Déjà Vu

by Beth Cato

Daniel remembered all too well the painful experiences of high school that drove him to the brink of suicide, but it was a thousand times harder to see his son endure the same thing. True to form, the school had dismissed the reports of bullying, saying boys would be boys and that the main bully – a school board member’s son - denied doing any wrong. Daniel’s fingers trembled as he held the camera steady on the tripod and watched his son pinned and mobbed by other boys waiting for the bus. As much as he ached to run to the rescue, he knew he couldn’t, because he knew that bully would bear twenty different sneering faces, and Daniel wouldn’t be able to stop his fists until each one of those faces was bloody and broken. All he could do was look through the lens, and weep. Justice would come.

6S

Beth Cato is from Hanford, California, but now resides in the wastelands of Arizona with her husband and son. More of her writing can be found here.