Chapter 32

THE CREW FELL HEADLONG into May, scrambling to get class projects finished, final exams taken, and Senior festivities attended. DMACC commencement was held on Saturday the sixth and Dennis happily accepted his AA degree. He stopped to wish several people he knew a good life and then ran to meet his girlfriends, including Brenda and Ardith. Of course, Peg, Dot, and Tom were also there to congratulate him.

“Just one more week!” Natalie said, dancing around with Dennis.

“We’re all ready for that,” Amy joined.

Peg was sulking a little, but Dennis reached over and placed his mortarboard on her head.

“You’re my favorite grad!” he said. She beamed and hugged him hard.

“I have a grad’ation hat!” she said, happily showing her mother.

“We’re celebrating at our house this evening, so all of you prepare for dinner and cake,” Dot said. “Next weekend, Lana’s parents are hosting our celebration.”

“That’s great!” Brenda said. “I’m staying up here. Our finals were a week ago and there’s no reason to move back until all of us can go.”

“Will you be up here, Ardith?” Dennis asked.

“No. I’m teaching a May term class. Three weeks of Latin immersion. Technically, I shouldn’t be up here today, but I’ll be heading back in the morning. And I won’t miss commencement at Bartley next Sunday.”

“Latin immersion?” Dennis asked.

“Who knew Salter needed a Latin teacher?” Ardith laughed.

On Sunday afternoon the fifteenth, Dennis, Natalie, Amy, and Lana lined up for commencement and filed across the stage at the high school to the applause of their families, friends, and classmates. That evening, they all gathered at the Browns’ for a big dinner and celebration of the four new grads. Amy’s parents had come to graduation, but were upset that they didn’t know she was planning to leave school early. They’d already said they wouldn’t approve of her going to college a year early. Gransy had stepped in and shook her guardianship papers in their faces, telling them they had signed away their right to make those decisions. They threatened to put the house in Bartley on the market at once. Gransy told them to go ahead and do it.

Everyone was a little shook up about the confrontation, but Amy’s parents had not been invited to the Browns’.

“Let’s have a picture of all the grads with your diplomas,” Natalie’s dad said. He’d been taking photos at every opportunity and made a comment about being glad they didn’t need to buy film any longer. He’d been uploading photos to the cloud as fast as he snapped them.

The teens lined up and held their diploma folders in front of them. John, Randy, Gransy, and Dot all snapped photos.

“Now open them up so we can see the goods,” Randy said. The teens opened the folders, showing the diploma inside.

“Dennis? Where’s your diploma?” Dot asked.

Dennis turned his folder to face himself and found a note.

“Your diploma will be issued when your last class at DMACC is finished. Ms. Morris.”

“No. No-no-no,” he said. “I specifically told Ms. Duval I didn’t want to wait for the class at DMACC. There’s no reason for them to do this.”

The news put a bit of a damper on the celebration, but everyone still had cake and ice cream and there were hugs and kisses all around.

“I need to see Ms. Morris,” Dennis said as the secretary entered the school office. He’d been waiting at the door until the school opened Monday morning.

“Um ... She’s not here yet,” the secretary stammered.

“I can wait. When do you expect her?”

“Not until 7:30. She has a pretty full calendar. Let me see when you can get in to see her.”

“Please don’t stall me on this,” Dennis pled. “It’s very important that I see her as soon as possible.”

“Well, have a seat and I’ll see if she can see you when she gets here. I’m not trying to delay anything. It’s just this office is incredibly busy the last week of school.”

“I understand. It’s just really important.”

“Could anyone else help you?”

Dennis just shook his head and sat down in the waiting area.

The principal arrived about seven-twenty and Dennis stood up immediately.

“Ms. Morris,” the secretary said, “Dennis Enders says he needs to speak to you urgently.”

The principal looked at Dennis and smiled.

“Dennis. It’s so unusual to see a senior back in the school the day after graduation. Come on back and tell me what is so urgent. Not some new crisis with the facility or intruders, I hope.”

“No ma’am,” Dennis said as they entered her office. “It’s graduation. According to your note, I didn’t graduate yesterday. I really need my diploma.”

“Oh, you’ll get it. It’s just a formality. By holding your diploma until your last class at DMACC is completed, the school district continues to pay. The diploma will be issued then,” she said, as if calming an unreasonable child.

Dennis supposed perhaps he was an unreasonable child and tried to calm himself. He hadn’t slept all night.

