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Authors: David Levithan
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small canyon of hair down the middle of his chest. Even in the half-light of his nighttime bedroom, I admired the ghost hairs on his neck as he let his hand fall on my leg, his skin three hues darker and one degree warmer than mine.
We stayed like this for as long as we could. This was the closest to sleep that waking could be, and I almost crossed the border. But then Jimmy asked me a question, and his voice was full of such unexpected vulnerability that I felt the full weight of my love for him…and wasn’t afraid of it, either.
“It’s all going to be okay, isn’t it?” he asked.
And I responded by holding him close and saying that whatever it took, we would make it okay.
ten
The next two days were like watching a car wreck about to happen and not having any way to stop it.
The governor of Kansas’s plan to throw the election to Stein’s opponent by disqualifying as many Stein votes as possible soon became clear. Among the groups he was targeting were:
(a) Urban voters whose polling places had stayed open past the election deadline because lines had been so long, even after the board of elections had announced that they were closed.
(b) College voters who, the governor alleged, may have voted twice by using absentee ballots in their home states.
(c) Provisional voters whose identities, he said, had been confirmed “too quickly.”
Virgil was already organizing a Stop the Madness campaign, galvanizing voters in our state to make it clear they were ready to protest any move the Kansas governor made. Virgil insisted that none of us skip school in order to help, so we had to wait until the last bell rang to head over to headquarters. I tried not to bristle every time Keisha and Sara were out of the room together, but I couldn’t help it—I was suspicious of their every move.
I would ask Mira where Keisha had gone to, and she would tell me Keisha and Sara had just run to the store for more envelopes, or that she was in the kitchen making coffee.
I avoided the second floor.
School, however, couldn’t be avoided. At school, we were all at one another’s throats.
Two days after the election—the morning after Kansas was put back into play—Janna and I walked in to find Mary Catherine leading a prayer circle that walked through hallways, chanting. With a loudness we hadn’t known she still possessed, she was beseeching the Lord to swing Kansas to Stein’s opponent. The few people in her flock shouted their assent, while the rest of the students just wanted them to get out of the way.
Janna looked pissed.
“I prayed last night, too,” she said to me, glaring in Mary Catherine’s direction. “I prayed for a good long time to God to do the right thing in Kansas. That’s all I said—
the right thing.
And I guess that’s the difference between Mary Catherine and me: I don’t feel I need to tell the Lord what the right thing is. I have faith the Lord knows.”
Jesse Marin was predictably harsh to me in homeroom. “You’re going down,” he taunted.
I ignored him and made sure my seat was in place after the pledge.
When we got to Mr. Davis’s room, we found Principal Cotter in the back, which actually made me feel a little better. I wondered if Ms. Kaye or some other teachers had talked to him. Whatever the case, Mr. Davis could barely contain his annoyance at being observed. He spat out facts about the War of 1812 like he resented each and every one of them. I kept my head down, because every time Mr. Davis looked my way I could feel his disgust. He wouldn’t even turn in Jimmy’s direction…until Jimmy took off his sweater.
It was warm in the room; it made sense for Jimmy to remove his sweater. Principal Cotter couldn’t really argue that he was being provocative. But the motion got Mr. Davis’s attention. Midsentence, he looked over and saw Jimmy…and Jimmy’s shirt.
It was simple, really: a white T-shirt with a small American flag in the center. That’s
We stayed like this for as long as we could. This was the closest to sleep that waking could be, and I almost crossed the border. But then Jimmy asked me a question, and his voice was full of such unexpected vulnerability that I felt the full weight of my love for him…and wasn’t afraid of it, either.
“It’s all going to be okay, isn’t it?” he asked.
And I responded by holding him close and saying that whatever it took, we would make it okay.
ten
The next two days were like watching a car wreck about to happen and not having any way to stop it.
The governor of Kansas’s plan to throw the election to Stein’s opponent by disqualifying as many Stein votes as possible soon became clear. Among the groups he was targeting were:
(a) Urban voters whose polling places had stayed open past the election deadline because lines had been so long, even after the board of elections had announced that they were closed.
(b) College voters who, the governor alleged, may have voted twice by using absentee ballots in their home states.
(c) Provisional voters whose identities, he said, had been confirmed “too quickly.”
Virgil was already organizing a Stop the Madness campaign, galvanizing voters in our state to make it clear they were ready to protest any move the Kansas governor made. Virgil insisted that none of us skip school in order to help, so we had to wait until the last bell rang to head over to headquarters. I tried not to bristle every time Keisha and Sara were out of the room together, but I couldn’t help it—I was suspicious of their every move.
I would ask Mira where Keisha had gone to, and she would tell me Keisha and Sara had just run to the store for more envelopes, or that she was in the kitchen making coffee.
I avoided the second floor.
School, however, couldn’t be avoided. At school, we were all at one another’s throats.
Two days after the election—the morning after Kansas was put back into play—Janna and I walked in to find Mary Catherine leading a prayer circle that walked through hallways, chanting. With a loudness we hadn’t known she still possessed, she was beseeching the Lord to swing Kansas to Stein’s opponent. The few people in her flock shouted their assent, while the rest of the students just wanted them to get out of the way.
Janna looked pissed.
“I prayed last night, too,” she said to me, glaring in Mary Catherine’s direction. “I prayed for a good long time to God to do the right thing in Kansas. That’s all I said—
the right thing.
And I guess that’s the difference between Mary Catherine and me: I don’t feel I need to tell the Lord what the right thing is. I have faith the Lord knows.”
Jesse Marin was predictably harsh to me in homeroom. “You’re going down,” he taunted.
I ignored him and made sure my seat was in place after the pledge.
When we got to Mr. Davis’s room, we found Principal Cotter in the back, which actually made me feel a little better. I wondered if Ms. Kaye or some other teachers had talked to him. Whatever the case, Mr. Davis could barely contain his annoyance at being observed. He spat out facts about the War of 1812 like he resented each and every one of them. I kept my head down, because every time Mr. Davis looked my way I could feel his disgust. He wouldn’t even turn in Jimmy’s direction…until Jimmy took off his sweater.
It was warm in the room; it made sense for Jimmy to remove his sweater. Principal Cotter couldn’t really argue that he was being provocative. But the motion got Mr. Davis’s attention. Midsentence, he looked over and saw Jimmy…and Jimmy’s shirt.
It was simple, really: a white T-shirt with a small American flag in the center. That’s
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