Chapter 3

Wednesday, August 24

My hopes that Reverend Neal wouldn't cause any more trouble were dashed as Mom pulled into the school parking lot to find the Reverend leading a protest, accompanied by three or four TV news cameras. Several of the protestors had signs with bible verses on them, including the one I was supposed to read in chapel this afternoon. "Reverend Tucker sure knows his stuff," I thought to myself.

Mom backed the car up. "I don't think it's a good idea for us to get out here, I'm going to pull around to the teacher's lot." She did so, and we ended up parking right next to Ms. Lease.

"Hello Hunter, Lanh," she said, getting out of her Prius, "and you must be..."

"Quint," my brother said, shaking her hand.

At that moment, Dr. Martin arrived. "Don't worry everybody; I have the situation under control. I've called the police to evict Reverend Neale from the school property, and 'Rather Reports' has agreed to do a story on The Program. Mr. Rather will be interviewing you all over the course of the day. Hunter, I've excused you from second period to do the interview. You will report to the library, the producers will tell you what to do once you get there."

I followed Dr. Martin to his office, stripped, and handed him my clothes. As I walked down the hallway towards English class, a girl I didn't recognized glowered at me.

"I think you're despicable," she hissed, "flaunting your perversion all over school like that. As soon as my parents let me, I'm transferring to Reverend Neale's school."

I smiled at her and kept walking. "Maybe these protests aren't such a bad thing after all; they might get rid of all the jerks around here." I thought to myself.

I got to English class and once again asked for relief, and this time Jeff offered to give it to me. He knelt down in front of me and took my swollen knob in his hand. Stroking gently at first, he looked up at me with a mixture of lust and something else –was it anger?- in his eyes. Holy shit this was hot! I looked back down at him as his pace quickened. "I'm about to cum," I warned him, "you might move your –ungh- face."

"I want it on me," he grunted, moving his face just inches away from my throbbing cock.

That did it for me. I came all over his nose, mouth, and chin. Jeff stood up and kissed me, smearing my own cum all over both of our faces. I didn't care, nor did I notice the rest of the class until Ms. Lease broke the silence.

"Jeff, since we were planning to talk about the fear of sexuality in 'The Scarlet Letter, ' would you like to explain to the class why you did that today and not Monday?"

Jeff nodded, and told the class that he had been afraid to reveal his sexuality because he thought that his family and friends from church would reject him. Seeing how accepting people were of Zach and I made him reconsider that fear, but the final straw came when he showed his parents the form asking to have him participate in the Program for swimming. They freaked out, and wanted to send him to the Neale Christian Academy. Jeff panicked when he heard this, and blurted out that he was gay. Mr. and Mrs. Dorsey did not react well to this bit of information, and wanted to send Jeff to some sort of camp that Reverend Neale said could 'cure' homosexuals. By this point Jeff was crying, and I was about to.

I didn't know why the story affected me so much. "You're probably getting a crush on him," I thought to myself, "I wonder if Mom could help him out."

Ms. Lease had the same idea. "Maybe it would help if I set up a meeting between your parents and the guidance counselor," she said, "since she has a Ph.D. in developmental psychology, she might be able to explain why those programs don't work, and Reverend Tucker could address your parents' religious objections to homosexuality." This cheered Jeff up a little bit, and Ms. Lease spent the rest of the class period discussing how modern homophobia resembled the Puritans' fear of sexually empowered women.

After English class got out I headed to the library, where I was greeted by a woman who I presumed to be a producer of some sort.

"You've got something on your face, dear," she told me, then turned to a man carrying a briefcase. "Carl, get this kid in makeup." The man opened the briefcase, which turned out to be full of makeup, which he applied liberally to my face and upper torso. He then took out a clip-on microphone.

"Janet," he asked the producer, "where do we put the mic?"

Janet looked puzzled for a second; "just have have him wear it around his neck." The producer wrapped the cord around my neck, so it looked like I was wearing the microphone as a necklace. Probably not the greatest fashion statement in the history of the world, but it would work. Then Janet led me to a seat next to Mr. Rather.

"How ya doin' kid," he asked me.

"I'm a little nervous to be honest," I replied, "I've never been on TV before"

"You'll do just fine." Someone counted down from three, and Mr. Rather looked into the camera. "Good afternoon folks, I'm Dan Rather reporting live from Adeline, Florida, about four hours North of where Hurricane Katrina is expected to make landfall tomorrow. Don't let that Category 1 rating fool ya folks, she's gonna be a doozy. Later in the program I'll talk with Marlee Matlin and James Carville about what President Bush's falling approval ratings mean for the midterm elections. But first, this kid next to me has been walking around school naked as a junebug all week, and that has some people madder than a bear that just stuck its paw in a hornets' nest."

Mr. Rather went on to interview me about the Program, how it had affected me, and what really went on between me and Vernon Neale. Overall I thought I did a pretty good job of presenting the positive impact of The Program, and disputing Reverened Neale's more creative claims about what the program entailed.

The interview ended before the bell rang, so I got to lunch a little bit early. I got my lunch, such as it was, and sat down across the table from Zach, who informed me that he had successfully convinced his parents to let him do The Program.

"To be honest, I think my mom just wants to have less laundry."

I laughed and said, "You know, being naked in front of other people might take some getting used to. You should come over to my house after school to practice."

He giggled, and I felt his socked foot slide over my bare toes. He must have slipped his shoes off under the table. Seizing the moment, I hooked my big toe over the top of his sock and peeled it off, making sure to rub against his arch as I did so. "I'm doing a reading in chapel today and my mom can give you a ride home afterwards," I said, repeating the procedure with the other foot.

As I caressed his soles Zach replied "At this rate you might need to practice giving me relief."

"What are you two doing?" asked Laura.

"Playing footsie," replied Zach.

Quint looked under the table to find me brushing my toes against Zach's ankle. "My God, we've created a monster!" he shouted.

Zach responded, "No, the monster's in my pants."