Bruce
and Danny Chapter 6: The Reveal

By: BeatleNumber9

The first two weeks of school had
been going great. Me and Josh pretty much did everything together since we met.

Before we left, Mrs. Ramos gave us
a reminder.

“Don’t forget that this Friday is the
school’s Parent-Teacher night.”

I had a feeling dad wasn’t going to
like that. I didn’t understand it at the time but dad was always insistent that
he and mom hide their existence from the school, wanted me to take the bus
instead of picking me up and dropping me off, and having me take any paperwork
they needed to fill out to school with me instead of him or mom dropping it off
themselves. Mom didn’t seem to share in his avoidance, saying it was dumb for
him to act like that.

So, as I boarded the school bus I
wondered how dad was going to get out of this parent teacher night.

As we ate dinner, I could see Danny
was eating a little slower than usual. It kind of looked like he had something
he wanted to say.

“You feeling alright, Danny?” I
asked.

“Uh…” He unfolded a piece of paper
he’d been keeping in his pocket and slid it over to me.

Uh oh! I thought. Did he get in trouble
or something? I unfolded the paper only to see the words “parent-teacher
night”. I let out a mild groan at this, both out of relief Danny wasn’t in
trouble, and annoyance that this time had finally come.

“What’s wrong?” Emma asked.

I just slid it over to her. She
just looked at it, then looked over at Danny.

“Well, looks like we’ll have to
clear our schedules for Friday night.” She said, giving Danny a smile.

“So, we’re going?” Danny asked.

“Well, it says attendance is
mandatory so, yes.” She said.

“Yeah,” I sighed, “I guess we are.”

“Yes!” Danny cheered quietly. “You
can finally meet my friend Josh.”

“Yeah.” I said, trying to sound
happy.

After we put Danny to bed I talked
over this whole parent-teacher thing.

“Ugh, I’ve been dreading this.” I
said.

“Well, you can’t say you didn’t see
this coming. You couldn’t avoid going to Danny’s school for the rest of his
academic life.” Emma pointed out.

“I know…” I sighed. “I just… I
don’t know, wanted him to feel normal for a little while.”

“I just don’t think it’s going to
be as bad as you’re making it out to be.” Emma reassured, as she got ready for
bed.

“You won’t be saying that once
we’re the only Anthros in a sea of humans.” I said.

“So, we’ll stand out?” She said.
“It’s not like they’re going to chase us out of the building or tell us that
our son can’t go to school there anymore.”

“It’s not about that, it’s about
how the other kids’ll treat him afterwards.” I clarified. It’s just…It’s not
going to be easy for him anymore.”

“Hey,” She said, putting her arms
around my shoulders and looking up at me. “it’ll be fine. We’re just two
parents going to their son’s parent-teacher night like everyone else.” She
kissed me. “I know you worry about Danny, I do too, but we can’t shield him
from everything at school. If something happens, we’ll handle it. It’s what we
do.”

“Okay.”

Well, it was time, we made the
short drive there, though it felt like an eternity for me. I parked and looked
at Emma next to me before getting out of the car. I walked over to Danny, and lifted
him up in my arms.

“Come on buddy.” I said. “Let’s do
this thing.”

Thankfully there weren’t that many
people in the front of the school now, since we were arriving a little late, at
least Emma had granted me that. By now most parents had arrived and were
meeting with their kids’ teachers. We went up to a lady sitting at an end table
with some fliers on it.

“Excuse me, we’re here for
parent-teacher night.” I said, trying to hide the reluctance in my voice.

“Hi, Mrs. Miller.” Danny greeted.

“Oh,” She said, looking surprised
to see us. “You’re Danny’s parents? I didn’t realize… You know what, never
mind,” She smiled, brushing off the awkwardness of the conversation, “just head
down that hallway and the kindergarten teachers will be in the gym.”

“Thank you.” I said.

Well, that wasn’t nearly as awkward
as I was expecting. I thought to myself as we made our way down the hallway to
the gym. Maybe Em was right? Maybe this wouldn’t be as bad as I was making it
out to be?

When we walked into the gym, it
took a minute, but conversations started dying down as I could see everyone’s
attention quickly zoning in on us, I could overhear one guy aske quietly “Did
they come to the wrong school?”. I could see a few people at least trying to be
polite, a wife tugging her husband’s shirt sleeve trying to get him to look
away from us, another group trying to continue their conversation they were
having before we walked in.

“So, where’s your teacher?” I asked
Danny.

“There she is!” He said happily,
pointing over to a short Hispanic woman, who looked to be in her 30s.

“Hi, Mrs. Ramos!” Danny greeted as
we walked over to her.

“Hello Danny!” She greeted back,
with a happy, but clearly surprised look on her face. “And you must be Danny’s
parents.” She said, extending her hand to me, with a small hint of nervousness
in her voice.

“Hey there.” I said, taking her
small hand and gently shaking it, while still holding Danny in my other arm.
“I’m a little taller than you thought I’d be, aren’t I?” I tried to joke.

She laughed at my dumb joke, and it
sounded pretty genuine.

“Well I can see where Danny gets
his charm from.” She shot back.

Both me and Emma gave a chuckle at
this.

“Danny’s told us a lot about you.”
Emma said. “He says you’re a cool teacher.”

“Oh, did he?” Mrs. Ramos gave Danny
a playful look, to which he responded to by burying his face in my chest, looking
slightly embarrassed.

