The Mob from TAC

Andrews jerked his tie straight for the third time in two minutes. The green folder sat on his immaculate desk, its corners perfectly lined up with the desk pad beneath it. He glanced up at the clock; the final bell had rung. Rex Cassidy would be there any moment to discover his antics were not welcome at Taukauri College anymore, and that at long last here was a principal ready to bring the hammer down.

  His intercom beeped and he pressed the button. ‘Yes?’

  ‘Rex Cassidy is here, Mr Andrews.’

  ‘Send him in.’

  Mr Andrews had hoped that Rex’s parents could be there too, but that was not possible. It didn’t matter though, as he would be sending a formal letter to them immediately and would be able to talk to them over the phone or the following day if they wished to come in.

  The door opened and a tall, very well built teen stepped into his office.

  ‘Rex Cassidy?’

  ‘That’s me.’

  He was nothing like he’d expected. His uniform was immaculate, his shirt carefully ironed and not a stain on it. No piercings studded his face, no smirk touched his lips. In fact, his expression was almost...warm, likable. Andrews flicked his gaze down to the folder in hopes that a picture had somehow materialized, to reaffirm that this was the boy causing so much trouble for his school.

  ‘Take a seat.’ Andrews motioned to the seat in front of his desk.

  Rex walked casually over to the desk and without any warning leapt into the air, and came down, bang into the seat, his feet landing on the edge of Andrew’s desk, his legs and arms crossed.

  ‘What the...?’ Andrews stared at Rex’s school-issued sandal-clad feet resting comfortably on the edge of his desk. It was hard to fathom a guy as athletic and good looking as him would ever wear such attire, but then of course he had no choice. There was no doubts in Andrews mind that at the end of the school day those sandals would come off and something fashionable would be put on instead.

  He came to his senses. ‘Get your feet off my desk!’ he boomed, glaring at the wayward teen, steaming at the casual manner in which he conducted himself.

  Rex calmly lifted his feet and repositioned them on the floor. He seemed oblivious to the fact that he was in real trouble and it was almost as if he didn’t care. Unless of course, he was one cocky son-of-a-gun who thought that he didn’t have anything to worry about. Well, he would be in for a real shock soon enough. ‘You seem very nonchalant for a boy who is in big trouble, lad.’

  ‘What no coffee?’ Rex replied, a gleam in his eye.

  ‘What?’

  ‘No coffee? Mr Morgan always offered me a coffee when I came to his office. Sometimes he would even open up the liquor cabinet.’

  ‘Morgan had a liquor cabinet?’ Andrews stared at Rex in total disbelief. The look on the boy’s face was so matter-of-fact it looked as though he was serious.

  ‘Oh yeah. We often used to sit down over a G & T and chat about the day.’

  Mr Andrews studied the serious expression on Rex’s face for a moment and then realised that he was being had. This guy was a con artist. Andrews had been certain that this boy would not get away with any of his shenanigans with him, but it seemed that he had severely underestimated him. He had walked right into Rex’s trap with this talk about liquor cabinets and the boy had successfully led him off track with red herrings.

  He peered towards the cocky teenager. ‘Look lad. You may think that you can make a fool out of me like you do with the other teachers in this school, but you’re severely mistaken.’

  ‘I would never dream of it. I can see right away that you’re the type of principal who doesn’t take any nonsense. I would be an eejit to try and take you on.’

  ‘You better believe it lad. I don’t take any nonsense from any student.’

  ‘Mr Morgan was always a little soft,’ Rex continued. ‘It wasn’t hard to run rings around him, he was pretty gullible. You’re obviously a lot smarter.’

  ‘I like to think I am. I like to think that I can match wits with my students. I can compete with the best of them, you’d better believe it.’

  ‘I could believe that. I bet if I tried to lead you on a wild goose chase of words, I’d come out second best.’

  ‘Well, at least you’re aware of that.’

  ‘Definitely. I’d have to be up early in the morning to put one over on you.’

  ‘You can get up as early as you like, but it won’t make any difference. I’m not going to be sucked in by the likes of you, no matter what.’

  ‘Well, I’ll be sure to be careful what I say to you in the future. You’ll end up making me look like the eejit instead.’

