Chapter 75: The Big Day

Wednesday, March 31, 1982

The big day arrived. I made it through my classes without incident and while trying to ignore the constant questions, mostly about either Jessica or Randy. My answers were pretty much that I completely supported Jessica and thought she would be an excellent class rep as well as cheer captain, and that, while I hadn’t heard Randy’s comments, my understanding of them was that they weren’t the sorts of things expected of Student Council members.

School was running on a modified schedule today, meaning all the classes were shortened by about 12 minutes. The plan would be for the candidates for the five top offices to speak. We were allotted four minutes each. That’s not much, but even so, with eleven candidates — mine was the only three-way race — that’s forty-four minutes. Add in introductory remarks from the principal, plus speaker transitions and the like, and we’re at an hour. After that, we’d split into the three grades electing class reps for another ten minutes or so of speeches.

Seniors got to go home early. Or hang out, if they rode the buses.

Our entire slate met at lunch. It was the first time I’d seen many of them except brief glimpses in the hall. I was surprised — and maybe not surprised, as well — when Jessica made a beeline for me and hugged me. “Hi! How’re you holding up?” I said.

“Good! It’s been crazy, though!”

“For me, too!”

“We need to plan something. Mid-April? How’s your schedule?”

“Without checking, which I’d need to do, the second and third weekends are probably clear. First you know about...” she giggled and nodded... “and the fourth is State.”

“I knew that, too,” she said with a grin. “So, let’s get together early next week and compare schedules. Then we’ll be past the election craziness and we can both talk to parents and boyfriends and girlfriends and all that and figure out their schedules. After all the commotion it’ll be interesting to find out if there was any reason for it all!”

I chuckled. “I like that. Sure, anytime. Um ... maybe Monday after classes? You know where I am seventh period.”

“Of course! My spies would have been able to find that out, but in this case, no need. Meet you at the benches just outside?”

“Sounds good!”

She gave me another hug, then scooted off.

After maybe 5 minutes of greetings, Tony got up. “Hey, everyone! Just wanted to say best of luck today. I’m nervous, not going to lie. I’m sure most of you are. Just keep in mind they’re obviously just as nervous as we are, and we’re strong, both in numbers and in ideas. And we’ve got your back, all around. I know it’s been crazy around here. Thanks for sticking it out and, with any luck, we’ll all be really busy next year!”

People cheered. It wasn’t the most inspirational speech ever, but it was heartfelt.

We were all excused thirty minutes early from seventh period to meet in a room off the gym. All of the principals were there. I suppose it’d have been a great time to pull some mischief somewhere else. Tom Myerson was also there, along with a couple of other teachers who often worked with Student Council — Mr. Glenn and Ms. Phipps, both senior Government and Economics teachers, and Ms. Epstein, who taught AP English IV. I thought Tom was probably in a conflict-of-interest situation, and he’d handle it honorably.

We clumped into our slate. The others had interesting dynamics. No one wanted to stand next to Randy, but he wanted to stand next to everyone. Several of the others were clearly close, others weren’t, and some, like Cindy, looked to be at loose ends.

Principal Riggs greeted us. “Hello, candidates! It’s rare that we have such interest in the election. I want to welcome all of you. In a minute, we’re going to draw lots for speaker order. After that, you’ll have about twenty minutes to prepare however you’d like to, and then we’ll get things started.”

Speaker-order draw was simple. They had numbered balls in a bag. Mr. Glenn pulled one for each speaker. For President, it turned out that Tony would go first, then Ray. I hoped Tony had a good kick-off planned.

My race was next, and, win! James, then Danny, then me. James looked like he thought he’d won the lottery, so ... even better. I’d really wanted to go last given how this race had developed. If I were an unknown, I might have wanted to go first and define myself, but I wasn’t an unknown anymore. Not after these last few crazy weeks.

Randy seemed pleased he’d go first. Lizzie barely reacted, but I was sure she was thrilled to get the rebuttal. Mikayla and Amit both had to go first, but with their races more skills-based than the others I thought it didn’t matter as much. Besides, the odds were strong that both my and Lizzie’s races would provide a lot of drama affecting theirs.

