We were in 7th grade. I was 11 or 12. I got called down to the principal’s office.

As I often do when met with sudden an unexpected authority, I felt my entire body tingle. What had I done wrong? I frantically searched my mind to replay my actions of recent weeks.

I couldn’t think of anything I had done wrong but also reasoned it could be anything. I collected myself as I walked down the hallway to the principal’s office at Pfeiffer Middle School in Massillon, Ohio.

When I got there, I could see out of the corner of my eye, my brother Bobby. His face was deep red. He was upset, and had visibly been crying. After speaking with the secretary she guided me to the principal’s office. We walked past Bobby in the nurse’s room (I don’t know what that room was. It was where you go to wait when you are sick and you need one of your parents to pick you up.) It had a therapy table in it, which he sat on, still deep red faced. He did not look at me.

I felt a surge of panic. What had happened? My mind was racing with worst case scenarios: something had happened with one of our parents or possibly one of our brothers. Bobby was obviously fine, albeit very visibly upset.

We got to the principal’s office where I was told to take a seat, the principal already there at his desk waiting for me.

The door was closed.

I don’t remember the specifics of the conversation that took place. The jist of it was that my brother had reported physical abuse at home, and they wanted to talk to me about it.

I panicked.

My brain started buzzing. Oh no. He reported dad or mom or both to the school. This must be really bad.

I studied the principal’s face. It told me everything I needed to know about the severity of this situation, and my brother’s accusation.

I fidgeted a little, not really knowing quite what to say, and knowing everything to say all at the same time.

“He’s making it up.” I felt myself blurt out to the principal.

He looked surprised. He sat up, he leaned in. I had his attention.

“He does this sometimes. He makes things up. I think he does it to get attention. None of it is true. Our parents love us and they don’t abuse us. We get disciplined, but it is always for good reason.”

This was a half truth. Well, from my 7th grade brain it was a half truth. My adult brain knows that this was a total lie.

I was panicking that we would get taken away from our home and thrown in to foster care and never see our parents again. Whatever was happening at home, would pale in comparison to the stories that our older brother Frank had told us about his experiences in foster care while we were in Florida state custody.

I dug in my heels. “He’s a liar. I think he has a problem.”

The principal said a few more things about this having been a serious accusation, and also serious if my brother was in fact not telling the truth. He could get in to a lot of trouble, as the police were called.

Oh My God. The Police!!!

“No, it isn’t true! Bobby is a liar! Please don’t take us away from our parents!!” I pleaded. Now crying myself.

The principal repeated himself but much more gently. The first time he had been more stern. I figured he thought I might soften up my stance, and he had to speak that way to me because he thought I was hiding something. Well, I was. But I wasn’t about to get thrown in to foster care.

We could manage whatever was happening at home. We wouldn’t survive foster care.

I mirrored the principal’s softening. I threw him a bone, offering again about how we were disciplined, and that he had been disciplined the previous evening, though I do not remember today what for. He is just mad that he got caught. He got mad that he is in trouble. This is not my parents’ fault.

A knock at the door. It was the police.

To that point in my life the only other time I had met the police was when I was almost kidnapped when I was 8-9 years old back in Illinois. Then, they were heroes. I had remembered their line of questioning came from a place of protection and earnest listening to my account of what had happened.

This time, they felt like a threat. I cried harder. Huge tears rolled down my cheeks. “Please, no! Don’t take us away from our parents!”

The principal assured me that we weren’t going anywhere and that we just needed to get to the bottom of this. He told me that my Dad was on his way, and that their standard protocol was to call the police and yes, I would have to speak with them to share my side of the story.

Oh My God, Bobby!! What Have You Done!! For however he thought he was going to try to get back at our parents, they were really going to be pissed off now!!

I know I tried to smooth things over. Plead with the principal that this was all just a misunderstanding. But he wasn’t having any of it. It was policy. We had to proceed with the discussions.

Two police officers walked in to the principal’s office and remained standing. One held a small spiral bound notebook and was taking notes.

