Chapter 137: Almost The End

Monday, May 21, 1984

While much of the day was, of course, consumed with finals, the article was an ever-present distraction all day. Teachers mentioned it. So did fellow students. Those who hadn’t been interviewed had to know what it was like; those who had wanted to talk about their little piece.

The consensus was, of course, ‘Rah Rah Memorial!’ We came off great, both as individuals and as a school, and that makes people happy — especially graduating seniors, and particularly those who might have few accomplishments of their own but could bask in the reflected glory of saying ‘Hey, I went there, too, and I held my own, even if I’m not in the paper!’

That’s what first-life Steve Marshall would have felt, of course. He wouldn’t have been in the paper, but he would’ve felt like he belonged, nonetheless. That, even if he wasn’t a star, he wasn’t a nobody. And — he wasn’t. Oh, perhaps socially he was, or nearly, but he’d had great grades, a reasonable number of friendships, and he’d been one of the National Merit Finalists. He belonged in the mix.

I could hardly begrudge those who took after him. There was nothing wrong with being that version of me, even if it’d eventually left me without dating experiences that might have saved me from a lousy marriage. He — I — had been fine. Sometimes sad, sometimes depressed, sometimes lonely, but ultimately fine.

That this version of me was so much better off didn’t mean he was a failure.

Ms. Epstein’s AP English final was, in the end, easy enough. These were the last essays I would write as a high schooler. I might well be the only person in the history of Memorial to survive eight years of Memorial’s English essays. I owed them a lot, and I knew it, but I was happy to see it come to an end.

My second final was PE, which was ridiculously easy. Fat, lazy Steve Marshall had gotten his ‘A’ there. This me? Cakewalk.

After that, I had Tom’s Government and Economics final. That was harder, but not really hard, not for me. I’d gotten an A in his class forty years ago, and I was a better student now.

Most of us lingered in Tom’s class. He’d been an influence on everyone in his class, just as he always was. For me, he’d been an influence twice over. For Angie, he might have completely changed the course of her life (even if he barely understood that now — and even if it might well have worried him to know that). I wasn’t sure she’d even told him that she was double-majoring in math. If he’d known, he might have been suspicious.

For good reason, too!

Principal Riggs caught us at lunch, after the first two finals and before Tom’s. He wanted to shake everyone’s hand and thank us for not saying anything bad. Everyone appreciated that.

As he was wrapping up, he pulled me just slightly aside. “I need to thank you the most of all. Some of the things I get credit for in that article are your doing, either personally or just by getting Student Council focused and productive.”

“You’re most welcome, of course! It’s been a pleasure.”

“There are a few people — you’re very much one of them — of whom I step back and think, ‘If they had wanted to, they could’ve been an absolute nightmare, and I’m the luckiest guy around that none of them were.’ I know you don’t think that way, but it’s what the job entails. You were around way back when, with that thing where some senior neanderthals tried to spike the punch. That’s the sort of knuckle-headed behavior that messes things up. There are people I would’ve expected to have pulled some sort of crazy stunt that would’ve raised my blood pressure — the Riley twins, for instance — and ... none of that. The rebels have channeled their rebellion. Lizzie could’ve been a nightmare, and she was a delight. The list goes on and on, and you’re adjacent to most of them. Even whatever you said to Danny Hill, back in the day. He could’ve made that election a farce, but suddenly he was ... helpful!”

I shrugged. “Sooner or later I’ll probably get burned. Maybe I already was, what with Max and his baseball bat.”

Principal Riggs winced at that. I’m sure that had been a nightmare for him, too. The liability issues alone would make for a very bad day for a principal.

I continued, saying, “I’ll give someone credit for being able to act like a mature, responsible person and they’ll turn out to be a mess. It’ll happen. I’ve been lucky that the people I’m close to have mostly lived up to what they can be, instead of playing down to their minimum.”

He nodded. “I’ll wish you luck on that! And on everything. In a way, I’m sorry you’re not speaking on Saturday, but Connie’s worked incredibly hard for it, and ... a little bird tells me some of your words will be out there, anyway.”

“It’ll be her speech,” I said. “She does have a crack speechwriting team to help, though.”

“I’m sure she does!” he said, chuckling. “I’m sure she does!”

We shook hands, and he headed off to talk to the next group of people who’d been in the article, which looked to be a few of the football players.

The vagaries of the calendar, combined with a number of us not wanting a meeting right after the musical, pushed the last Student Council meeting of my life to this afternoon.

We started the meeting talking briefly about the article. Everyone was happy about it, even the Council members who hadn’t been quoted (which included most of the underclassmen). They just wanted to congratulate those of us who were included.

I mostly let Megan (who had gotten a mention, as next year’s leader: ‘I have some very big shoes to step into, but that’s okay. I’m used to pressure, I’ve learned from the best, and I have big feet!’) run it, chiming in when she wanted me to. She did pass it to me at the end, though, which I’d expected.

