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Anna covered her eyes just before the slushie hit her with a horrible, ice cold, slosh. The three hockey players in front of her laughed loudly.
Then the four teenagers heard a distinct clear of a throat.
Anna uncovered her eyes, and the three hockey players looked behind them to see principal Oliver Heston stood right there, with arms crossed and a disappointed expression.
“Dude,” said Andy in some disbelief, “are you ever in your office?”
Oliver raised an eyebrow. “I'm going to be in a minute, with you three.” He looked at the slushie covered girl. “Anna,” he said, in a kinder voice, “you go ahead and wash yourself off as best you can in the bathroom, and then go see Mrs. Pilsbury-Schuester. She’ll try to find you something dry to wear, and you can talk to her for awhile.” As he spoke, he had gotten out a pad of paper and a pen, and had written something down. “Here,” he said, as he tore the piece of paper off the pad and handed it to her, “a hall pass.”
Jeromy thoughtlessly crowed, “Lucky you, you’re getting out of your ugly, stinky dress!”
Anna looked even more like she wanted to cry, ran away, and Oliver glared at the boy. “Really, Jeromy?” he asked, voice hard again, “right in front of me?” He let out an exasperated sigh and made a ‘come with me’ gesture. “All three of you, in my office.”
He lead the way, and the three boys followed him to his office. “Hi, Janet,” he said, as they passed the receptionist.
“Hi, Oliver,” she replied, but didn’t look up from the computer as she continued to type.
The four entered the office, Oliver in last as he held the door open for them, and they all took a seat, Oliver in his office chair, the three in chairs that faced the desk. Trevor had to grab one of the chairs that rested by the wall.
Oliver clasped his hands and leaned forward as he looked at each of the boys in turn. “So,” he began, “am I to understand that you didn't take my speech about how I would not tolerate bullying at this school at the assembly that we held, literally yesterday, seriously?”
The three boys looked at each other. It was Andy, sat in the center, who finally spoke for the group. “Principal Sylvester never really cared,” he answered.
Oliver leaned back. “I think you’ll find,” he stated dryly, “I am not principal Sylvester.” A beat. “I hardly even look like her.”
This caused Trevor to snort, which caused the other two boys to stare at Trevor. His face quickly dropped back into a neutral expression.
“Ya know, it’s interesting,” Oliver mused, which got the trio’s attention again, “how different schools have their own cultures. Back at my old school, it wasn't slushies that got thrown at people. The bullies threw-” he paused and looked at the three, who were suddenly rapt. “-I'm not giving you ideas,” he said with a smirk.
The three collapsed back into their chairs, disappointed.
“Of course,” Oliver continued, “slushies couldn't have been thrown at my old school, because our school didn't have a slushie machine. In fact, on that note…” Oliver leaned toward the microphone at his desk, and pressed the button to broadcast his words through the school speakers. “Students and faculty of McKinley, this is your principal. I would like to announce that, should there be one more incident of anyone giving anyone else what I understand is dubbed a ‘slushie facial’, the slushie machine will be removed.”
“No!” Jeromy cried out.
Oliver raised an eyebrow. “Yes.” He went on into the microphone, “Since the slushie machine is and will remain the only type of junk food available at this school, and it is to some extent a treasured part of this school’s identity, I'm sure the majority of you would not want to lose it. I should mention I had to be talked into keeping the thing in the first place, so I'd love a good excuse to get rid of it. So, trust me, this is not an empty threat, but a real warning. The next time someone throws a slushie at someone else on school grounds, the machine will be removed.” He took his finger off the transmission button and began to lean back away from the mic, then seemed to think of something else and quickly darted back, pressed the button, and stated, “I would like to give a heartfelt apology to the student that was slushied today. I didn't realize I had to specifically include slushies in my speech. Let me make things clear; the school board somehow not recognizing being slushied as a form of bullying does not remove my authority to take the machine away, or ban slushies from the school. They are high in sugar, them being spilled on the floor makes the floors slippery and dangerous, and I'm sure I can think of more reasons for a ban.” He paused for a moment, and then concluded, “That is all for now. Work hard, and be kind, everyone.”
He ceased his pressure on the button, his message delivered. “Now,” he started, “what to do with the three of you?”
“You can't get us for bullying,” said Jeromy.
“Shut up, Jeromy!” Andy hissed.
“I can definitely get you for bullying,” Oliver said, as he pointed at Jeromy, “I heard you call Anna ugly and stinky.”
“I did not,” Jeromy protested. After a beat, he continued, “I called her clothes ugly and stinky.”
“Jeromy!” Andy hissed, again.
“...oops,” said Jeromy, as he looked at the floor.
“Regardless,” Oliver moved on, “you heard what I just said over the speakers. I can get you for endangering the other students by spilling liquid on the floor. We’re lucky there was a janitor nearby that saw it. Hopefully no one slipped before he could grab a mop and a caution sign. I'll be laying the blame on you for that as well if that happened.”
Andy looked aghast. “You can't do that.”
“Sue did everything she wanted, and everyone is all but drowning in guilt for having forgotten I existed for just over seven years,” was Oliver’s frank response. He made his left hand into a fist, rested his elbow on the table, and his chin on his fist. “I can get a lot of what I want, Andy. Luckily for them, I'm reasonable and not interested in retribution.” He sat back up, and addressed all three. “My goals are for my students to succeed, for my students to be healthy, and, most importantly, for my students to be kind.”
“You think being kind is more important than being successful?” Andy asked, incredulous.
“A world where everyone is a millionaire but is also an asshole is not a world I'm interested in living in,” Oliver affirmed.
