Naomi bedding Lucas, then. "So this is why she didn't snap up the permanent position immediately", coughs a faintly embarrassed Brad. Well, yes. Especially since her new role as Whore of Babylon seems to be keeping her occupied full-time. "You have done the wrong thing morally and you know it", Jack trumpets, after trapping Naomi in a corner. However, Naomi is persistent in her belief that she's an acceptable human being. "I'm a good teacher", she mopes, when Brad confronts her. "And I haven't done anything wrong, so why should I be punished?" Well, it's not about punishment - yet. "If I believe the issue warrants it," Brad declares, "I will take it to the Department." And, as we all know, threatening somebody at Summer Bay High with "the Department" is like dangling an arachnophobe over a pit of black widows. Naomi pulls a Macaulay Culkin in Home Alone face by way of response. School's outWord fans, here's one for you. "Grounded means grounded", Dan asserts, as he fixes Drew to his desk with the kind of stare that could keep planes on the tarmac. However, Drew's studies couldn't be further from his tiny mind. Instead, he's panicking about how to get Belle back on side. When he catches up with her, she gives him short shrift.

"You can't even show me respect", she sniffs. And when he does eventually convince her to meet up with him at lunchtime, a study group gets in the way - and Belle is stood up.

Out of spite, she later steals Drew's assignment - leaving Dan and Naomi doubting that he ever wrote it in the first place. This is the final straw for Drew, who decides to hang up his exercise book for good.

Belle, feeling terrible, admits to her bad deed - but it comes way too late. "I'm not going back", Drew hisses. "School's just not my thing." His grades, you feel, would probably agree.

Named and shamed

While Brad ponders whether he should refer Naomi's sorry story to the Department (gasp!), Jack tells Martha that he'd rather to take it to the courts.

"If a teacher sleeps with a student," he says, as his nostrils flare, "it should be instant dismissal." All the while, Colleen observes their exchange through eyeholes cut into a newspaper.

Later, Jack offers his brother some support before he comes under the scrutiny of his headmaster. However, as Lucas reveals nothing new about his incident with Naomi, Brad decides to close his investigations into the matter.

Naomi is overjoyed at being let off the hook, but not for long. That afternoon, in the diner, she's taken aback when she sees the headline on the local rag.

"Teacher caught in student sex scandal", it screams. Yep, forget the Department (argh!) or the courts - Colleen's taken it to the press!


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