Tempted By The Badge. Deborah Fletcher Mello

“Has anyone seen Mr. Locklear?” She gestured toward the only empty seat, going off topic for a brief moment.

      There were shrugs and looks of disinterest, no one seeming to care that one of their own was missing.

      She shook her head ever so slightly. “So, what is everyone talking about?” she asked, her eyes shifting back to the student staring at her.

      “One of the teachers is getting fired,” Damon stated. “Someone’s been giving it to a student on the side,” he said with a snide laugh and an inappropriate hand gesture. He slapped palms with the boy beside him. “I bet it was Coach Peterson. Which one of you girls has been giving it up to him in the locker room?” he quipped.

      Laughter rang around the room and the noise level rose slightly. Joanna winced, unable to fathom how any adult could even consider taking advantage of a student’s trust. That her kids were piqued by such an abhorrent rumor didn’t sit well with her. It didn’t sit well with her at all. She shook her head. “That will be enough of that, thank you.”

      “He’s serious,” a young woman named Shannon Heigl said. “One of the teachers has been having an affair with a student and the student reported it to the administration.”

      Another student added her two cents. “They’re going to press charges and whoever it is plans to sue the teacher and the school district!” she exclaimed.

      Joanna’s gaze skated from one face to the other, everyone suddenly looking at her to either confirm or deny the rumors she was hearing for the first time. A string of expletives suddenly rang through the air, Damon cursing as he continued to scroll through his phone. “This is so effed up!” he said with a snide laugh.

      “Mr. Morrow! Watch your mouth!” she chastised. She held out her hand for his cell phone. “I said no phones.”

      The young man eyed her sheepishly. “I was just shutting it off. I swear,” he said as he shoved the device into the top of his book bag and the book bag under his desk. He dapped the palm of her hand and gave her a wink of his eye.

      Joanna met the look he was giving her with a stern stare, her eyes narrowed. She shook her index finger in his direction. “You’re walking a very fine line with me, Mr. Morrow. You do not want to test my patience.”

      As she turned, she saw him leaning to whisper to the boy beside him. “The student is male! The teacher’s a woman!” he quipped, the two giving each other a high five as if that was something to celebrate. A titter of laughter and hushed whispers swept through the room.

      “All right, that will be enough,” Joanna said as she moved to the front of classroom and began to count off test papers at the head of each row. “Let’s focus on something useful, please. It doesn’t matter who did what to whom, regardless of gender—if such a thing happened, it’s wrong! Let’s not waste any more of our energy on unsubstantiated accusations. Spreading rumors only serves to hurt people unnecessarily. You all should want to be above that.” Her eyes connected with each student, finally coming to rest on Damon Morrow’s face. He was still grinning from ear to ear, his chest pushed forward arrogantly as he and his desk mate whispered one last time.

      “Take one and pass it back,” she said to the students at the front of each row.

      Minutes later their heads were down, pencils scribbling away as they diligently tackled question after question. Joanna moved back behind her desk and took her seat. She’d been teaching since forever at Riptide High School, the Chicago, Illinois, staple rich with history. She’d also been a student here back in the day, the senior class president of her graduating class and a cheerleader. Her parents had both been graduates, as well, and before them, her maternal grandfather, one of the first to integrate Riptide classrooms before it had been court mandated.

      Joanna came from a long line of educators, beginning with her paternal great-great-great grandmother, who’d taught other slaves on a Georgia plantation how to read and write. Her mother had taught English at Riptide’s rival high school for most of her career, only recently retiring from her assistant principal position to tend her beloved gardens. During the spring and summer, she grew the fruits and vegetables she intended to can in jars while catching up on her reading when the weather turned. Joanna’s father was a math professor at the local community college, determined to trek to his day job until they laid him in his casket. Both loved what they did, and so did Joanna.

      She had always known she would be a teacher, even preferring to play classroom instead of house as a child. Despite the challenges of students who were self-absorbed, more abrasive and less focused, she enjoyed everything about sharing her love of history with the students who came every September and were gone by June.

      And Joanna loved history. She found it fascinating that if you examined the past closely enough you could find a precedent for most current situations. She loved helping her students discover that for themselves. It was thrilling when she could show them a correlation between their own challenging academic environment and the courts of the Italian Renaissance, giving teens philosophies on how to survive in their dog-eat-dog world. When there were questions of integrity they studied Martin Luther King, Gandhi, Thomas More and people who, through the ages, epitomized the fight for what was right. When students bemoaned their home situations, she made them research life in the Middle Ages and its lack of comfort and convenience. There were lessons to be learned from the past and Joanna enjoyed everything about exploring them.

      The time passed quickly and when the bell sounded, announcing the end of class, a few of them jumped in surprise. Joanna stood. “Pencils down, please, and leave your tests in the basket on my desk on your way out. There is no homework tonight, so enjoy the break!”

      Chairs slid against the concrete floor and the noise level rose as the class marched single-file past her, sliding exam papers into the wicker container on the corner of her desk. As the last student made his exit, they were still spreading gossip, cell phone messages and social media updates being shared. Joanna couldn’t help but wonder if there was any truth to the allegations, but figured she’d learn more before the day ended. She had no doubt there were as many teachers gossiping as there were students trying to dig up information.

      As Joanna bound the test papers with a large rubber band and a sticky note detailing the class and time, her friend and associate barged into the room.

      “You’re on break now, right?” English teacher Angel Graves gushed, tossing a look over her shoulder.

      Joanna nodded. “I’m chaperoning fourth period study hall and grading these test papers. What’s up?”

      “Haven’t you heard? The administration is in an uproar and there’s been two police detectives in the principal’s office since this morning. Someone’s in some serious trouble. Mrs. Magee says it’s about to hit the fans!”

      Joanna shook her head from side to side. “Mrs. Magee gossips too much! I don’t know why you pay that woman any attention,” she said, referring to the office secretary.

      “I pay attention to her because she’s that inside line to everything that goes on in this school. You should give her more credit. Besides, aren’t she and your mother old friends?”

      “Which is how I know she gossips too much!”

      “Yes, but she always has the best gossip!”

      Joanna laughed as they made their way out of the classroom and down the hall toward the other end of the school building. Their conversation was easy and casual as they maneuvered their way through the throng of students hurrying to their next period class before the late bell sounded. “So, who did what this time?” she asked.

      “It’s serious. They’re claiming teacher misconduct and inappropriate contact with a student.”

      “Are they saying who?”

      Angel shrugged. “Only that the student is a senior.”

      “I just can’t believe it. I know some of the men around here are slimy, but I can’t imagine any one of them doing such a thing. That would