Schooled: Chapters 19–24

“You recruited half the school to bug him, and he turned them into an army of volunteers.”

“Eighth grade president isn’t a real job,” I seethed. “It’s a joke, remember?”

Cap wouldn’t be allowed to throw around big chunks of school money without permission from the office. Maybe the whole thing was a lesson about philanthropy.

He stood frozen with fear, probably straining all those math brain cells to calculate how big a wedgie he’d just earned himself.

Still, there was only one other person in the whole school who was as disgusted as I was by all this hippie-mania.

He looked so suspicious that I felt a pang of remorse for the mean things I’d said and done to him since kindergarten.

In all the years I’d known him, we’d never had a conversation that hadn’t been a sham to lure him through a door with a bucket of ice water balanced on top.

He sneered at me. “Oh-ho-ho! Looks like somebody’s been replaced!”

“I was his friend when no one else would talk to him,” Hugh said resentfully. “When you and your cronies were trying to ruin his life.”

“Look, Cap’s president. We’re stuck with that. But there’s still time to puncture the tires of this bandwagon before the Halloween dance ratchets him up to icon status.”

For someone who grew up knowing only one person, suddenly knowing hundreds of them was a little intimidating.

Of all the things she said to me, this was maybe the most baffling. How could I get a life when I was obviously already alive?

It was funny—a money-obsessed world was the main reason Rain had dropped out and formed Garland. Yet, in my experience, money was really excellent, and every time I spent it, someone ended up smiling.

I was getting better at understanding school customs, but this one didn’t make much sense to me.

So much of school was like that—more a feeling than anything of substance.

I started walking toward the players just as they started toward me—and began to pick up speed. I could feel the ground shake as they reached a full-on stampede.

They were already airborne, coming in like a wave of guided missiles.

The crowd was in a frenzy, howling every time another Condor piled on.

Still silent, the crowd began to file out in an orderly fashion. They fell in line behind Cap and the coaches, like mourners in a funeral procession.

Before Zach, school was pure torture for me. Imagine spending 180 days a year in a place that’s designed to take everything you’re not good at and make it important. Zach rewrote those rules for me. School had nothing to do with learning and knowing and getting the right answers. School was about sports and girls and fun and being popular, because you’re good at sports, hang out with the right girls, and have a lot of fun.

There was something about this disaster that just didn’t add up.

“If there’s one thing I tried to teach you besides the fundamentals of football, it’s to use your head for something more than a place to put your helmet! What in God’s name were you thinking?”

The speculation got wilder every minute. One rumor actually had it that Cap might take revenge on the team by running us over with a school bus.

“Come on!” I exploded. “There’s no revenge! It was an accident!”

Naomi was beyond furious. “Oh, sure, twenty guys accidentally jumped on him.”

Zach was the captain of the Condors. He knew about the pep rally. He knew the locker room setup and the longtime rivalry with Rhinecliff.

And he had a grudge against Cap that was growing bigger every minute.

I guess I must have looked like the Incredible Hulk—sickly green and bursting out of my shirt in sheer rage.

“You’re delusional!” It was classic Zach—the sneering, superior put-down tone that he used on other people, but never on me. “You’re just feeling guilty because you’re the one who hit him!”

The hall just about exploded with agitated chatter.

His breathing blew pink bubbles in the torrent of blood that was still pouring from his nose.

The condemned man on public display—the guy who had KOed Cap, and tackled him before that.

And in spite of everything we threw at him, Cap never fell apart, or ratted us out, or even got mad. For weeks it had been open season on the eighth grade president, but he hung in there. That’s what first brought me around to admire the guy. I didn’t care that he could drive a bus or plan a dance. Cap Anderson was quality.

The scene was eerie. All eyes were on Cap, but no one was saying a word—not a peep, not even a whisper.

I turned beseeching eyes to the social worker. “This is your case, Flora. I know you have a special connection to the kid. Can you shine any light on this for me?”

“I noticed he wasn’t exactly streetwise. But that didn’t stop him from committing fraud.”
“He’s no more capable of fraud than of flying,” she said flatly.

He’s got all the idealism of the sixties with none of the reality checks.

He’s not a criminal, he’s the exact opposite—totally innocent in every sense of the word.

“Did it ever occur to you that ‘unfortunate circumstances’ might not be just a lame excuse? What if it means—what if it means—”

Finally, Lena spoke, her voice subdued. “I think I might know why we can’t find Cap.”