Chapter 10 - The Folder in the Drawer
The blue folder was exactly where Logan said it would be.
District security photographed the drawer before touching anything. Principal Ward stood beside them, pale and silent.
Daniel stayed back with Ethan.
He wanted nothing more than to take his son home, put ice on his hand, make him dinner, and close the world outside.
But Ethan kept saying, “I want to know.”
So they stayed.
The folder contained seven student names.
Beside each name were notes.
Argumentative.
Parent difficult.
Challenges authority.
Distracts Logan.
Potential transfer recommendation.
Ethan’s name was last.
Beside it, Mrs. Vale had written:
Father influential. Proceed carefully.
Daniel read the line twice.
His anger became something colder.
“She knew who I was.”
Principal Ward nodded slowly. “Everyone knows your company installed the district system.”
“And she still unplugged the camera.”
“She probably thought local power killed recording.”
The technician shook his head. “It used to. Before the upgrade.”
Daniel looked at him.
“Show me.”
The technician opened the network logs.
Every time a camera lost local power, the new system logged the event and attempted a wireless failover. That function had been activated only forty-eight hours earlier.
Mrs. Vale could not have known.
The technician searched backward.
“Here.”
Room 214 had lost local power six times in four months.
All after regular dismissal.
All for periods between three and seventeen minutes.
Principal Ward covered her mouth.
Daniel asked, “Can we recover any footage?”
“Maybe metadata. Maybe cached frames.”
“Do it.”
Ethan tugged at Daniel’s sleeve.
“Dad?”
Daniel knelt.
“I’m sorry I didn’t tell you before.”
His heart broke a little. “Tell me what?”
“Sometimes she kept kids after class and told us not to talk about it because our parents would make everything worse.”
Daniel stared at him.
“How many times did she keep you?”
“Three.”
“What happened?”
Ethan looked at the floor.
“Today was the first time she hit me.”
May you like
Daniel waited.
Then Ethan added, “But it wasn’t the first time she raised the ruler.”
