Chapter 8: Monday
The meeting at the school was at eleven o'clock.
We sat on one side of a long table — me, my husband, Donna in her professional capacity, and a woman named Rachel from the local authority's online safety team who Donna had contacted on Friday.
On the other side sat the head teacher, the deputy head, and Tyler's parents.
Tyler was not in the room.
Neither was Ethan.
Carol looked like she hadn't slept.
Her husband — a large, quiet man named Graham who had said almost nothing since they arrived — sat with his hands flat on the table and his eyes on the middle distance.
The head teacher opened the meeting.
She had clearly already reviewed the material Donna had sent through, because she moved quickly past the introductions and into the substance.
"We've reviewed the channel content that was reported," she said.
"And I want to be clear from the outset — this is serious.
The volume of content, the nature of it, and the fact that it was distributed across multiple school networks means we are not treating this as an isolated incident."
Graham looked at his wife.
She didn't look back.
"Tyler will be suspended while we complete our investigation," the head teacher continued.
"Depending on what that investigation finds, we may be looking at a longer-term consequence."
"He's never been in trouble before," Carol said.
"Not once."
"That's noted," the head teacher said.
"It doesn't change what we found."
Rachel from the online safety team spoke next.
She explained, clearly and without drama, what the content constituted legally.
She used specific terms.
She talked about the photograph of me in particular — the fact that it had been taken without consent, that it had been used to create content designed to humiliate, and that it had been distributed to minors.
Graham's hands pressed harder against the table.
"Did you know about this?" my husband asked him.
Directly, quietly.
Graham looked up.
"No."
"Did you know he had a channel?"
"I knew he made videos.
I thought it was gaming."
"Did you ever ask to see them?"
Graham's jaw moved.
"No."
My husband nodded once and said nothing else.
Carol leaned forward.
"I want to know what you want from this.
What outcome you're actually looking for."
"I already told you on the phone," I said.
"I want this understood.
Not punished for the sake of it — understood.
By Tyler.
By the boys who watched.
By the school."
"And by us," Graham said.
It was the most he'd said all morning.
His voice was flat and tired.
"You want us to understand it too."
"Yes," I said.
He nodded slowly.
He looked like a man who had spent the weekend finding out who his son was and was still adjusting to the information.
The meeting ran for another forty minutes.
By the end, there were specific actions on paper — the school's investigation timeline, the referral to the online safety team, a requirement for Tyler to complete a structured program before any return to school.
As we were leaving, Graham stopped me in the corridor.
Carol was ahead of him, already at the door.
"I'm sorry," he said.
"For what he did.
And for what your son saw.
And for what it did to you."
He said it simply, without asking for anything back.
"Thank you," I said.
He nodded and walked to catch up with his wife.
Donna touched my arm as we walked to the car.
"You did well in there."
"We all did."
"No." She shook her head slightly.
"You.
The way you stayed calm.
The way you kept bringing it back to understanding rather than punishment.
That's harder than it looks."
I thought about the promenade.
The gold light.
My arm out.
The silence that followed.
"I had a good few days to think about what I actually wanted," I said.
She smiled.
"And what do you want now?"
I looked at the school building, then at the car where my husband was waiting, then at the sky.
"Lunch," I said.
May you like
"I want a proper lunch."
She laughed — a real one — and we walked to the car together.