For the class reps, I only paid attention to a few, and of those, everyone I cared about got the second speech.

I didn’t have much use for my twenty minutes. If I’d had to go first, sure, but third? I was going to be reacting to the others.

Twenty minutes later we could hear the noise from students filling the gym. Principal Riggs called us to order and led us out. I would be seated next to Danny and Randy in a big line of chairs. The class reps were up there with us even though they wouldn’t be speaking. Seemed silly, but whatever.

After giving a few more minutes for stragglers, Principal Riggs got us rolling. “Welcome, students! As most of you know, this year’s Student Council race has been anything but boring!” There was a wave of laughter at that. “Now we’ve reached the pivotal moment, where each candidate will speak of their vision for next year’s Council and ask for your vote. I know some people believe that Council doesn’t matter, but this will determine things like your dance themes next year, fundraisers, supplemental funding for teachers, and much more. Student Council has input in many places.”

I’m not sure how many people bought that, but it seemed like a fair number were at least willing to go with it.

“Please give your attention to each candidate, politely, and refrain from being disruptive.” That was new. I wondered if something was afoot.

“First up, we have Tony Hill, running for Council President.”

And with that, we were off. Tony’s speech was ... okay. Solid. Uninspired, but fine. He talked about a vision of a more inclusive Council that solicited student input and reflected the broader population of Memorial. That we had a rare opportunity to change the direction and make Council more representative and less a bunch of students who never really did anything. It worked. It wasn’t great, but it worked.

The next two were my biggest worry. Ray and James got to go back-to-back. If they’d coordinated, they could effectively put together a jumbo-sized speech attacking our slate and extolling the virtues of the incumbents.

Didn’t happen. Ray chose to do a rah-rah-Memorial-sports-are-great-so-vote-for-me speech that ignored everything but his own race and barely even touched on Council itself, except that he was a Council veteran and therefore knew everything. In most years it’d have won him the race. This year? It was badly out of tune, I thought.

James was a bit more business-like, talking about his time as a class rep. However, he didn’t really have anything to say about what he’d do, just that you could trust him because everyone knew him and, besides, he’d been a class rep. He did make the claim that everything was great, so obviously Council was doing just fine and nothing needed to change.

That put Danny up. Danny was funny, of course. He talked about how ‘Council didn’t do anything anyway’ and ‘everyone knew that’. His conclusion was the critical part for me.

“I have to say, this race has been crazy! I have to give credit to Steve, who came to talk to me and understand my position in this race.” James shot me a look. I don’t think he’d expected that. Probably never crossed his mind. “Never talked to James, not once. Still haven’t. Look, y’all, Council is a joke. Always has been. That’s my point, and if you think so, too, say it with your vote. But, if you think Council’s not a joke, Steve at least has some good ideas. I don’t think the administration will let them do anything, but, hey, if you do, or want to let them try, I can’t fault you on that. But James is never going to do a thing. At least I’m honest about it.”

James was glaring at Danny by this point. Danny had part of the crowd clapping. Not enough for him, I thought, but a goodly part. It wasn’t bad.

And then it was my turn. I got up, walked to the lectern, smiled, waved. I hoped this went well; I was about to throw a bomb and hope it went off the way I wanted it to.

Hello, everyone! Three weeks ago, no one knew who I was. Now, somehow, everyone does. Funny how that happens. I guess it just takes running for Council. Or, well, turning down the new head cheerleader for a date might have been the reason. (Laughter! Yay!)

This race is really about one thing. Danny boiled it down pretty well. You’ve got three choices. First, maybe you like how Council’s run now. You like what little they do. You like things a bit quiet and conservative all around. You don’t want to rock the boat. If so, hey, James is your guy. Not going to get in the way of that.

Or, second, you think Council’s a joke. You’re not happy about everything, but no one can do anything anyway. Danny’s got the market cornered on that; if that’s you, he’s your guy.

Or, finally, you like how things are but you think they can be better. That’s where I come in. I want to see if we can make things a little better.

