Maybe, I thought, things could be as easy with Ren and Darcy and the other A’s as they had always been with Drew.
I took another drag on the vape pen. I could feel the weed starting to take effect as I stared at Ren’s blank walls. They stretched open and bright white before me, full of possibilities.
Disciplinary hearings conducted by the Student Ethics Board were always open to the public. They were held in Bleeker Hall, in the largest lecture room that Knollwood Prep had—a room usually reserved for when important speakers came to campus or for large, school-wide meetings, because it was the only room besides the auditorium that could seat the whole school if everyone decided to show up. Usually, the only people who attended were the students on the ethics board themselves, the student facing punishment, and Headmaster Collins. But because of the public nature of Auden Stein’s offense, dozens of students and even some faculty were present on the day of his hearing.
Crosby, Dalton, and Ren sat in the row behind Drew and me. Crosby kept poking Drew in the back of her neck with his pencil, and Drew kept giggling and acting annoyed and turning around to swat him. I had my feet propped up on the back of the seat in front of me. My ankle itched and I was trying not to scratch it. I’d put more triple antibiotic ointment on Nancy’s bite mark last night and a fresh Band-Aid. Now I peeled back the edge of the bandage to sneak a peek. The bite had scabbed over; there would definitely be a scar.
“Some townies are having a bonfire tomorrow,” I heard Ren say to Dalton. She was talking about the high school kids from Falls Church, who would sometimes have parties in the woods between town and campus. Sometimes upperclassmen from Knollwood would go because there was always lots of beer and pot. “You going?” Ren asked Dalton.
I glanced behind me and saw that Ren was picking at her nails. She looked bored, as if someone had dragged her there against her will.
“Maybe,” Dalton said. “Could be a good time.”
“Hardly,” Ren said. “What do I have to do for a little excitement around here, slit my wrists?”
“Jesus, Ren,” Dalton said.
“I’m just saying . . . did they have to build this school in the middle of fucking nowhere? Nothing interesting ever happens here.”
Crosby reached forward to poke Drew again and Ren smacked his hand away.
“Stop that,” she said. “We’re not five. Or apes.”
In the front of the room, Stevie, the president of the Student Ethics Board for two years running, stood up to read the board’s verdict for Auden’s punishment. The legs of her chair squealed against the wooden floorboards of the lecture hall as she stood. She read the charges against Auden: Theft and destruction of personal property. Harassment of a faculty member. It was enough to suspend him for two weeks. Or, at least, that’s what the Knollwood Augustus Prep Student Book of Conduct demanded, but the official punishment was always recommended by the Student Ethics Board and then carried out by Headmaster Collins. Always, always, the Student Ethics Board handed down the harshest sentence possible, because they wanted the faculty to take them seriously. They didn’t want to look like a group of weak-willed kids giving preferential treatment to their peers. And also, because only total Goody Two-shoes nerds were on the Student Ethics Board.
“The board recommends that Mr. Stein be suspended for two weeks for indecent conduct unbefitting of a student at Knollwood Augustus Prep,” Stevie read. “Furthermore, we recommend that, at the conclusion of Mr. Stein’s suspension, he be required to meet with a guidance counselor, who will assess Mr. Stein’s readiness to reenter this institution.”
I rolled my eyes. Mr. Franklin, who was seated on the lecture stage across from the Student Ethics Board’s table, crossed his arms and coughed, clearly feeling that the punishment was not harsh enough. I’m sure he had pushed for Auden’s expulsion.
“Thank you, Miss Sorantos,” Headmaster Collins stated. He sat behind a large wooden table that had been set up in the middle of the room, squarely facing the stadium-style seats of the lecture hall. He scratched his chin, looked down at the folder open on the table before him, and gave a little flick of his hand to Auden, who promptly stood up.
Headmaster Collins paused for a moment and then looked out at the audience of students and faculty.
“For the first time in my tenure here at this fine institution, I find myself in disagreement with the Student Ethics Board’s decision,” Headmaster Collins said.
Stevie gasped and dropped her pencil, which rolled loudly across the table and clattered to the floor.
“I’m afraid there’s a larger issue at stake here than the disappointing ways in which Mr. Stein has chosen to conduct himself, which the board has failed to address. And I must take part of the blame on myself,” Headmaster Collins said. “There’s been a weed we’ve allowed to grow among us for many years. And if we don’t commit ourselves to rooting it out now, eventually it will spoil the whole garden.
“Tradition. What is tradition? We have a great many traditions here at Knollwood Augustus Prep. We have a tradition of graduating some of the best and brightest young minds in this country, who go on to the best schools in this country, and become part of the best institutions in this country. We have a tradition of fostering excellence, integrity, and innovation. But for many years now, we’ve also fostered a tradition of catering and cowering to a select few students who take it upon themselves to facelessly harass and bully students and faculty into letting them have their way or merely for the purpose of their own entertainment. These self-proclaimed vigilantes fly in the face of what this institution values—they champion crude and selfish aims, like the cancellation of Saturday morning cultural enrichment classes, often at the expense of something much more dear, like a man’s reputation.
“Tradition. That has been a word many alumni—and even faculty and students, at times—have used to protect this group, and for a long time, too long now, I have stood silently by. But when this tradition threatens the traditions that are essential to this institution, I will bear it no more.”
Headmaster Collins looked at Auden now.
“Mr. Stein, while you are bearing the blame for the disgraceful events that occurred in Mr. Franklin’s classroom, I do not believe you acted alone. And so, while I believe two weeks’ suspension is the proper punishment for these offenses, I do not believe we have the math quite right yet. For it is not two weeks for one person, but two weeks for each person who took part. And since tradition suggests that there are at least a dozen members of this illicit group, then the full term of this punishment is two weeks for each of these twelve students, or, if you choose to be their scapegoat, twenty-four weeks’ suspension for one.”
I sucked in my breath. A murmur of heated whispers filled the room.
“Did he just say twenty-four weeks?” Drew asked me.
I didn’t answer her. I was looking at Auden. His eyes were wide as he absorbed the full weight of what Headmaster Collins was saying. Two weeks’ suspension was bad enough—a black mark that would go on his permanent academic record. None of the top schools would want him now. But twenty-four weeks’ suspension? He would have to repeat the year. He would be held back.
“So I will ask you again, Mr. Stein, but this is the last time I will ask,” Headmaster Collins said. “Give me the names of the students who acted along with you, and have the punishment evenly divided amongst you, or take the full weight of the punishment on your own head. The choice is yours, Mr. Stein, but you must make it now.”
Drew stiffened and went still beside me. I knew what she was thinking of: Wellesley, and how being named for this sort of misconduct would cost her her admission. She was thinking about her parents, George and Fern, whom she was always waging some form of emotional warfare against to get their attention, but how this would get her the worst kind of attention, the kind she didn’t want.
But I wasn’t thinking about college or about how my father would react. I was thinking how the whole tradition of the A’s—which had been in existence for nearly as long as Knollwood itself—hung tenuously in the balance. I hadn’t had a chance to be a part of it yet, hadn’t had a chance to leave my mark. It couldn’t be over yet. It hadn’t even started.
