Page 54 of All These Beautiful Strangers
Dalton laughed. “See, this is exactly why I like you, Calloway. You’re not like other girls.”
I held up my hand. “I’m going to stop you right there, before you get to the follow-up cliché line of the century, ‘I’ve never felt this way before.’”
“Hell, you don’t make this easy, do you?” Dalton said, rubbing the back of his neck. “It wasn’t a line—you aren’t like the other girls here. Other girls would have taken that as a compliment, but I say it to you, and you basically tell me to piss off.”
“Okay, geez, sorry,” I said. “What did you mean then, if you weren’t being cliché?”
“I meant, you’re not like other girls, because other girls travel around in these packs, like they’re scared to be alone,” Dalton said. “But you’re by yourself a lot. Not because you don’t have friends, but because you’re just comfortable that way. You’re also, like, the master of bullshitting teachers. And you invite yourself to guys’ poker night, and then soundly beat all of us. Though your tactics were a bit unfair. And while most girls—and guys for that matter—are obsessed with who they’re hooking up with, I’ve never seen you with anyone. You’re just—I don’t know—different. And I like that. I like you. And that isn’t a line, it’s just the truth.”
I was quiet. I’d always had a way with words. I was quick with witty retorts. I was an expert at deflecting teachers’ questions with observations so long-winded they’d forget what their question was by the end of it. But now, I couldn’t think of a single thing to say.
“Say something,” he said.
I exhaled. It was cold enough out that I could see my breath.
“You’re all right, too, I guess,” I said after a moment.
“Okay then,” Dalton said, as if that settled everything. “Here,” he said, shrugging out of his jacket and wrapping it around my shoulders. “You’re shivering.”
“I’m okay,” I said, but I wriggled into it anyway. It still had his warmth.
“Come on,” Dalton said, and he took my hand. “There’s something I want you to see, and I don’t want us to miss it.”
We turned back down the path that led past the auditorium and started walking. As we walked, I heard the bell tower over the campus church strike the hour. Ten o’clock. I almost stopped; I almost turned back. The orchestra would just have finished playing—and sure enough, the doors to the auditorium ahead of us were opening, and people were pouring out. I wanted to turn around and go back the other way to avoid the hassle of the crowd of alumni, but then I saw it.
In front of the auditorium was a row of busts on short pillars. On one side were busts of every headmaster who had served at Knollwood for the past one hundred years. At the end of this row, of course, was Headmaster Collins’s bust, which had just been put in the previous year. It usually stood out because it was slightly whiter than all the other busts. The elements hadn’t weathered it yet to the same sepia shade as the others. But tonight, it stood out for an entirely different reason. Under the floodlights from the auditorium, you could see it even from a distance—Nancy’s diamond-encrusted dog collar around Headmaster Collins’s neck. The diamonds caught and sparkled in the light. But it wasn’t just the dog collar or the leash attached to it that drew attention. A balloon had been glued to the bust’s lips, with “Bark! Bark! Bark!” written all over it. And on the pillar, someone had spray-painted the words “Heel, Collins. Good boy.”
This has been an administration with a bark and no bite, but no more, Headmaster Collins had said at Auden’s disciplinary hearing. He had threatened the A’s. And when Dalton had asked Ren what she had thought of the headmaster’s challenge, Ren had barked. I had thought it strange at the time.
Now someone from the alumni group had seen Headmaster Collins’s graffitied bust; people were gathering around it. I could hear the excited fervor of the crowd. And there, making his way hurriedly to the bust, the crowd parting in front of him like the Red Sea, was Headmaster Collins himself.
“It’s embarrassing, that’s what it is,” Grandfather said, sawing into his stack of pancakes. “How a grown man can’t command the respect of a bunch of teenagers when that’s his fucking job is beyond me.”
“I wish I’d gotten to see it,” Piper said for the hundredth time that morning, sighing into her glass of orange juice. “I wish I’d been there instead of back at the hotel watching the baby.”
“I’m not a baby,” Clementine said, slamming her fork onto the table.
“Stop that,” Aunt Grier said, picking up the fork and handing it back to Clementine.
Rosie’s Diner was always busy on Sunday mornings after church let out, but it was especially busy today with most of the alumni still in town for homecoming weekend. I spotted at least half a dozen people I knew from school and their families, all with the same idea to have one last meal together before everyone hit the road.
I sat on the outside of the booth only half listening to the conversation. I couldn’t get the text conversation I had had with Greyson out of my head. I had turned his suggestion over and over in my mind last night. It seemed so obvious. Why hadn’t I thought of it before as the best place to start? I had questions, and somewhere in some dark, dusty storage closet, there was a box full of answers.
“He should be fired,” Grandfather said. “I’m going to give Fred Eakins a call when we get home. He’s on the board. I’m sure he’s already heard about it.”
“Don’t give yourself an aneurism,” Uncle Teddy said. “When it comes down to it, it’s really just some spray paint and a balloon and some kids having some fun. We got up to much worse in my day.”
He winked at me across the table.
“Teddy, please, they’re going to think we condone this type of behavior,” Aunt Grier said, wiping at the corner of Clementine’s mouth with a Wet-Nap.
“Getting into some trouble is good for your complexion,” Uncle Teddy said. “Leo, Charlotte, I want you to know that if you don’t call me sometime before your teen years are up asking me to bail you out of jail, I’ll be a little disappointed.”
“Teddy,” Aunt Grier said.
“Get it all out of your systems before it goes on your permanent record,” Uncle Teddy said.
“No proselytizing at the breakfast table,” Eugenia said.
