“No,” I lie.
The election. Yesterday’s debacle. Where I, Ivy Sterling-Shepard, three-time class president, lost the senior-year election to Brian “Boney” Mahoney. Who ran as a joke. His slogan was literally “Vote for Boney and I’ll leave you alone-y.”
Okay, fine. It’s catchy. But now Boney is class president and really will do nothing, whereas I had all kinds of plans to improve student life at Carlton High. I’d been working with a local farm share on bringing organic options to the salad bar, and with one of the guidance counselors on a mediation program to resolve disputes between students. Not to mention a resource-sharing partnership with the Carlton Library so our school library could offer ebooks and audiobooks along with hard copies. I was even looking into holding a senior class blood drive for Carlton Hospital, despite the fact that I faint at the sight of needles.
But in the end, nobody cared about any of that. So today, at exactly ten a.m., Boney is going to give his presidential victory speech to the senior class. If it’s anything like our debates, it will mostly consist of long, confused pauses between fart jokes.
I’ve been trying to put on a brave face, but it hurts. Student government was my thing. The only activity I’ve ever been better at than Daniel. Well, not better, exactly, since he never bothered to run for anything, but still. It was mine.
Mom gives me a look that says Time for some tough love. It’s one of her most powerful looks, right after Don’t you dare take that tone with me. “Honey, I know how disappointed you are. But you can’t dwell, or you really will make yourself sick.”
“Who’s sick?” My father’s voice booms from someplace in their hotel room. A second later he emerges from the bathroom dressed in travel-ready casual clothes, rubbing his salt-and-pepper hair with a towel. “I hope it’s not you, Samantha. Not with a six-hour flight ahead of us.”
“I’m perfectly fine, James. I’m talking to—”
Dad approaches the desk where Mom is sitting. “Is it Daniel? Daniel, did you pick something up at the club? I heard there was a rash of food poisoning over the weekend.”
“Yeah, but I don’t eat there,” Daniel says. Dad recently got my brother a job at a country club he helped develop in the next town over, and although Daniel is only a busboy, he makes a fortune in tips. Even if he had eaten bad shellfish, he’d probably drag himself into work anyway, if only to keep adding to his collection of overpriced sneakers.
As usual, I’m an afterthought in the Sterling-Shepard household. I half expect my father to inquire about our dachshund, Mila, before he gets to me. “Nobody’s sick,” I say as his face comes into focus over Mom’s shoulder. “I’m just…I was wondering if maybe I could go to school a little later today? Like, eleven or so.”
Dad’s brows shoot up in surprise. I haven’t been absent for a single hour of my entire high school career. It’s not that I never get sick. It’s just that I’ve always had to work so hard to stay on top of classes that I live in constant fear of falling behind. The only time I ever willingly missed school was way back in sixth grade, when I spontaneously slipped out of a boring field trip at the Massachusetts Horticultural Society with two boys from my class who, at the time, I didn’t know all that well.
We were seated close to an exit, and at a particularly dull point in the lecture, Cal O’Shea-Wallace started inching toward the auditorium door. Cal was the only kid in our class with two dads, and I’d always secretly wanted to be friends with him because he was funny, had a hyphenated last name like me, and wore brightly patterned shirts that I found oddly mesmerizing. He caught my eye, and then the eye of the kid next to me, Mateo Wojcik, and made a beckoning motion with one hand. Mateo and I exchanged glances, shrugged—Why not?—and followed.
I thought we’d just linger guiltily in the hallway for a minute, but the outdoor exit was right there. When Mateo pushed it open, we stepped into bright sunshine, and a literal parade that happened to be passing by to celebrate a recent Red Sox championship. We melted into the crowd instead of returning to our seats, and spent two hours wandering around Boston on our own. We even made it back to the Horticultural Society without anyone realizing we’d been gone. The whole experience—Cal called it “the Greatest Day Ever”—created a fast friendship between the three of us that, at the time, seemed like it would last forever.
It lasted till eighth grade, which is almost the same in kid years.