“I appreciate your thoughtfulness,” he said through forced calm. “But I’ve already paid my tuition for the summer term and don’t require assistance from the school district. What I need is my diploma, dated the same as my classmates. It’s very important.”

“What can be so important that you are willing to pay an extra $550 to get it? If Salter U is a problem, I can make a call and resolve it with them.”

“It’s a personal matter, ma’am. It is personally very important to have my diploma dated the same as Natalie’s, Amy’s, and Lana’s. It’s a promise we made ... to each other,” Dennis explained.

Morris opened a desk drawer and pulled out a folder. She motioned Dennis to close the door, which he did.

“You can see that you aren’t the only one whose diploma we are holding. It’s amazing how many students come up to the last week of school and then discover they are missing a credit. That obviously wasn’t the case in withholding yours.” She looked up at him after she had separated his diploma from the folder. “Dennis, I have to ask, are you being coerced by a teacher or former teacher or any other school employee to get your diploma on a certain date?”

“Coerced? No ma’am!”

“Are you planning something that would be illegal if you didn’t have your diploma by this date?”

“What difference does that make? To me and to my girlfriends, this date is significant. I just want the diploma I’ve earned.”

“I see. The school, as you know, has been under a magnifying glass regarding the staff and student relationships. You helped bring that down on us. Not a factor of blame, mind you. Your participation in the election campaign, however, didn’t help matters.” She looked at the diploma and reached in her drawer for a pen. She dated and signed the piece of paper. “It would have allowed plenty of time to let things blow over if we waited until August to issue this. The district attorney was not allowed to register for two campaigns at once. She was so certain of a victory that she did not register for re-election as DA. In November, she’ll be gone and we’ll have a new thorn in our side. Um ... District Attorney, I mean.”

“I appreciate your concerns, but we have rigidly kept everything in our lives absolutely legal. I don’t believe the District Attorney will have the reach to harm any of us. But, the date on that scrap of paper you are holding is vitally important to that,” Dennis explained.

“Please don’t ever come back in the future and complain about being abused,” Ms. Morris said. “You and all of us have been through enough. Is there anything that could come back to haunt us?”

“No, ma’am.”

“Then here. Congratulations on your graduation. I’m sorry we caused you concern.”

She handed Dennis the document and he quickly checked the signatures and the date before accepting her hand in agreement. He breathed a sigh of relief as he left and headed out the door.

He paused in his car long enough to text his girlfriends, including Ardith.

Diploma in hand. Dated May 15. All is well.

Then he headed over to the Kellys’ where he was working on getting a new crop in on Abe’s field.

“Did you get everything worked out?” Randy asked when Dennis showed up. It was only eight o’clock but he already had the tractor out and ready to roll.

“Yessir. Signed, sealed, and delivered.”

“Good. The planter is set up to drill alfalfa. The seed is all here and you shouldn’t have any problems now. The rains of April have all the farms in the county a little behind, so I’ll be heading out to take care of the fields back home. When you get this planted, you can start on the field you’ve been taking care of for me the past couple of years. We should be able to get that one sown with wheat this week, since you won’t need to wait between disking, fertilizing, and planting. It’s nice to have you back full time.”

“Thank you, Randy. Um ... Not that I mind, but why are you still managing Abe’s field. Are the new owners paying you for me?”

Randy started laughing.

“You’re normally so bright. When you are slow to pick something up, I’m surprised. I bought the place, Dennis. I just couldn’t stand the thought of this little bit of paradise going to someone who wouldn’t care for it. When the opportunity came up to rent it to the Kellys and you were here to work the fields, it just seemed like too good a deal to pass up,” Randy said.

“Oh! Lyle Kelly said something about that a while back and I thought he just meant you were managing it. I guess a lot was happening and I didn’t get everything straight,” Dennis said. How had he managed to misunderstand that? He shook his head.

“Well, we didn’t intend to tell you kids about it. But I figured you could use the income and this is just the right size plot to learn to run a farm on.”

“I appreciate learning,” Dennis said. “But, um ... you know I don’t plan to go into farming as a career, don’t you?”

“Yes, don’t worry. But by the time you’ve mastered things out here, my son will be ready to start taking responsibility. I’m actually thinking of turning the place into a teaching farm and working with a few kids who want to learn every year,” Randy said. “Of course, if you did decide to go into farming, the fifty acres you’ve been tilling would just be a start. The other two hundred acres have been lying fallow for the better part of a decade since Abe entered it into a land bank. It’s still good farmland.”