When I was a small child, before I’d developed a healthy fear of confrontation, I would freely report to my parents any injustice I encountered, even at the hands of adults. In these particular cases, if my father felt I’d been sufficiently wronged, he would deal with the matter himself.

Now most parents would make a phone call, but my dad was a lawyer and handled all life’s quandaries litigiously. He’d type up a formal letter, then give it to me in a sealed envelope, ordering me to deliver it to the teacher, coach, store clerk, or whoever it was that’d picked on me.

These little white envelopes were mysterious and magical. I never knew what the letters inside them said, but the receiver would instantly start treating me nicer after opening one. When I’d ask my father how he achieved such a feat, he’d say only, “Words are my business.”

But by the time we moved from Boston to Vermont, I was a mature woman of fourteen, and had reached the age where you didn’t admit you even had parents, never mind voluntarily invite them into your world. I made my mother drop me off a quarter mile before the location of any social event and disallowed her to get out of the car when she retrieved me. I fought my own battles, no longer invoking the Don Corleone envelopes my father conjured to subdue the wrath of the evil Kindergarten teachers.

An attorney for a government defense company now, my father had become someone to avoid, a perpetually scowling man who read nothing but news magazines and took overseas business trips he couldn’t discuss. Jaded and volatile, he started nearly every sentence with “Those God damn -- (insert hippies, communists, liberals, Red Sox, etc.).”

The man argued like a pro and used this skill as a leisure sport when company came around. And while I forbade him to speak to own my visitors, he sent many a potential boyfriend running from the house with a mere twitch of his Spock-like eyebrow. He was a land mine, something you stepped around if you had a brain in your head.

But my father was the last thing on my mind that afternoon when the school was made to watch a film sponsored by some charity group. My thoughts were on my latest crush, Greg Democa, who sat next to me in class earlier and gave me gum. I accepted this romantic offering with dreamy enthusiasm, certain this meant he was in love with me. I would chew it until it was a shriveled, flavorless glob of wax, then save it in a little box to give him on our wedding day.

But somewhere through the haze of hormones and grape Bubble Yum, the film on the big auditorium screen caught my attention; images of naked babies and bombs dropped on villages of screaming women. The picture changed, showing a still photograph of Richard Nixon holding a shiny black telephone to his ear.

“So then President Nixon called up Henry Kissinger,’” a voice-over narrative told us, “and said ‘You’d better bomb those Cambodians, or it’ll be your ass, Henry!”

I swallowed my gum. I didn’t give a shit about Richard Nixon. I was fourteen. He was an old ex-president that comedians made fun of, nothing more. And I didn’t know who Henry Kissinger was. But there was something weird about this film, a major deviation from our usual assemblies about walkathons and hot air balloon festivals.

As we left the auditorium, the visiting charity group held out cans, and we donated whatever spare change we had, which since we were high school kids, wasn’t much.

By the time school let out, I’d forgotten about the film, my mind back on Greg Democa, his Bubble Yum, and his perfectly faded red tag Levis.

But fate intervened that night at dinner, when my brother, a junior at my school, brought up the film in front of our parents.

“What did you think of that assembly today?” he asked between mouthfuls of mashed potatoes. “Can you believe what they said about Nixon telling Kissinger to bomb those Cambodians or it would be his ass?”

I willed my brother’s head to explode.

My father dropped his fork. The corner of his lip twitched and the Spock eyebrow arched to a record height. “What is the name of your school principal?”

“Mr. Graves,” my brother answered and went back to his mashed potatoes. As if nothing had happened. As if he hadn’t just pulled the pin out of a hand grenade.

The following morning my father didn’t mention the film as he got ready for work, so I prayed to the god of all that was good and un-embarrassing that he’d forgotten about it. I checked his desk and saw no white sealed envelopes, no newly typed letters, no decapitated horse head to leave under Principal Graves’ pillow.

But when I walked into my second period science class later that morning, a cluster of students huddled together by the windows.

“FBI,” one of them said.

“Nah, CIA. Definitely CIA.”

I went to the window and saw my father crossing the courtyard toward the school, dressed in his navy blue suit with huge, mirrored sunglasses, brief case in hand.

“Aw, shit,” I said as Principal Graves met him at the front doors, shaking his hand.

“Isn’t that, like, your DAD?” Heather Channing asked. “Gawd, I’d just die.”

My stomach churned through my next two classes. This wasn’t fair. After a year in this town, I’d only just made the transition from “new kid” status. I’d worked hard to achieve my badge of cool. I knew which jeans were acceptable and which would get spitballs shot at the back of my head. I’d learned to pronounce my R’s so they’d stop picking on my accent. I’d thrown away all my Shaun Cassidy albums and replaced them with Van Halen. People liked me. They invited me to parties. I was in.

And now he was going to ruin everything.

For fifth period, the entire school was called to an assembly once again. This time Principal Graves stood before us. He apologized that he had not pre-viewed yesterday’s film before allowing us to see it and explained that the views expressed therein did not necessarily represent the views of the administration. A parent had brought this matter to his attention, and he was grateful for it.

He didn’t mention my name. He didn’t mention my father’s name. The assembly let out. I was in the clear. I was in the fucking clear. It was over, done, and no student gave a shit enough to ask who the parent was. Most of them got stoned for assemblies anyway. They’d forget the whole thing within ten minutes.

I was elated with relief upon entering my last class of the day, World History with Mr. Connors. I’d survived with no sealed envelopes traced back to me. Greg Democa took the seat beside me and smiled, making my heart flutter. Life was good again.

“Today, class, we’re going to forgo our scheduled lesson to discuss something else,” Mr. Connors announced. “For those of you that don’t know, Adrienne’s father spoke to Mr. Graves this morning about yesterday’s assembly film. I’d like to discuss what Adrienne’s father said, and what it means to all of us.”

A chorus of desks squeaked as all heads turned to look at me.

Then Mr. Connors went to the blackboard and picked up a stick of fresh chalk. In huge yellow letters, he wrote COMMUNIST PROPAGANDA.

The nausea that had wavered all day made a final stand, and I felt my face turn green as Mr. Connors underlined the words three times, with feeling.

Greg Democa turned away and offered Heather Channing a piece of gum.