I stood up and said, “This is it for me, as you all know. It’s the end for me, and for Jess, Amit, Darla, and Calvin. I’m sure you’ll hear more from us, but not in these roles. I’ve served with many of you for two years, some for just one. All of you are great! All of you can go do great things! Those of you who are back next year: keep up the tradition, and train your replacements! All of you, please, keep in touch. You know where I’ll be living, and I fully expect to be in the same house with the same phone number for the next four years. Seniors, I’ll get you the information. For the rest of you, I’ll send it to you once Southwestern Bell figures out what the number is going to be.”

One by one, Jess, Amit, Darla, and Calvin rose, giving much the same message, if tailored to their own circumstances.

Once we’d finished, everyone else gave us a round of applause. I gaveled the meeting closed, and we all got up, shaking hands, hugging, and talking.

It was one of the shortest council meetings of my two years, and perhaps the longest time I’d ever spent in a council meeting, too. No one wanted it to end, but all good things must, eventually.

On the way home, we stopped for a bit at Jasmine’s house, where Jas pitched the car idea to Camille and Francis. They were slightly skeptical, but not overly, and it came down to its being Jasmine’s money and not a bad idea. Francis had no problem with covering the car in his insurance.

Perhaps ironically, they’d considered buying her a car for her birthday, but passed on it when she’d said that she was fine with us driving her around. Especially since he hadn’t had to buy her a car, Francis was fine with covering the insurance on an ongoing basis.

I was glad that Jas was buying the car. That was one load off my mind. I had enough things I was hiding from Mom and Dad. It was much better to not have to add this one to the list.

Their first visit to the house — whenever that happened — was likely to be something of a shock. I’m sure they weren’t expecting it to be as nice as we planned it to be. We could give them some good misdirection on that, but I wasn’t happy about it.

Then, sooner or later, Dell was going to be revealed, assuming that worked out. If it turned out the way we expected it to, our little company would be worth more than Dad’s lifetime earnings potential — and that was just one deal. It was going to be a shock no matter what. Happy news, in so many ways, but also something completely unexpected.

The less we had to hide things now, the better off we’d be later. How realistic that was, though, was a question. At one point, we’d confidently thought we could wait until a proposal was imminent before telling Jasmine or Paige, and look how that had turned out!

When we got home, there was an envelope from A&M waiting for Angie. She eyed it curiously, then opened it. Mom and Dad were clearly curious, too, but willing to wait.

She opened it, read it, and bit her lip.

“Huh!” she said.

“What’s up, honey?” Mom said.

“Well, I apparently am no longer receiving the Fred P. ‘Lucky’ Collins President’s Endowed Scholarship.”

Both Mom and Dad started muttering, but Angie continued, saying, “I am instead receiving the Elizabeth T. ‘Lovie’ Beauford President’s Endowed Scholarship, the terms for which are exactly the same.”

“Do they say why?” Mom said.

I had a guess, of course. I suspected Angie had the same one.

“It says ‘At the request of the scholarship’s named donor, we have elected to award their named scholarship to another student. As a result of this, you will now receive... ‘“

“So,” I said, “Mr. Collins had someone else in mind.”

That was the polite way to put it, anyway.

“That’s how I read it,” Angie said.

Dad bit his lip, then said, “Well, I’m sure Ms. Beauford is a wonderful person.”

“I’m looking forward to meeting her at that reception in October,” Angie said.

As Dad went off to wash his hands for dinner, and Mom went into the kitchen, Angie and I exchanged a look.

“Prom,” Angie mouthed, and I nodded.

Who knew? I was suspicious of the same thing. My guess was either the Prom mention of Angie, or the more in-depth Sunday article (either the photo with Paige, or the rather pointed quote) — or maybe both — had gotten to ‘Lucky’ Collins’s attention. After some consideration (or maybe none at all), Mr. Collins had requested that his name not be associated with a lezzie.

Oh, that could be totally wrong. Maybe ‘Lucky’ had a great-grandniece or grandson or whatnot who he wanted to have his scholarship. Could be! I wasn’t going to overly judge the man. Heck, even if it was about Prom, Angie would be better off with a scholarship named after someone who respected her. I presumed that, if it was the issue, they would have consulted ‘Lovie’ Beauford before reassigning her scholarship to Angie.

If, of course, Mr. Collins and Ms. Beauford were still alive. Who knew?

Angie called Paige and she had no such letter. Either Paige’s donor (Earl T. ‘Beau’ Monson) was fine with Paige as she was, or Mr. Monson hadn’t gotten the news, or Mr. Monson was no more. All of those were reasonable possibilities.

My name had been out there for so long that either my donor was fine with things, or they weren’t paying much attention. Either was fine with me. I wouldn’t apologize for being who I was, though — but, then, that wasn’t a requirement.

I gave Michael a call to check in on things. It’d been long enough that it seemed worthwhile, especially with that article as a backdrop.