Read Online American Bad Boy: A Military Romance by Sadie Black, Eddie Cleveland - Free Book Online Page B

putting me through the paces, giving me no rest, and melting my heart with his father’s signature smile.
    Once Joel passed away, Chris spiraled out of control. Simple pranks and adventures took a darker turn toward destruction. He dropped out of almost all of his activities, giving up everything except football for a group of boys that look like a gang in training. All they’re missing are little name tags. Hello My Name is: Thug.
    Initially when Joel was killed in the accident, I took Chris to a psychologist who said that he’d stop acting out after six months or so. We just hit the anniversary of Joel’s passing a few months ago and, if anything, Chris has only stepped up his efforts. I feel like he’s an engine that’s picking up steam on whatever this track is that he’s decided to head down, and I’m left feebly standing at the end holding my arms out to try and stop him. But we both know he has the power to mow me down.
    I make my way into the principal’s office. A path I wish I couldn’t sleep walk to. My son is sitting on a little plastic chair against the wall across from the school secretary, Miss Wilmot. I give him a look and as he tilts his head and peeks up at me from under the brim of his ball cap. He knows he’s in shit, the flash of fear in his eyes doesn’t escape me.
    However, the older he gets, the more we’re both coming to realize that a mother only has so much power. I can yell until I lose my voice, I can take away every single thing that he enjoys and ground him, but I can’t seem to change this path he’s on. He won’t be happy until he watches his entire world go down in flames. He doesn’t know yet how difficult it is to build a life from ashes.
    Miss Wilmot looks over her glasses at me with a look that instantly transforms me back into a ten-year-old. My gut twists up into a knot and when I reach the edge of her desk I’m surprised that I don’t have to stand on my tip-toes to look over at her. It’s strange how a place or a moment can make us all children again. Like decades of growth haven’t slid by us. Like our timelines shrivel down, depleting years of experiences with a single stare.
    “Ms. Brickman, how nice to see you again. Too bad it’s never under different circumstances.” She looks over her wire-rimmed glasses and I stare down into my palms. How does she do that? I need to bring her to my house to give Chris that look when he’s acting up. I’d most certainly have a much different son.
    “Mr. Vaughn is waiting for you in his office, you can go right in.” he continues.
    “Thank you,” I mutter, my ears burning up and the skin on the back of my neck prickling as I watch my feet shuffle to the office door. Put my hair in twists and my feet in Mary Janes because somehow the last eighteen years of my life have disappeared. I’m a butterfly who lost her wings, crawling into the office.
    The door is open and Mr. Vaughn doesn’t look up from the file folder he has under his nose when he waves me in. “Come in, come in. Sit down, sit down.” he repeats himself.
    I sit across the desk from him and fold my hands in my lap, waiting for him to stop reading whatever the folder holds. It’s thick and tattered around the edges. Chris Brickman is written down the side tab. I swallow hard when I try to imagine how many offenses that folder must hold for it to be so thick.
    “Ms. Brickman.” I jump in the worn office chair as the principal jolts me from my thoughts. “As you can see, your son has had another incident here that we need to discuss.” Mr. Vaughn carefully places the file folder on his desk and fans several sheets out across the top.
    “What happened?” My mind races with possibilities. What have I already been in here for this year? Disrupting classes, fighting, skipping school, the list swirls through my mind as I wait for the next step in his delinquency to be reached.
    “Christopher was found with explosives in the boy’s bathroom today, Ms.