Chapter 31: A Ghost From Her Past

It was report card day. Sophia sat in her homeroom, waiting for her second quarter report card. The first quarter had been fantastic, mostly B's with even a couple of A's, the first she had seen in some time. She hoped the second quarter would be even better-she thought she had done well.

Mrs. Curtis finished handing out the report cards, but Sophia still hadn't gotten one. "That's strange," Mrs. Curtis said. "I don't know what happened to yours, Sophia. I'll see if I can find out." Just then, the phone connected to the main office ran. "Yup. OK. I'll send her right down." She hung up the phone. "Sophia, you're wanted in the main office."

Sophia got up to go, her classmates hooting and hollering about "big trouble." Sophia herself didn't know what to think. She didn't remember doing anything that would get her into trouble.

"Hi, I'm Sophia Daniels. I was called down here." She said to the secretary.

"Yes, dear. Mr. Carvalho is waiting for you, go right in." Mr. Carvalho, the principal? This did not sound good at all. Why did the principal want to see her?

She opened his door. "Mr. Carvalho? I'm Sophia Daniels. You wanted to see me?"

"Yes, Sophia, I did. Come right in. Have a seat." He pointed to the chair in front of his desk. She sat. "Sophia, I have something that I want to show you." He withdrew a piece of paper from his desk.

She recognized it-it was her report card from second quarter last year. It was mostly D's with a couple of F's thrown in for good measure. All the comments spoke about what a disruptive, unteachable student she was.

"I remember this, unfortunately. Why did you want to show me this, Mr. Carvalho?"

"So you would remember. I wanted to make sure you remembered."

"I can scarcely forget."

"Good. There's a reason for this, Sophia. I've talked to your teachers, so I could make sure there was no monkey business going on. I've also talked to Mr. Doherty, and he talked to me about some of your work with the Peer Counseling group, and he gave me a bit of an idea of what was going on when you were getting these kinds of marks. I take it that things in your personal life are better this year?"

"Much," smiled Sophia, although she was a bit confused.

"Good. Now, I took this little pleasure away from Mrs. Curtis, because, as Principal, I tend to deal with mostly bad stuff, so I hoard the good stuff whenever I can." He smiled at Sophia, who smiled back, but still was confused. "Don't worry, dear, I'm getting to the point." She laughed. "I wanted you to see this"-he pointed at the old report card-"this, from just one short year ago, so you could remember. Because I wanted you to truly appreciate the magnitude"-he withdrew another piece of paper-" of this."

He handed her the paper. It was this year's report card. She looked at it

A... A... A... A... A... A... A... A

"Oh my God," she gasped. She had gotten straight A's.

"Congratulations, Sophia. This is a turnaround the likes I have rarely seen in 25 years of teaching. You should be immensely proud of yourself."

"Oh my God," Sophia said. And then she started to cry. "I can't believe it, I just can't believe it. Straight A's? Me? Oh my God," she said, sniffling. Mr. Carvalho just laughed, and handed over a box of tissues, which Sophia gratefully accepted. She blew her nose, and sniffled, and wiped her eyes.

"You recovered?" Mr. Carvalho asked.

"Yeah," Sophia smiled at him. Then her smile got wider. "I can not wait to show this to my boyfriend!"

"Boyfriend?" Mr. Carvalho asked.

"Yeah. My boyfriend, Warren, is a genius studyaholic Preppie who's ranked in the top ten in his class at St. Michael's, no less."

"Really? Did he inspire you to this turnaround?"

"Yeah, he did, at least partially. He made me care just by caring himself."

"Then, I would say he's going to be enormously proud of you, also."

"Yeah, he will be... but that's not the only reason I can't wait to show him this report card."

"Really?"

"Yeah. We've been going out for a year, now. He always, as you might imagine, gets astounding grades."

"If he's ranked top ten at St. Mike's, of course."

"Right. They got their second quarter report cards last week. Warren got his typical, all A's... but there was one A minus," Sophia grinned.

Mr. Carvalho smiled. "Oh, you mean..."

"I got better grades than my genius preppy boyfriend!" Sophia burst out exitedly. "We've been going out for a year, and I've never even gotten close!"

Mr. Carvalho cracked up laughing. "And he'll never live it down, right?"

"Oh, not really-I know well enough that if I was taking the courses he is, I wouldn't be looking at all A's. No offense to the school you run, Mr. Carvalho, but St Mike's is St Mike's. And he's in all of the top honors classes you can take over there." She smiled. "But he is my boyfriend, and he does love me, and he will let me get away with gloating, at least for a little while."

