Chapter 67

“Right, of course. But you keep the promise anyway. That’s what love is. Love is keeping the promise anyway.”
—John Green, The Fault in Our Stars

THE WEEK WAS INTENSE from the moment we stepped inside the school until we collapsed at the end of the week. Thursday, all sophomores were required to take the PSAT 10 test. Every sophomore in school, all 550 of us, were required to take the PSAT. This test had no bearing on college admissions but could result in National Merit Scholarship. That was fucked up since supposedly our National Service provided tuition for college or technical school. Apparently, however, there were tiers of schools you could apply to and the National Merit Scholarship allowed you to apply tuition-free to a higher tier college.

I was beginning to think that, like most government programs, National Service was cobbled together out of a dozen different programs and had to accommodate hundreds of different systems that were already in place when the Service was founded. Sort of like Homeland Security. I looked around the school and knew half the people who took the test this week would never be able to pass it in four years. Why bother? I guessed that college enrollment, which had already begun to show a decline, was going to tank in the next few years as people started depending on the skills they learned in the Service.

I was beginning to compile a list of questions to investigate about the effect of the National Service on our society. First, with mandatory birth control—specifically mandated to reduce and eliminate teen pregnancy—we would hit a point where there would be as much as a six percent drop in birth rate from pre-Service levels. This would then be picked up by an increase in births by people in their twenties as they come out of the Service and start families. The question arising in my mind was whether, having delayed pregnancy by two to five years, young women would then get pregnant in their twenties at the same or higher rate as in their teens pre-Service?

Then there was the effect on colleges. College enrollment took an immediate hit the first year the National Service was instituted. Supposedly, everyone who entered the service was trained in a skill that was transferable to the adult workforce. Having those technical skills when they came out of Service, how many who would have gone to college would simply not bother now that they could earn a skilled laborer income? Would colleges ever regain the numbers they once had? And as a result, would the value of education be reduced even further than the late conservative attacks on it had managed?

Finally, I wondered what the less quantitative effect on people coming out of the Service would be? Would we show an increase or decrease in violent crime? Would there be an increase or decrease in depression? Suicide? Marriage? Divorce? I wondered how many of those questions had been asked by anyone who voted for the twenty-eighth amendment.

Got a little distracted there. PSAT. V1 never took a PSAT. I took the SAT as a senior and filled out a form that said what colleges I wanted my scores sent to. Two months after taking the test, I got a letter from one of the schools that said they were happy to welcome me in the fall. I filled out their questionnaire and in the fall, I started school. I guess the form was their application for admissions.

I was thankful I’d been paying more attention in English and was better prepared for language skills. Even the math portions required that you analyze and parse an English sentence.

The recommended daily calcium intake for a 20-year-old is 1,000 milligrams (mg). One cup of milk contains 299 mg of calcium and one cup of juice contains 261 mg of calcium. Which of the following inequalities represents the possible number of cups of milk m and cups of juice j a 20-year-old could drink in a day to meet or exceed the recommended daily calcium intake from these drinks alone?

And kids say they’ll never use Algebra after high school. The math part of the statement was simple. Parsing the English was what made these questions difficult. And three-quarters of the test was English language. My extra sessions with Ms. Levy and her critique of my creative writing came in handy.

A subway system is expanded to provide service to a growing suburb. A bike-sharing program is adopted to encourage nonmotorized transportation. 1) To alleviate rush hour traffic jams in a congested downtown area, stoplight timing is coordinated. When any one of these changes occur, it is likely the result of careful analysis conducted by transportation planners.

Which choice for 1) best maintains the sentence pattern already established in the paragraph?

A) NO CHANGE

B) Coordinating stoplight timing can help alleviate rush hour traffic jams in a congested downtown area.

C) Stoplight timing is coordinated to alleviate rush hour traffic jams in a congested downtown area.

D) In a congested downtown area, stoplight timing is coordinated to alleviate rush hour traffic jams.

After four hours, I was glad to get to the final essay question. When I read it, I was especially thankful for the time Ms. Levy had spent during our study of Julius Caesar talking about argument and persuasion. Our little escapade writing arguments had been followed by a number of examples of logically constructed persuasive speeches.

As you read the passage below, consider how Paul Bogard uses evidence, such as facts or examples, to support claims, reasoning to develop ideas and to connect claims and evidence, stylistic or persuasive elements, such as word choice or appeals to emotion, to add power to the ideas expressed.

We had one sheet of paper to make notes and organize our thoughts and four pages in the answer booklet to write our essay. The whole exam, including reading, organizing, and writing, was allowed fifty minutes. The passage we were responding to was two pages long. Out of the corner of my eye, I saw kids starting to write as soon as we were told to open our booklets and I wondered how they could write something without having read the passage yet. That took me five minutes before I was ready to make notes.

I felt I’d done pretty well. I was able to pick out the salient points from the passage and make a few of my own in talking about them. I was shot by the time we were finished.

Rachel and Joan met us in the parking lot after we were done. Rachel had taken the PSAT 11 and was as tired as the rest of us. Joan was a senior and would take the SAT on November second. After her scores came back, she’d decide if it was worth her time to take the ACT or re-take the SAT in the spring. I wondered how many people who took the tests even knew what the acronyms meant. Scholastic Aptitude Test was originated after World War I as an Army IQ test. It became a standard college entrance exam in the thirties. The American College Test started competing about the time I was in college. Now, both tests were being challenged by the National Service Aptitude Test, NSAT, that everyone had to take within thirty days of their eighteenth birthday. Everybody wanted their slice of the pie.

Anyway, Beca got in Joan’s Miata. Desi, Brittany, and I loaded into Rachel’s Yaris and we headed up to North Side High School for the Girls’ Volleyball Sectionals. I couldn’t believe Livy had to take that test and then get on a bus to go play volleyball. You’d think the schools would coordinate these things better. All the teams looked tired when they took the court. It showed when our team only managed to take one game of their first match. They were out. At least Livy could focus on running now.

Friday, the first grading period ended. We all wanted to celebrate so we decided to go to the homecoming football game that night. Some genius decided starting a big dance after an hour and a half of dirty, and this year muddy, football was dumb, so the dance would be Saturday night. As it was, Livy left us at halftime so she could get rest before cross country regionals the next morning. The race wasn’t until ten-thirty, but it was at West Noble up in Ligonier so we had to get moving early. Brittany caught a ride home with her so she wouldn’t risk any parental censure that would keep her from the dance Saturday.

By some miracle, and a last-minute field goal, our team won the game and we were in a good mood when we filed out with the happy fans. Desi disappeared with Joan and Beca grabbed my hand.

“I haven’t spent any time with my boyfriend the past two weeks,” she said. “It’s been impossible all fall with school and cross country. Rachel, can I sit in the back seat with Jacob while you drive me home?”

“Sure you can, sugar. I might have to park someplace for a while so I can get back there with you, though.”

“Yeah,” Beca sighed. “Just for a little while.”

Beca and I got in the back seat and Rachel started the car. Beca cuddled up next to me. She didn’t try to kiss or make out. She really just wanted to be held and cuddled. Rachel parked at Eagle Marsh and crawled in beside us, sandwiching Beca. We just held her between us.