time, David conveniently returned from the bathroom and saw me unzipping my pants. When he started running to me to stop me, I apparently beat him to the punch and slammed him into the wall. I then allegedly said to her, ‘I am so much bigger than him, girl! You are so beautiful, you should be with a real man who can really meet your needs instead of this loser.’"

Monkey hung his head. I can’t even express how much of a lie all of that is!

True to her annoyingly positive sense of humor, Sophie tried to make a joke, "Well, yeah. When have they ever stayed after school for anything? When has either of them ever turned in anything?"

Monkey let out another disconcerting gust of laughter. "Yeah, well, they have a witness that they were driven home an hour after school three days that week from getting extra tutoring from me, and that I have always issued private detentions to… to… her."

Sophie cocked an eyebrow and queried with mock formality, And who, pray tell, is this witness?

Monkey looked even more pained, if that was possible. Dick Nuseman.

At this point, the bated breaths in the room were all released in the first chaotic moment since Monkey had shoved Jeff:

What?! (This was me, again. Wasn’t I full of intelligent and helpful ideas that day?)

Can this be real? (Arty.)

That will never go to court; the jury will see what kind of kids these are! (Sophie.)

Oh shit. (Max. The second longest sentence I’d ever heard him say.)

Punks think they’re freakin entitled to whatever the hell they want! (Jeff. He was also, obviously, full of helpful remarks.)

A whispered Oh my god escaped from the lips of the student teacher. She never did decide to be a teacher. I think that after this semester and the fear wrought from it, she graduated college and then promptly re-entered to get a job as an marketing manager instead. That’s alright. More than forty percent of our staff would later join her in a fearful exodus.

Monkey’s disgusting laughter came out in peals, until he was coughing, sobbing, and groaning all at the same time. The bell was soon to ring to send us back to our respective cells, but there was no way Monkey was in any state to see students. I looked at Jeff, and he nodded, knowing what I was thinking without even a word. He turned to Monkey, shaking him just a little to get him to quiet himself.

Sam, go home. We have a class and a half remaining. I’m gonna take your split class right now, and Erin here does not have a last block class. She’ll cover yours. You need to go home and see Cindy. You’re tough, and we’ll get through this, but we’ll tackle it tomorrow. For now, though, you need to go see Cindy and your kids. Do you understand me? Do you need officer Hank to drive you home?

Monkey shook his head. He patted Jeff’s back, touched my shoulder, and walked out of the room looking like a human in form but a mythical undead in spirit. He obviously was seeing without seeing, because I watched him walk directly into our school police officer. He mumbled an apology and moved on. There was no way he could drive home like that.

I flagged down the officer, who was looking slightly offended, and told him the abbreviated version. He cannot drive home, Hank. Please, drive him, follow him, do whatever he’ll allow. He can’t drive home alone. Hank’s face went from slightly annoyed to horrified. Without a word, he took off at a brisk jog to the front door.

I did take Monkey’s last block class. By then, the rumor mill had started, and as soon as the bell rang, Brandon Hart raised his hand and said, Hey, Miss Tussler, did Monkey quit?

I took a stern approach with this lazy asshole who hung with the three kids who thought they could ruin someone’s life. "That’s Mr. Monkey to you, Mr. Hart, and no."

Then where is he?

I bet he quit, came a low, cocky voice from the back—Stanley Johnson, another of David’s lemmings with sagging jeans, greasy hair, and a self-important smirk. I don’t know what he’d had to be cocky about—he and David would have to repeat that class multiple years. Anyway, I have never felt a desire to physically harm a student, but a sudden rage welled up inside me. I think I choked it before it appeared on my face. I smiled as if it were a joke and let maple syrup drip from my voice as I responded.

Why-ever would you think that, Mr. Johnson?

O, I dunno, I heard he was a sex predder. If folks found that out… sucks to be him.

His ignorance and audacity would soon be the end of me. I think you mean ‘predator,’ Stanley. ‘Predder’ is not a word. And that’s a pretty awful thing to say about someone. I think you should keep thoughts like that to yourself during class and instead just tell the proper authorities. Would you like to share that with Mr. Goldburn?

Nah. I’m fine here.

It was all I could do to remain only passively aggressive. Stanley, if you are truly concerned that one of your teachers has the potential to harm another student, you have a responsibility to report that. I am going to ask you to take your concerns to Dr. Goldburn. If not, then that is a criminal offense.

I doubted that a statement like that would have any effect on a student like Stanley—and I wasn’t even sure if it was true or not—but I felt that, to save face as much as possible in front of the other students, I had to drive it home that public allegations of that kind were unwelcome.

To my surprise, he did look slightly taken aback at my comment. I took his moment of confusion to my advantage. Stanley, please. Visit Dr. Goldburn with your concerns. They are very important. It worked. Stanley rose out of his chair and made for the hallway. I don’t know if he ever made it to Fred’s office, but at least he was out of Monkey’s room.

A very shy young student named Melissa Crowder raised her hand and asked me, terrified, if what Stanley said could be true. I smiled what I hope was a reassuring smile and said, I cannot officially say that Stanley is wrong. What I can say is that I’ve known Mr. Monkey since I was about your age, I know his family, and I know how he lives his life. I don’t think that anyone has any reason to fear any indecency from Mr. Monkey.

I hoped that they would hear my screams of Oh my god, you all know Monkey didn’t do anything, and you know what jerks Stanley, Dick, and David are! under my politically correct tone. The unfairness of it all almost made me lose it, but I gritted my teeth, hoping that my guarded comment would serve the purpose for which I employed it.

I was well aware of the danger facing me. If this awful girl and her boyfriend would tell a flat out lie to gain whatever ends they had in mind, there was nothing stopping other students from conspiring to put words in my mouth in order to put me on the chopping block as well. Everything from here on out had to be calculated and weighed. Life was changing. Fast.

And for the worst.

Brandon Hart broke me out of my reverie with a slightly defiant:

Then where is he?

I don’t know. But I do know you are covering the French Revolution, which is something I know a little bit about. Just because Mr. Monkey is not here does not mean you get to do nothing for ninety minutes. A small rumbling rippled through the crowd. I recited in French, Liberte, egalite, et fraternite. And class began.

In the middle of class, Rachel had a narcoleptic episode again and Brandon and a buddy of his I’d never had in class were mimicking Rachel’s breathing on the desk, trying to make little red spots on their faces like the ones she would have when she woke up from her unrestful sleep. I stepped over to the boys.

Gentlemen, does it strike you as humorous that your classmate has an unfortunate condition? They exchanged glances and laughed what they tried to