“Hey dad?” He looked back up at me.
“Can I go find Josh?

“Sure buddy.” I said, setting him
down.

“Just stay in sight sweetie,” Emma
told him, “and we’ll come find you when we’re done.”

“Okay.” He said before walking off
to find his friend. We turned our attention back to his teacher.

“So, how’s our boy?” Emma asked.

Once I broke away from mom and dad,
I went looking for Josh. It didn’t take me long to find him, by one of the
snack tables with his folks. I cheerfully run up to him.

“Hey Josh!” I greeted.

“Uh, hi Danny.” He sounded a little
nervous.

“What’s wrong?” I asked, noticing his
restless state.

“Who’s that?” He asked pointing
over to my parents.

“Oh, that’s my mom and dad.” I said
matter-of-factly.

“But… they don’t look like you…” He
said.

“I’m adopted, remember?” I reminded
him.

“Oh yeah…” He said.

Then Josh’s parents walked over to
us.

“Is this that friend of yours you
were telling us about, Josh?” His mom asked him.

“Yeah…” Josh said shyly.

“I’m Danny.” I greeted.

“Very nice to meet you Danny.”
Josh’s dad said reaching out and shaking my small hand.

“You too.” I said back.

I didn’t know what dad was so worried
about, this was going fine, but I still noticed how nervous Josh was.

“What is it?” I asked.

“Well… I guess I just haven’t seen
that many parents like yours…” He said.

“There are no Anthros where you
live?” I asked curiously.

He shook his head.

“Weird, there’s tons of them where
I live. I’m like, the only human.”

“So… are your parents nice?” He
asked.

“Of course they are!” I said, a
little confused, why wouldn’t they be.

“But yeah, Danny’s adjusting very
well in class.” Mrs. Ramos said.

“That’s wonderful to hear.” Emma
said before chuckling a little and patting me on the arm. “Bruce here was
pretty worried about our boy’s first day. But I told him it’d be fine, looks
like I was right.” She kissed me on the cheek.

“Yeah, I guess so.” I said, smiling
and rolling my eyes. “It’s good to hear he’s got no problems making friends.”
But I wondered if I should bring up my concerns.

“Well it’s very common for parents
to be worried about their kids starting school.” Mrs. Ramos reassured.

“Right…” I said. “But, uh, there’s
a reason I was so worried. I mean, being the kind of family we are has given us
a few bumps in the road. I’m just a little concerned about bullying…” I
confessed.

“That’s very understandable.” Mrs.
Ramos said.

“I’m even more worried now that we
showed up here today…” I said. “He’s just been so happy going to school the
past few days, I don’t want it to get ruined by a few kids who think he’s
different because we’re his parents.”

“I understand.” She said. “I’ll
make sure if anything happens he feels comfortable coming to me to talk about it
and we’ll deal with it.”

“That’d mean a lot.” I said.

“Well, we’re happy he’s doing so
well in your class.”

“Well, if there’s nothing else you
want to discuss,” I said after a bit of an awkward silence, “I think we’ll go
find Danny and take off.”

“Okay, I’ll let you go then.” She
put out her hand and shook both of ours. “It was very nice meeting you both.”

I looked around the gym, trying to
ignore the few people still staring at us and murmuring to each other, and
spotted Danny talking with another boy and his parents. Me and Emma headed over
to him. My heart sank a little when I saw how his friend reacted to us walking
over, moving slightly behind his mom and looking really uneasy. I tried not to
let my disappointment show.

“Hey, Danny.” I said, rubbing his
shoulder. “Is this your friend you’ve told us about?”

“Yeah, this is Josh.” Danny said,
cheerfully.

“Well, hey there Josh.” I said,
giving a slight wave.

“Josh, don’t be rude, say hello to
Danny’s parents.” His mom said.

“Uh…hi…” He said quietly.

“Aw, he’s just shy.” His dad said,
before holding out his hand for me to shake it. “Nice to meet you, I’m
Richard.”

“Bruce.” I said back, shaking his
hand.

“Emma.” My wife said, shaking his
hand after I did.

“I’m Krista.” Josh’s mom said.
“Nice to meet you.”

“Well, it’s getting late and we
don’t really have anything else to do, so I think we’re just going to head
home.” I said, picking Danny up.

“It was nice meeting you.” Emma
said.

“You too!” Richard said.

“See you Monday Josh.” Danny called
back.

“Okay!” Josh called back.

Well, it least it didn’t seem like
we completely scared his friend off,
I thought to myself as we left the school and walked to the car.

“See, wasn’t that relatively
painless like I said it’d be?” Emma asked as we got in the car.

“I guess.” I said, rolling my eyes
a little, starting the car and driving home.

I watched Danny play with Angie,
Tyson, and Owen as I talked with Karim.

“I’m just worried how Danny’s
experiences at school might change after this week. I mean, he just seems so
happy, I’d hate for that to change just cause some kids think it’s weird that
his parents aren’t human.”

“Well, how did the people there
react to seeing you and Emma there?” Karim asked.

“About how you’d expect.” I said. “Though
it was more like half the gym stopping to stare and gawk at us as opposed to
the entire gym.”

Karim chuckled a little. “Well,
it’s not like they’re going to start a petition to kick Danny out of school.”

“Pssh, I hope not…” I said.