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“Fair’s fair, Claudie. You got my placement. We’re just putting things back the way they should be.”
    “Oh,
your
placement. I’m sorry.” She sounds as sorry as a drone bomber. “I guess I forgot you owned it. I guess you must have the deed in your safe.”
    Asher pretends to laugh. Hahaha. “You know what I mean. My dad set that placement up. Mayor Duggin did it as a special favour.” Working in the mayor’s office may not be an internship in DC, but it’s a step in the right direction. Asher’s father thinks he should consider a career in politics. It’s what he would do, if he had his life to live over. “It’s part of my professional strategy.” Just about everything Asher does – the classes he takes, the grades he gets, his hobbies, interests and extracurricular activities – are part of his “professional strategy”. “Working in the mayor’s office is going to look a lot more impressive for law school than working in the community centre.”
    “Not if you wanted to work for the ACLU, it wouldn’t.”
    “But I don’t want to work for the ACLU. Corporate law, that’s what I want.”
    Claudelia sighs. Two of the things she likes about Asher are that he is ambitious and he is focused. Everyone else, including herself, is about as focused and ambitious as a dust mote. There are times, however, when they are also two of the things she likes least about him. This is one of those times. “Your dad must know someone high up in the school system. Couldn’t he get your placement changed?”
    The simple answer to this question is: yes, of course he could. Albert Grossman knows someone high up in every system in the country – bankers, businessmen, generals, administrators, judges, politicians. In this instance, he is a friend of the superintendent of schools.
    “I don’t want to bother him with this.” One of the things Asher likes about Claudelia is that, unlike Georgiana (who’s a major drama queen) and Marigold (who could find something good to say if they were all on a sinking ship in an ice storm), she’s so logical. Though today it’s a quality he’s finding annoying. “He’s really busy right now.”
    Claudelia makes an um-duh face. “Oh, please. That’s like saying water is wet. Your dad’s always busy. He probably works in his sleep.”
    He would, if he slept more than a few hours a night.
    “Which is why I don’t want to go to him with something this dumb. I want to handle it myself.”
    Handling things himself has been a recurring topic of conversation between Asher and his father lately. Albert Grossman has high expectations of his son. Indeed, when Asher talks about “my professional strategy” he really means his father’s, planned almost as soon as Asher was born. Albert Grossman is extremely successful, but Asher is going to be more extremely successful – perhaps even President (or, at the very least, in the Cabinet or Senate). Which is why he’s decided Asher needs to take more responsibility for himself. Act with the maturity and dignity of his calling. Dr Kilpatiky wasn’t the only one disappointed by Asher’s choice of Halloween costume, though for different reasons. It didn’t bother Albert that his son bought some second-hand clothes in the charity shop (washed three times then dry-cleaned) and tied a bandana around Dunkin’s neck. Impersonating the much less fortunate didn’t offend his sense of moral rightness. Albert Grossman is a lawyer, not a spiritual leader. What bothered him was that Asher misjudged what the principal’s reaction would be. He should have known better. In the future, that kind of mistake could cost him an election.
    “So maybe you should get Byron to help you.” Claudelia laughs. “He’s the computer wizard. Maybe he can hack into the school’s system for you. Change the placement at source.” Claudelia is joking.
    But Asher isn’t. “He won’t do it.” She should have known he’d already asked Byron. Asher is