Page 29 of The Academy
“He’s mad at me forno reason!” Taylor says. “He wasspyingon my phone, and he misunderstood…”
“Okay, okay,” Rhode says in what he thinks of as a therapist voice. He’s afraid to touch Taylor, so he positions himself between her and Hakeem’s door. “We’ll see you tomorrow, Taylor.”
“I’m going to FaceTime you in ten minutes,” Taylor shouts at the door. “You’d better fucking answer!”
During Intervis, Mr. James makes his usual rounds in the Gator. First, he checks the Schoolhouse. He’s too lazy to patrol the halls like he’s supposed to, though he did it religiously back in the day—and caught his fair share of kids joining the Harkness Society. Most of them he barked at and let go with a warning. The only kids he turned in were the douchebags: One kid accused Mr. James of leering at his girlfriend’s tits. Well, her tits were out on display, how was Mr. James supposed to avoid seeing them? Another kid called him “Mr. Jameson” to his face. (Mr. James secretly finds the nickname funny—and apt. He does break out his flask of whiskey once the sun goes down, though he prefers Bushmills.)
After the Schoolhouse, Mr. James checks God’s Basement. Here, he’s a bit more conscientious. He parks the Gator out front and enters the chapel. It’s a soaring space that smells like furniturepolish—they’re fanatical about the “integrity of the woodwork”—and beeswax candles. A light is kept on above the altar at all times, which helps guide Mr. James down the aisle to the back stairs.
And… jackpot! He hears voices and footfalls on the steps. He flips on the stairwell light to see Honey Vandermeid and Cordelia Spooner. Their heads snap up in alarm. Cordelia puts a hand to her bosom and says, “Jesus, Michael, you scared the piss out of me.”
Mr. James says, “You weren’t who I expected to find, sorry.” Cordelia seems flushed, and Honey Vandermeid—she’s a fine-looking woman, Mr. James wouldn’t mind having a go-round with her in God’s Basement—twists her long blond hair into a bun. “Everything… okay?”
“Just fine,” Honey says. “We heard a rumor about kids sneaking down tonight, so we came to check it out.”
“You could have just called me,” Mr. James says. “Thatismy job.”
The ladies can’t get up the stairs and past him fast enough, it seems, and they talk over each other:Oh yes, we know, thanks, Michael, have a good night, good night, good night.
“Good night?” Mr. James says. He turns to watch them skulk out of the chapel like a couple of guilty kids.
What were they doing down there? He has only one guess—but it’s too wild, even for this crazy place.
At five minutes to eight, Mr. James is heading back toward the dorms and passing kids going to the Sink or the Teddy to study.Hey, Mr. James. How’s it going, Mr. James?Mr. James lifts a hand, occasionally saying,How’s it going, Trouble?He tries to be sparing with his greetings, since he has a reputation as a grouch to uphold. He’ll return to the security office, a garage on the Back Lot, where he’ll watch a couple episodes ofYellowstoneand then do his final rounds before check-in at ten.
As he’s motoring around the back of the dorm buildings, he sees two figures ascend the cement stairs that lead up from the cellar of Classic North.
What fresh hell?he thinks.Have the kids discovered another place to sneak around?Mr. James has spent enough time in that cellar dealing with furnace issues to know how inhospitable it is. But maybe creepy is a kink.
He slows down and confronts the two kids as they reach the path.
Surprise, surprise,he thinks. He doesn’t know a lot of the students by name, but he knows this young man.
“Hey, Mr. James,” the kid says.
The girl he’s with, tall and thin with glasses, stares at her shoes. Mr. James has seen this girl around, always carrying books. He doesn’t know her name.
“Good evening, East,” Mr. James says. He nods toward the stairs. “What were you two doing down there?”
East grins. “Nothing.”
Nothing?Did young Eastman really just toss him anothing? God, the kid is so cocky, but something about him is likable. He’s a rebel, just like Mr. James was in high school. And, of course, Mr. James knows who his father is.
“Okay, then.” Mr. James won’t press it; his show and his flask await. “Have a good night.”
Head of School Audre Robinson cherishes her evenings. After prepping for the following day with a glass of wine and having dinner in the Residence, she takes a scented bath and reads her mystery novels (she loves Louise Penny and Selena Montgomery). She eats a couple of pieces of dark chocolate, then crawls into bed by ten thirty and prays there will be no overnight emergencies.
But a couple of times a week, Audre forsakes both bath and reading for a stroll around the campus during study hours, which are held from eight to ten p.m. She observes the kids as they do a group project for Evil and Justice or tackle an essay for Visions and Revisions. (Mrs. Wully has started out this course by having the kids compareKing Learwith Jane Smiley’sA Thousand Acres,sheer brilliance in Audre’s opinion.) She likes to see the kids in the Grille readingBel Cantowhile they sip dulce de leche milkshakes. She overhears Lisa Kim and Annabelle Tuckerman debating US trade policies with China. The students’ young minds are discovering the poetry of Jorie Graham, the intricacies of calculus. They memorize the periodic table, the causes of World War I. As buoyed as Audre is by all thelearningthat takes place at Tiffin, she’s also sadly aware that most of the facts will fall out of the backs of the students’ heads in a few short years. Audre couldn’t pass an Algebra II test now if her life depended on it; she’s lost the basic plot ofThe Old Man and the Sea—does he die in the end? But a truly fine education teaches the students to be curious, to ask questions, to augment their understanding of the world around them and feel at ease in it.
Audre realizes not every student is immersed in academia—or is even on task. Somewhere on campus, a freshman girl is on her phone crying to her mother and begging to come home, Davi is probably giving her followers a peek at tomorrow’s OOTD, and Audre doesn’t even want to hazard a guess at what East is doing. But for the most part, the developing imaginations and intellects of Tiffin are engaged, the gears turning, the creative juices flowing.
When the chapel bells chime ten, both the Teddy and the Sink empty out as we hurry back to the dorms for check-in. Then we shower or snack, we complete our skin care routines, we brush our teeth and occasionally floss, then finally, finally, climb into bed.
“Bonne nuit, mes cheries!”Simone Bergeron calls out as lights down the hall go out, one by one.
We’ve all heard about this bit of nightly theater—are the girls on the first floor living in a Madeline book?—but we’re too tired to care.
Outside, the moon shines down on camp as we, the 240 students of Tiffin Academy, fall asleep.