What does better mean? Memorial hasn’t updated the dress code in nearly a decade. Maybe it’s time we looked at it. Council can drive that.

Or maybe you like social events. I can guarantee that the social committee will be empowered to push for more interesting and better events if you elect our team to run things. The other guys? They’d like to move back a decade, not forward.

Maybe you like academics. Most of you don’t know that Council has a role in fund-raising and in advising groups like the PTA on which teachers to assist. We’ll take that seriously and put real work into choosing who gets help.

Maybe you just like the idea of a Council that looks like the student population. Take a look around. We’re a mix of ethnicities, religions, nationalities. Our team looks like that. The Council right now? Not so much.

One thing I can tell you is that we will actively seek out your thoughts and input. We’re not going to just hold our meetings and talk amongst ourselves and be visible just once a year, at elections.

That was pretty much all I was planning to say until yesterday. I’ve heard that some harsh words were spoken yesterday about the race, about other candidates in the race, and even disparaging a Student Council position.

Now, maybe that’s wrong, and if so, I’ll be the first to apologize. However, I feel strongly about this. If someone can’t respect each and every student at this school as a person and respect their right to make their own choices and live their own life, they have no business running for Council. If someone doesn’t respect the office they’re running for, they have no business running for Council. If someone looks at the school and thinks that sex, or ethnicity, or religion, or whatever determines who should get to do which jobs, they have no business running for Council.

Our team is built on respecting each and every student, even those who hold views we don’t personally agree with, whether they’re more conservative or more liberal. Whether they’re preppy, or yuppies, or goths, punks, whatever. Totally mainstream, or totally on the fringe. We’ll never stop listening and we won’t put you down. Any candidate who can’t say the same? They have no business running for Council, and anyone running for Council should repudiate them.

That’s all I’ve got to say. Thank you, and I hope you’ll support me, my friends, and our team in this election.

I drew a solid wave of applause. I also had to walk back and sit next to a guy who looked like he wanted to strangle me. Tony looked a bit stunned, and so did Danny. Ray and James looked distinctly unhappy. Lizzie was nearly stone-faced, but I could tell she wanted to smirk. Mikayla was less successful at not smirking, and Valerie, her opponent, was a little green. So was Marcus.

Three minutes later, it was clear I’d hit the target. Whatever Randy had meant to say turned into a muddled mess about how ‘some people’ were in no position to judge who should be on Council and how they shouldn’t even let ‘those people’ run in the first place and how he knew all the ‘good people’ running for Council would fully support all of that, and by the way, he was great friends with Ray and James and Valerie and Marcus. Valerie looked particularly horrified at that, but the rest didn’t look thrilled in the least.

If Randy managed to say anything about what he’d do, it was that he’d work to rename his office to ‘Scribe’ so that it would better reflect the important work of the office. Or something. He had the presence of mind to not actually say something outright misogynist, but it still came through.

He glared at me as he walked back to his seat.

Lizzie walked up and proceeded to be Lizzie. Sharp, focused, and deadly. She said, up front, that she was ‘different,’ and that not everyone could handle that, but that was fine. She’d been different all her life and was used to it.

Then she brought up the word ‘Secretary.’ How it originated in the Latin for ‘secret’, and meant someone who kept important secrets. That it was a term of respect for the officeholder and signified the importance of the office.

She closed with this: “My opponent doesn’t want the office he’s seeking. He thinks it’s beneath him. Fine for half the student population, though, but not for him. I’ve had a reputation for years as hating half the students myself, so I know a bit of what that’s like. I don’t; I never have. I just don’t want to date them.” She got laughter on that. And some boos, but not many. “Steve is a good friend. So’s Amit. Tony is becoming a good friend, and so are Calvin, and Troy, and Blaine. Look, I know some of you are simply opposed to my being who I am. I don’t think that should affect your choice in this election, but you be you. That’s how I’ve lived my life, after all. But ... I don’t understand why you’d vote for someone who mocks the office he’s running for and puts down half of humanity. And I don’t understand why you’d vote for anyone who supports someone like that. You be you. Just, be the best you that you can be. Thank you, and please vote for me and for my friends!”