I don’t remember really anything about that conversation. I remember they felt like a threat to me. They were literally standing between me and the door and I know that I would have repeated everything that I said to the principal and probably more to these two police officers.

When Dad showed up he looked very disappointed. But he also looked very concerned, to my surprise. He looked concerned. Maybe this won’t be such a big deal, afterall.

In the end, the principal and the police concluded that there was no case here but they told us that they had to keep a record of it in our file. My dad had a presentation of such caring and warmth and concern on his face.

I was confused and also just relieved. He was just worried. He was just concerned. We’d all go home and enjoy a nice family dinner together. Dad hugged Bobby.

We are not a hugging family. But I savored having seen the gesture. It gave me reassurance that everything was actually somehow and miraculously, going to be ok.

Dad had one arm slung around Bobby as we walked out of the middle school, to the car. His face still very beat red, but looking relieved himself.

An eerie and familiar silence followed us in to the car as the last door closed.

No one said anything.

Uh, yeah so my panic alarms started going off because I was noticing the energy in the car go zig and then zag. Dad was not whistling. He did not have his arm across the back rest of the bench seat of our Buick. We were in the same car and yet felt miles and miles away.

But because nobody said anything I reassured myself. I thought back to the concerned face, the worry, the hug, the arm slung around Bobby. Everything was ok. Everything was going to be ok.

What time was it? I don’t know, by then. It was dusk. I do not remember the season, or what I was wearing. It was dinner time, I knew that much for sure.

We got home and mom was fixing up dinner. Ok, this really is all going to be ok. If something was wrong we’d be sitting down and having a serious conversation but this looks perfectly normal!

Bobby went down to his room. I went to mine. I am not sure where Dad went. I assume Markie was in his room, playing.

Man, it was spaghetti night. I could smell the pasta boiling. I was pumped! I loved spaghetti night!

“Dinner is almost ready!”, Mom called. Markie and my bedrooms were in the same hallway on the main floor. We filed in to the kitchen to set the table.

From downstairs I could hear Bobby starting to make his way up.

Dad appeared seemingly out of nowhere in the kitchen, to take his place at the head of the table.

Bobby turned the corner in to the kitchen. “What are you doing here?” Dad asked. I don’t know if I have a good word for the tone in his voice. It wasn’t anger, it wasn’t rage, it was flattened. There was no tonality.

“Oh. I thought I heard that dinner was almost ready?” he stammered, seeing all of us assembled in the kitchen now and setting the table would confirm that what he had heard was accurate.

“This is a family dinner. You are no longer a part of this family.” Dad said, delivered in the same no-tone. No attitude, no anger, just flat.

Bobby stood there for a moment, visibly perplexed. If I could read his thoughts I imagined he would be wondering if this was a joke. Very funny – ha ha.

Dad continued to situate himself at the table and he acted as though Bobby did not exist and was not still standing there, waiting for the punchline.

Mom walked around him, saying nothing, and followed Dad’s lead: Bobby didn’t exist anymore.

Markie and I looked at each other, confused, and not knowing what to do.

“You got something to say?” he snapped at me. Oh, there’s the tone I know so well! I know that one, and not to trifle with that one! “No.” I looked down at my empty plate, suddenly no longer hungry.

At some point, Bobby went back down to his room. I wouldn’t have seen him. I was too busy staring a hole in to my plate to avoid the ire of our father. I assume Markie was doing the same, though I’m really not sure.

After dinner Markie and I did the dishes.

Dad went down the stairs and proceeded to beat the ever living daylights out of Bobby.

—–

I don’t know if Bobby knows that I betrayed him. That I called him a liar, even though I know that my dad was hard on him. Way too hard.

I know that I was just a kid trying to survive.

And, so was he. And he actually had the guts and courage to report it.

Only to have nothing come from it.

That means that for Bobby he wasn’t safe at home, at school, or even with the police. Where does one go from there?

Would life have been better for all of us, for him, to have been taken away from that life and put in to a new one? Would it have been worse? It’s impossible to know for sure. But I know that the one that continued was really damn bad. Especially for Bobby, until he left home when he was 17.