  ‘Well, just you make...’ Damn it, he was doing it again. The guy was making him look like a total idiot… or eejit as he put it. This kid was good, really good. ‘Enough of this!’ Andrews tried hard to hide his embarrassment. ‘You’ve side tracked me long enough. It’s about time we talked about why it is that you’re sitting here in my office. There will be no coffee and there will be no alcohol, got it? You’re here because of the trouble you’ve been causing. You may have thought that you could get away with things under the old principal, but you’re not going to get away with things while I’m here. And I don’t care if your parents are paying this school a bri... grant!’

  Rex lifted his left eyebrow. ‘A what? A bribe? Is that what you were about to say? That’s quite an accusation isn’t it, Mr Andrews?’

  ‘I didn’t say that!’

  ‘You almost did.’

  ‘Well, I didn’t! And even if I did, it doesn’t make any difference. No amount of money is going to keep you in this school, not while I’m principal!’

  For the first time a look of concern came over Rex’s face. He gazed at Andrews and said nothing for several seconds. When he finally did, it was without his usual cockiness. ‘What are you saying?’

  ‘I’m saying that I am expelling you!’

  Andrews waited to see what Rex’s reaction would be. He expected a dramatic response, maybe anger, or even remorse.

  Rex sat there expressionless.

  Mr Andrews continued to study him for several seconds before speaking again, ‘So have you got anything to say?’

  ‘What needs to be said? You’ve made up your mind, haven’t you?’

  ‘By the way you’re talking it seems to me as though you’re happy about this.’

  ‘Not particularly. I like this school. But I also like being Rex Cassidy. That means that I don’t submit to any required standard.’

  Andrews stared at Rex. ‘I don’t believe what I’m hearing. You really don’t care, do you?’

  ‘Of course I care. I’ve made many good friends here. But what good is me doing a big whinge or getting upset going to do? Entertain you? It’s not going to change your mind. You’re determined that you don’t want me here, so there’s nothing that I can do about it, is there?’

  ‘No, there isn’t. At least you can see my point of view. You see I won’t tolerate fighting in this school. I won’t tolerate the humbling of staff members and especially not tormenting them to the point that they would quit!’ He glared at Rex for a few seconds just to let his words sink in.

  Rex scowled. ‘That eejit Browning got what was coming to him. If I had my way, it would be a lot worse. He messed around with a friend of mine.’

  ‘A friend of yours? You mean Vanessa Dante? The girl you were having a relationship with?’

  ‘Hell no. If he’d messed with her, it definitely would have been a lot worse for that douche bag. It was a mutual friend of ours. We both wanted that scumbag to go down so we came up with a plan to get rid of him.’

  ‘You took the law into your own hands?’

  ‘Well last time I heard, constantly humiliating a teacher who deserved it was not considered vigilante justice.’

  ‘That’s beside the point! You had no business doing that. And to think your girlfriend went along with your twisted little scheme. That doesn’t say much about her, does it?’


  Rex’s eyes narrowed now and for a moment, Andrews feared he’d said too much, However Rex spoke in a calm, but serious tone. ‘I don’t think you want to get into this conversation, Mr Andrews. Not if you are going to bad mouth Vanessa. So leave her out of this and let’s just focus on me, shall we?’

  Andrews pretended that was exactly what he intended, which really for all intents and purposes was the case. ‘Indeed, let’s do that, shall we? This school will no longer tolerate the sort of activities that you have involved yourself in the past. Therefore, I must make an example of you. You have gotten away with too much for far too long. Do you understand?’

  ‘Clearly.’ Rex continued to peer at him through narrow eyes. ‘So I guess that’s that then.’

  ‘Yes, I guess it is, but if I were you I wouldn’t be so blasé about this. Sure, you can go to some other school, some school that’s struggling with its budget. You can offer them big bribes not to expel or suspend you, but one day you might end up with a principal like me, one that won’t take any nonsense. Frankly, I hope that you do, because you certainly can’t go around rebelling against the system for the rest of your life. You can’t keep going on bribing authority and living your life without regards for rules and those above you. And you certainly can’t get away with playing the fool for the rest of your life can you?’

  Rex snickered. ‘We’ll have to see, won’t we Mr Andrews? We’ll just have to see.’