Mr Carvalho laughed again. "Good for him. Enjoy this, Sophia. You deserve it. Congratulations, again. And keep it up!"

"I plan to," she said, leaving the office beaming.

Sophia walked up to her house, still grinning from ear to ear. She looked up, and saw Warren sitting on her porch, waiting for her.

"WARREN!!" She screamed, running up the street and practically tackling him with a bear hug. "Warren, you'll never believe it!"

Warren giggled. "Boy are you in a good mood today!"

"Uh-huh." She reached into the backpack and withdrew the card. "Look at this!" she exclaimed proudly.

Warren looked. "Wha... Straight A's? Sophie, you got straight A's?"

She nodded her head, beaming.

"Sophie, this is FANTASTIC!" He wrapped her in a bear hug of his own. "I am so proud of you!"

She giggled. "I hope you noted the absence of any A-minuses," she said with an evil grin.

"Yes, I did," Warren said with a smile of his own. "You, Sophia Daniels, officially got better grades than your preppie boyfriend." She giggled again. "Enjoy it. You deserve it."

"Oh, Warren, you are the best. C'mon, I wanna show this to my Mom."

They ran into the house, still giggling, and saw Ellen Kovach standing in the kitchen.

"MOM! MOM! You gotta look at this!"

"Alright, Sophia, what's the big excitement? Hi, Warren." She took the report card from Sophia's hand. "Sophia, these are all A's!"

"Uh-huh."

Ellen looked like she was going to cry. She enveloped her daughter in a hug. "Sophia, I am so proud of you I can't put it into words. This is one of the most fantastic things I have ever seen."

"Thanks, Mom."

Ellen took a deep breath, and the smile disappeared from her face. "Come on in the kitchen. There's someone I want you to meet."

"OK," Sophia said, puzzled. She walked into the kitchen and saw a man, about her Mom's age, sitting at the kitchen table. "Mom, you bringing strange men home?" Sophia giggled.

"Not hardly," Ellen said with a weak attempt at a smile. Sophia looked at the man, questioning, but Warren didn't. Sophia hadn't figured it out yet, but Warren took one look at this man and knew exactly who he was. The resemblance was unmistakable. "Oh, shit," he muttered under his breath.

Ellen confirmed his suspicions. "Sophia..." she took a deep breath..."this is your father."

"My... father?" Sophia managed to squeak out. Brian Daniels looked up at his daughter.

"Hello, Sophia. You certainly have grown into a beautiful young woman."

"You... are my... father?"

"Yes, I am." Brian replied.

Warren had had his hand on Sophia's shoulder, as reassurance. Suddenly, he felt that shoulder go to steel. He almost withdrew his hand, but Sophia grabbed it and put it back.

"How can you be my father? I don't have a father!"

"Ellen, what did you tell her?" Brian asked.

"She knows she has a father. Sophia, I never told you you didn't have a father."

"You didn't have to tell me. I never had a father. I had a sperm donor, and an abusive one at that. You don't get the right to be called father when you disappear for twelve fucking years!!!"

"Sophia, I..." Brian started.

"Sophia, calm down," Ellen said at the same time.

"CALM DOWN???? Mother, how could you let this maggot into our house, and let him call himself my father? So, tell me, "father", where have you been for twelve years?"

"The time wasn't right," Brian offered weakly.

"Oh, no, the time was right, 'father'. You should have been here, oh, about a year and a half ago. You would have seen the results of your wonderful fatherhood. But you weren't. So where were you, 'father'? Where were you when I was a complete drunk, just like you? Where were you when I was letting myself get beat up by guys, because of the subconscious memories of you beating me, 'father'? Where were you when I had one foot in the fucking grave? WHERE WERE YOU, WHEN ALL THE DAMAGE YOU CAUSED ALMOST DESTROYED MY LIFE, YOU FUCKING ASSHOLE! WHERE WERE YOU?????????"

And with that horrific outburst, Sophia tore up the stairs to her room, crying so badly she was almost screaming.

Warren was standing with his head in his hands, leaning against the wall. "Oh, lovely."

Ellen was moving towards the stairs. "I'd better go up there."

"NO!" Warren shouted. "You stay right here, Mrs. K. I will go up. I love you dearly, but bringing him in here was so colosally stupid I can't believe it. And she's going to take your head off if you go up there."

"HEY!" Brian yelled at Warren. "Who are you to talk to Ellen that way?"

"No, he's right." Ellen offered.