Vance walked behind his desk, leaning his knuckles heavily against the polished oak surface. His breathing was still erratic. He stared at me for a long time, as if trying to calculate exactly how much of a threat I was.
“Liam,” Vance finally said, his voice smooth again, but tight with barely contained strain. “You are an excellent student. A hard worker. We are proud to provide you with the financial assistance you need to walk these halls.”
“Thank you, sir,” I managed to say, my throat dry.
“Oakridge is a delicate ecosystem,” Vance continued, pacing slowly behind the desk. “It relies on reputation. It relies on the absolute discretion of everyone within its walls. Especially our work-study students. Now, I need to know exactly what you saw out there today.”
“I saw Trent Sterling assault a member of the staff,” I said, a spike of defensive anger cutting through my fear. “He shoved Joe to the ground. Then he broke his cane.”
Vance waved a hand dismissively, as if an assault on an elderly man was completely irrelevant. “Yes, yes, teenage tempers. Boys will be boys. The pressure of the season gets to Mr. Sterling. It will be handled internally. What else did you see, Liam? After the cane broke.”
He was fishing. He needed to know if I understood the significance of the key.
I swallowed hard. My mind raced back to the metallic clatter, the hollowed-out wood, the heavy brass, the deep engraving. B-17.
But my survival instincts, forged by years of scraping by at the bottom of the social ladder, kicked in. I knew the rule of the underprivileged: never show powerful people that you hold their secrets.
“Nothing, sir,” I lied, keeping my expression perfectly blank. “A piece of metal fell out of the stick. Trent made a joke. Then you arrived.”
Vance’s eyes narrowed into dark slits. He studied my face, searching for a twitch, a bead of sweat, a tell. I kept my breathing steady. I didn’t blink.
Vance slowly exhaled, seemingly satisfied. Or at least, deciding he didn’t have enough proof to call my bluff.
“Listen to me very carefully, Liam,” Vance said, his voice dropping to a soft, menacing octave. “Old Joe is being sent home for the week. The incident with Trent is closed. If I hear a single rumor about what happened on the path today… if you mention this altercation, or anything that fell out of that cane, to anyone… I will immediately revoke your scholarship. You will be expelled for violating our code of conduct. You will be back in public school before Friday. Do we understand each other?”
He wasn’t protecting Trent. He was protecting the key.
“Yes, Mr. Vance,” I said quietly. “I understand perfectly.”
He unlocked the door and gestured for me to leave. As I stepped out into the hallway, I felt physically ill. My hands were shaking. I had just sold out the only person at Oakridge who treated me like a human being just to save my own skin.
By the time I got back to the courtyard, the sun had fully set. The path was empty. Joe was gone. The broken pieces of the cane had been swept away. Only Max was there, pacing nervously around Joe’s abandoned tool cart.
I jogged over to the cart to pack up our tools. Max nudged my leg with his nose. The golden retriever seemed incredibly agitated. He kept looking toward the main building, whining, then looking at me.
“I know, buddy,” I whispered, scratching behind his ears. “I know they took him.”
As I began organizing the rakes, my mind started trying to assemble the pieces of the puzzle. What the hell was B-17?
I remembered the sheer rage radiating from Trent when he lost the scrimmage. It wasn’t normal teenage anger. It was aggressive, chemically fueled rage. And Vance… Vance was obsessed with the football team. He needed them to win the state championship to secure funding for the new science wing.
B-17.
Oakridge Academy had a massive, multi-million dollar athletic complex. The lockers were arranged in wings. Section A, Section B…
B-17. Locker B-17.
My stomach churned. Did Vance find out Joe had the key to a football player’s locker? Was Trent doing steroids? If Trent was doping, and the Principal was covering it up to save the season, that would explain the rage, the cover-up, the panic over a missing key. Maybe Joe, cleaning the locker rooms at night, had confiscated the key from Trent to stop him, hiding it in his cane for safekeeping.
It made twisted sense. And if it was true, Vance was going to ruin Joe’s life to protect the school’s star quarterback.
I couldn’t just walk away. My dad had let a corporation crush him without a fight, and it destroyed his spirit. I promised myself I would never let power dictate truth.
I locked up the tool cart and quietly slipped toward the athletic complex.