Page 9 of Small-Town Secrets
"They take your lunch money because your parents are loaded," one of the boys piped up.
"Yeah, and because you're annoying," the child right next to him added. They had to be brothers, because they looked very similar. So similar, in fact, that I felt like I was having double vision looking at them. Twins, then.
Rude twins. Even if I couldn't fault them for thinking that Lydia was a little bit annoying. Not that I could admit that. "No one's annoying," I said in the most decisive voice I had. If it worked on dogs, maybe it would work on children too?
No such luck. It was as if the group hadn't even heard me.
"Don't be such an asshole, Tyler," another boy standing behind the twins spoke up. "You're just jealous because you're poor. I know charity's paying for you and your stupid brother to be here."
The twins whirled around to stare daggers at the other boy. "Shut your mouth, Nelson," Tyler demanded. "We're not poor! Our paps has a lot of money! Our paps has more money than your paps!"
Nelson scoffed. "Everyone knows your paps kicked you and your daddy out. My paps says it's because your daddy is so ugly."
Ouch. I had no idea what Tyler's daddy looked like, but that comment was unwarranted. I'd thought Tyler was a little rude, but this Nelson kid seemed to be a real troublemaker. Evidently Tyler was feeling this way too, because he threw himself at Nelson before I could even react.
"Take that back!" he screeched, lounging at Nelson with his full body-weight, making them both tumble to the gym floor where they started to wrestle. I winced.
What had I told Jake about this kind of thing not happening on my watch?
It was time to make good on that promise, wasn't it?
Without even thinking about it, I grabbed Tyler by the back of his shirt and pulled him off Nelson.
"Let me go!" he protested, lashing out at me. I dodged his small fist easily, but still, this kind of behavior was not something that could be tolerated. What if the other children took his outburst as cue that they could act the same way?
I would have totalanarchyin this gym.
That image was horrifying enough that I immediately knew what I needed to do. My alpha instincts kicked in and I stared the boy down, firmly grasping his upper arm. "Stand still!" I ordered, infusing the command with as much authority as I could.
And then something unexpected happened.
The boy sniffed the air as if he could smell my alpha pheromones in spite of his young age, and then a look of purefearflitted across his young features.
Quickly, I let him go and took a step back.
I'd wantedrespect, notterror.
I knew that I needed to say something to defuse the situation, but once Tyler realized that he was free, he dashed for the changing room.
"Ty!" his brother shouted out, following on the boy's heels. "You idiot!" was the last thing I heard before they both disappeared from sight.
What the hell was that all about?
Feeling a little lost, I took stock of the remaining children. No one had paid attention to me when I'd called them into the gym earlier, but now they all eyed me as if I was their new favorite source of entertainment. "We're starting!" I announced before they had time to ask any more questions. "Run five laps around the gym to warm up, all of you. C'mon, move!" I clapped my hands together and that finally spurred them into action.
I knew that I needed to check up on the twins, but I also couldn't leave the other children unsupervised, so I was relieved to see the boys come back into the gym just as the others were on their last lap. When I called for them to join in, they did without question. I had no idea what the two of them had discussed in private, or why Tyler had been so scared in the first place, but for the time being, I chose to be happy that they were behaving, as were all the rest of the kids.
It wasn't like I didn't have to call the kids to order every now and then, but for the most part, the remainder of lesson went smoothly. I tried to learn everyone's names while we went through some basic things just so I could get an idea of how far along they all were.
The day before, I'd dropped by the sensei's house to talk about what they'd done so far, so I knew generally where to start. The greatest challenge really was to make sure that everybody listened and that nobody got hurt. I also wanted to make sure that they enjoyed themselves at least a little bit. I remembered only too well how much I'd loved karate class when I was their age and they deserved to have that kind of experience too.
Honestly, I thought I didn’t dotoobadly. I went through the basics with them, corrected their forms, and ended with some friendly sparring. Emphasis on friendly. There weren’t any more uncontrolled fights after that first one.
Still, I breathed out a sigh of relief when the clock struck six and the class was officially over. "Alright, kids," I said. "Go get changed."
As the children started filing out of the gym, I found Tyler with his brother and reached out to tap him on the shoulder before the two of them could leave. "You guys alright?" I asked, since I hadn't really had time to talk to them before. "I'm sorry if I scared you before."
"You didn't scare me," Tyler insisted, puffing out his chest. Meanwhile his brother—I'd learned by now that his name was Chris—eyed him suspiciously.
