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Maga and mixed martial arts classes suitable for beginners that we can raffle off at the event. And Howard Willette, director of corporate communications for a Stonington-based company called NorthStar Enterprises, said I should come in and meet with him face-to-face so we can discuss possible ways for their firm to get involved with Vander.
    I mean, this is incredible. I actually flipped out for a second when I got the NorthStar email. I actually cried a little. I’ve never been to a professional corporate meeting before, and I’m so excited to go in person to the offices of NorthStar Enterprises and represent Vander and our student body and meet with someone who might actually be able to help us take things to the next level. I feel like, in all honesty, I’m exactly the right person to build this relationship.
    When I think back on it now, last year’s Fall Formal was really an incredible turning point for me. It was the first time I understood that I could have both Jesse and the rest of my life and one didn’t have to destroy the other. It was the first time I realized that corporate sponsorshipcould change the whole way student council does business. And at the end of the night, as I was slow dancing the last dance before clean-up in Michael’s arms, I told him I was going to run for student council president this fall, and he said he would support me and my dreams no matter what. He told me I should always shoot for the stars.
    We campaigned really hard this September—I’m really proud of how hard me and Michael worked. And even though Melissa Formosa got president, and I only ended up getting vice president because Julie Dressel quit at the last minute to focus on soccer, everything worked out perfectly in the end. Vice president has turned out to be the best possible role for me. It lets me do a ton of work behind the scenes that actually has a huge impact on the school, work that I might not have time to do if I were president. This corporate sponsorship idea is just one example. Now that I’ve been vice president for a couple of months, I’ve learned that a lot of the real power in school happens behind closed doors, where the general public doesn’t even see it. I’ve realized that I’m right where I want to be.

5

Jesse
    It’s so early there’s still a silvery sheen of dew on the grass around Vander High. The Saturday morning sun is a puddle in the dingy sky, and Jesse stands in its watery light watching her mother’s car recede down the access road away from school. She has five bucks, her phone, her notebook, a pen, and her Swiss Army Knife in the pockets of her cargo pants and a crumpled sack lunch in her hand. She didn’t watch her mother pack it, but she’s guessing it’s the health-food version of death-row cuisine: five rice crackers in a used Ziploc bag, soggy bulgur-wheat salad in a curry-stained Tupperware container, two leathery dried apricots in a paper towel, as appetizing as a pair of shriveled human ears. “Enjoy,” her mother said to her grimly as she handed it to her through the passenger’s-side window. “Call me if they violate your human rights. I’ll see you at five.”
    It’s weird to be at school on a Saturday. Empty of inhabitants,it feels creepy somehow, like an abandoned factory, a ghost town. The reflective windows look dead to Jesse, concealing nothing behind them but desks, blackboards, and silence.
    Jesse sits down on the damp wooden bench under the crab-apple tree by the side door. She’s supposed to meet the ASP supervisor there “
promptly at 8:00 a.m.
,” the disciplinary ticket reads in Snediker’s unnervingly tiny, square-cornered handwriting. The bench is deeply grooved with gouged-out graffiti—LOVE YOU MATT—SK8 OR DON’T—JIZBIZ WAZ HERE—SENIORS 4EVA—and Jesse fingers the smooth bullet of the Swiss Army Knife in her pocket, imagining for a moment what it would feel like to carve JH LOVES EM into the bench. She closes her hand around the