“Yeah, you’re definitely not principal Sylvester,” murmured Jeromy.
“I am not,” Oliver agreed. The room was quiet for about a minute as he considered punishment, and the three boys remained silent, no desire to get on his ire any further. They knew what half of the punishment would be; not exactly a punishment, a sort of sensitivity training. They'd need to individually, then as a group, talk to Mrs. Pilsbury-Schuester about their feelings, why they felt the need to pick on others, and how their actions could cause serious harm to people. They already dreaded that enough; it sounded like a total drag.
The second half, they didn't know. The second half was a kind of community service type thing, where they would help in the maintenance or betterment of the school in some way. What that would be depended on what needed to be done at that time.
“I know,” Oliver declared, finally. The three boys looked at him, without enthusiasm. He spoke as he filled out their ‘detention’ slips. “We’re updating the library in a big way. Going through the books to see what is damaged and needs repairing, what is horribly out of date and must be discarded, like encyclopedias from the 1980s, dismantling and removing some of the old shelves that are falling apart and will be replaced, and so on. You’ll be joining Mr. Waters and the team of students already working on that; they’ll decide what jobs you get.” He smiled warmly as the three boys groaned.
Jeromy whined, “You mean we gotta spend hours carrying books for a bunch of nerds and that new faggot librarian?”
Andy and Trevor rapidly turned their heads to stare at Jeromy, Andy’s eyes wide with what looked like fury at Jeromy and his inability to keep his damned mouth shut.
“Dude,” was what Trevor said quietly, as he shook his head.
The three boys looked back at Oliver when his chair creaked as he shifted his weight and crossed his arms. “You are,” he addressed Jeromy, eyebrow raised. “And I think it’ll be you going first to talk with Mrs. Schue.”
Jeromy looked at the floor again. “Yeah, okay,” he said, so quiet it was barely audible.
“Alright.” Oliver stretched. “You’ll be talking about your reasons why with Mrs. Schue, and what you say to her will stay with her. But, I do want to know why it was you were picking on Anna, I’d like to know for myself. The amount of penance you’ll be paying won't go up if you fess up.”
He was greeted with silence.
He huffed out a little breath, and looked at Jeromy with a bemused expression. “You really can't make your situation worse, you know that. You said it was because her clothes were dirty? That’s why? Just that?”
Jeromy shrugged. “She’s kinda weird, too, but, yeah. Her clothes are dirty and torn, she smells, her blonde hair is greasy and looks almost gray, she’s gross.”
Oliver wrote something down as he remarked, “She didn't seem that bad to me. And, uh, you really think you can comment on someone else's hygiene, Jeromy?”
“...what’s that supposed to mean?”
“It means that Axe body spray isn't a replacement for a shower, Jeromy.” He tapped his pen on his notepad. “Do you treat all your peers with dirty clothes this way?”
“She’s the only one we’ve slushied, but-”
“-Jeromy!”
And Jeromy was successfully shushed by Andy.
Both of Oliver’s eyebrows lifted, but he didn't press any further. He didn't need to, not right then. “Alright,” he said, as he set down his pen, got up from his seat, and clapped once, “we’re done here.” He picked up the three slips, and stepped around his desk to hand them out to the three boys. After a gesture to get up from him, they all stood, as well. “You are to go to class, now, and then, after your lunch break, go to Mrs. Schue’s office. You sit and wait on the bench by the door until it’s your turn. Don't forget to hand in whatever homework you had before you leave school to your teachers of the classes you're going to miss today because of your actions. And to get today's assignments. After school on Wednesdays for the next four weeks is when you’ll be at the library. It’s all on your slips there.”
“You can write really fast, huh?” said Jeromy.
Rather than respond to that, Oliver walked to his office door, opened it, and held it open for them. “Go on, get to class.”
After they had filed out and left, he went back to his desk, sat back down, and considered the note he wrote.
[Install washers and dryers for students without access to them at home to use? Get sponsorship from local housing appliance store to help pay for them. Allow use of locker room showers to all students? Or does building a single shower next to this new laundry room make more sense, though it would be another expense?]
He decided that it was a definite yes on the new laundry room. And the single shower might be the better idea. There’s a lot of students that are not comfortable showering with other people showering nearby.
...with how expensive that would all be, he really hoped no one slushied anyone again. The Big Quench sponsorship formed a decent chunk of school funds.
The phone rang. He saw Janet answer through the glass, and then she spoke to him through the desk intercom. “Oliver,” she said, in her bored tone, “it’s Megan Fulton from the school board. She wants to talk to you about the slushie machine. Line one.”
Megan Fulton was the one person in Ohio that didn't feel any guilt about having forgotten him at all. And she had thought Sue had been the best thing to happen to McKinley, with a steadfast belief that everything Sue was accused of was either lies or not that bad. She hated Oliver before he had even done anything as principal. ‘Ah, Christ.’
He put her on speaker and turned down the volume. The way to handle her was to let her ‘talk’ for about two minutes, and then explain to her why she’s wrong. She has yet to understand that Oliver is nothing like Figgins. He won’t be intimidated.
“ARE YOU OUT OF YOUR MIND?! YOU SNOWFLAKE LIBERALS ARE RUINING THIS COUNTRY WITH YOUR SAFE SPACES-”
Only day two of second semester classes at McKinley, and Oliver knew this job would age him as fast as a presidency does presidents.
But, goddammit, it would be worth it.
“-AND TEENAGE BOYS ARE JUST MONSTERS BY NATURE! BOYS WILL BE BOYS! I KNOW PEOPLE LIKE YOU WANT TO FEMINIZE MEN-”
... it will be worth it, goddammit.