"I'm not here to use the phone." I said.
"Then what do you want?" She asked, continuing to type away.
"I need to see Mrs. Compleigh." I told her, referring to one of the school counselors, the one who had pushed Mike into independent study.
Her hands still blurring across her IBM, she asked, "Do you have an appointment?"
"No." I replied. "But it's kind of an emergency. I need to…"
"You'll have to schedule an appointment with her if you want to talk to her." She replied tersely. She returned her full attention to her work.
"This is an emergency." I tried again. "I need to see her now."
She gave a hiss of disgust and pushed herself away from her desk. She turned to me, her eyes full of contempt. "Look young man," She said, projecting all of the petty authority she possessed towards me. "Our counselors are busy people and I can't just go sending kids in to them any time some student asks. Now if you could just…"
"Now wait a minute." I interrupted, using my adult voice, a voice I rarely employed anymore. It worked it's magic. She, as well as the other secretary and the two volunteers all stopped and stared at me. Concentrating my attention on the one I'd been speaking to I asked, "What is your name?"
"My name?" She asked, the first tinges of actual anger appearing in her tone.
"Yes." I nodded. "You know, what they call you?"
"Now you listen to me young man…" She started, but weakly. She seemed cowed by the bold way I was speaking to her. Her expression reminded me a little of how Richie had looked when he'd realized he'd bitten off a little more than he could chew.
"Your name?" I demanded, sharpening my tone a little.
"Mrs. Wilks." She finally said. "Now I really…"
"Well, Mrs. Wilks," I said, "When I went through orientation for this school it was explained to me that the school counselors existed to assist me in times of need. That they were student advocates. I was told I could talk to them at any time during the school day. Any time. Are you telling me now that that was a lie?"
"Well no." She stammered, "You can talk to them any time if there is some sort of, well, problem. It's just that for routine matters like what you're…"
"Routine matters?" I asked, exasperated. "I believe I told you twice that this was an emergency. Emergency is not a synonym for routine. Emergency means a pressing matter, a problem, something that requires immediate address by qualified people. I would like to see Mrs. Compleigh for this problem that I have. Is she here?"
"Well, yes she is." Mrs. Wilks said, looking quite dazed now.
"Good." I nodded. "We're getting somewhere. Would you please tell her that a student has a problem and would like to see her?"
"Uh…, well, what is your name?" She asked.
I told her.
"Okay." She nodded, jotting it down. "And what do you need to talk to her about?"
I looked around, seeing that our audience was raptly awaiting my answer for that one.
"That is most definitely none of your business." I told her.
She opened her mouth, seemed about to say something, and then perhaps thought better of it. She stood up and headed through a door, closing it behind her. The other three occupants of the room continued to stare at me for a moment. The two student volunteers were hiding smirks of amusement at the exchange they'd just witnessed. Finally they reluctantly went back to work.
Mrs. Wilks returned a few minutes later. She gave me a nervous look and said, "Mrs. Compleigh will see you in just a minute."
"Thank you." I said.
She didn't answer my thanks. She walked over to a large filing cabinet and, using a key from a ring, opened up one of the drawers. She fingered through it for a few seconds and finally pulled a manila file from it. My eyes are pretty sharp, always would be, and I had no trouble seeing my name printed on the tab. She carried the file back through the door from which she'd come. She returned a minute later and sat back at her desk.
Another five minutes went by and the same door opened revealing Mrs. Compleigh. She was about forty or so, with long brown hair that was tied into a bun. She wore a plain brown dress and nylons. Her eyes held a cynical gaze as she appraised me.
"Billy?" She asked. "If you would come with me?"
I stood and pushed my way through the little barrier door and then followed her through the back door. We moved down a hallway past the principal's and assistant principal's office, both of which were empty, a copy machine, a coffee maker, and finally to a door with the counselor's name printed on it.
She opened the door and led me into her office.
Her office was small and cramped with a cheap metal desk taking up a large portion of the room. Two small chairs sat before the desk. Her work area was cluttered with various papers and forms although my file was nowhere to be seen there. Framed pictures of two children, one a boy of about ten, the other a girl of about fourteen or so, sat on the desk flanking her penholder. On the wall behind the desk were two framed degrees from the University of Idaho at Boise. She had a bachelor's degree and a master's degree in public education with a minor in Psychology. The air in the room smelled as if she regularly violated the school no smoking policy.
She worked her way behind her desk and waved me to a seat in one of the chairs. I sat.
"Well Billy," She started. "Mrs. Wilks is a little upset by the way in which you talked to her." She started. "She says you were getting smart with her. Is that true?"
"Getting smart?" I asked contemplatively. "Why do teachers, counselors, and secretaries tell kids not to get smart? Isn't that what we are in school for?"
This produced a few stunned seconds of THE LOOK. Finally she kind of shook her head, as if clearing her mind of my words. "We'll discuss Mrs. Wilks later perhaps." She said finally. "I understand you have some sort of emergency?"
"Yes." I nodded.
"I hope it's nothing serious." She told me. "You're one of our better students here. In fact, if not for some poor grades your first year, you'd probably be in the running for valedictorian. So what kind of emergency does a bright young man like yourself have?"
I looked at her in disbelief for a moment. She had rattled off my school record with the intention of making me believe that she knew who I was and how I was doing in school off the top of her head. She was trying to give me the impression that she knew all of her students by name and could instantly recall their respective records. Her psychology or education classes had probably assured her that this was a good trick to instill trust. I dismissed this without comment only reluctantly.
"Well actually." I said. "I am not the one having the problem. I came here on behalf of Mike Meachen."
Her face clouded a bit. "Mike Meachen?" She asked me. "I don't understand."
"Mike Meachen." I repeated. "Surely you remember him? You talked him and his parents into independent study?"
"I'm afraid," She told me firmly, "That what Mike Meachen and his parents discussed with me or decided to do is none of your business."
"Is that a fact?" I asked pointedly.
"YES, it is." She replied, annoyed. "Now if that's all you wanted to discuss, I have a lot of work to do."
"If that's ALL?" I asked, switching to the adult voice again. "You encourage a student to drop out of school, to destroy his life, and you wonder if that's ALL I want to discuss? What kind of counselor are you anyway?"
"Now wait just a minute!" She said sharply, sitting up straighter and leaning over the desk towards me. "Mike is going to independent study. He is NOT dropping out. He is NOT destroying his life."
"Don't give me that crap." I told her, holding her hostile gaze. "You know as well as I do that no one graduates from independent study. It's a holding tank where you put kids that you think are going to drop out anyway so that when they do, it doesn't go on your statistics."