Chapter 42

I watched with a smile as Hannah Mills walked regally to the podium. When she started her speech I looked at the sea of green caps around me. Most of us had made it through all four years. The final four weeks of our senior year had rushed past with a flurry of activities.

Prom was everything I'd hoped it would be. Missy was radiant in her teal gown and glowed with happiness and contentment. We danced the night away, lost in our own world. It was only later that I realized we had danced every dance together. None of our friends commented, except Liv. There was a tear trickling down her cheek as she hugged Missy on the stage. Missy had been elected Prom Queen and Liv was first runner-up. "You two are so perfect together it's scary," Liv had told her. Missy had a tear in her eye when she told me the story later.

I wasn't paying much attention to Hannah's speech, although the bits I did catch seemed filled with the usual platitudes about taking hold of the future. Instead of listening, then, I spent the time looking through the classmates seated in front of me, reminiscing about the various times I'd had with each of them.

When the school year started I could never have guessed that my senior year would be the roller coaster ride it had been. But with a smile, I knew that I wouldn't have changed a thing. Except maybe... I laughed to myself. No, it wouldn't have been right to date Gail Carson just to get a look inside her sweater. Some things would just have to remain a mystery. I had won a far greater prize, in any case.

The sound of everyone around me clapping brought me out of my reverie, and I looked back up to the stage to see Hannah step away from the platform and Lisa Carver replace her. Lisa started her speech, and I started to zone it out and return to my reveries when she caught my attention by apologizing to the teachers and staff. Once she had my attention, she proceeded to tilt my world's axis. You would have thought that after the year I'd had, I'd have been used to it, but it threw me every time. As I listened to Lisa's words, I knew this time would be no different.

"The person who taught me the most important thing I learned in the last four years was not a member of the faculty or staff. Rather, he started the year as another one of the masses of students at this school. In fact, he was a nobody. Or at least that was what those of us in the "in" crowd thought of him. He wasn't rich. He didn't play sports, play in a band or even act in the spring dramas. Also, while he was smart, he didn't have the grades to compete with Hannah and me. He stood out in no special way. In short, he was your average high school student.

"But over the course of this last year, he changed so many of us in this class and this school. He showed us how one boy, no, how one MAN, with a conscience and a set of convictions could change what needed to be changed.

"He showed me that the "in" crowd didn't know a thing about who the important people in this class were. He showed us that people that we thought were beneath us were really at least as good as we were, and many times, were better than we could ever hope to be.

"This boy showed me that a girl I thought was no better than a common whore had more class in her little toe than I ever possessed. And he did it without hurting my feelings.

He showed us all that the football stars we all idolized were nothing more than thugs who spent their time hurting others. He showed the courage that few of us would ever have dared to show. He fought for those we thought were less than the dust on our shoes.

"He showed me what love looks like. I spent the whole evening of our Prom looking at it. I'm sure most of you saw it as well, if you watched him dance with his princess. I hope to someday see that same look in the eyes of my dance partner. I know that I will feel truly blessed that day to know someone loves me as completely and unreservedly as that.

"He showed me the same respect he showed everyone else here, even though I was just a bottle-blonde cheerleader. He looked past that, and was probably the only one of you who knew that I would be standing up here speaking to you today.

"So, thank you, John, for the lessons I'm sure you didn't set out to teach. Thank you for the hard things you did that helped so many of us. And whatever you do, John, please, don't ever forget the last paragraph of the paper you corrected for me in April."