Dorsai - Jan

Dorsai

Jan

"Fifth: you are to apologize to Mr. Marshall, for reasons that should be obvious by now, even to you.

"Sixth: at your earliest convenience, I wish to visit with you in my office." With that one, Kelly looked at me – she knew that 'earliest convenience' meant "instantly if not sooner", and that it wasn't going to be old home week for Mr. Jenkins. He knew it, too – the sweat was popping out on his forehead.

He finished up by saying "Mr. Marshall, I apologize to you for any inconvenience or unpleasantness resulting from this confrontation. I promise you, no one else will have to go through it. I would also apologize to the young lady involved – I trust she's there and can hear me as I say that I am both sorry for putting her through this, and admiring of her for having such a friend as Mr. Marshall. I would also congratulate her on her achievement – I have no doubt that she has well and truly earned it."

Kelly spoke first, saying "Thank you, sir, for both your apology and recognition."

I followed her by telling him "I wish to thank you, as well, sir. It is a pleasure to speak with someone of your intelligence and caliber."

I could almost hear him smile as he said "Indeed. I think I would like to meet you, Mr. Marshall, under more – shall we say amicable? – circumstances."

"I think I would like that, too, sir.", I answered.

"Then if there is nothing else?"

We all assured him we were done, and the connection ended.

Mr. Jenkins waited, nervously, until the phone went dead; then made his apology to Kelly. She accepted it, quietly, while looking at him as if he was something that had just crawled up out of a primordial ooze.

His apology to me was nearly as abject and profuse as what he'd offered Kelly – I treated him as though he were something I'd have to clean off my shoe.

When he was done, I stood up, and asked Kelly "Do you want to leave now, or finish up the rest of your classes?"

She glanced over at Jenkins; he looked as though wishing the ground would open up and swallow him. Clearly, whatever her decision, his opinion wouldn't be a factor.

"I think I'll finish up. See you at home?"

"Gladly."

With that, we kissed – Jenkins only glanced at us – and left the office.

At the secretary's desk, Kelly said "I'll be needing a pass to get to class, please."

The secretary seemed hesitant to comply – until she looked up at me, and saw that I wasn't going to tolerate any nonsense or delays. A few seconds later, Kelly had the requisite pass, and we went out into the hallway – where she hugged me fiercely, and said "Thanks, Dan. I'm sorry to have to ask for your help like that, but he just wouldn't listen to me."

"It's okay. I've met him, now, and understand completely. But I don't think you'll have any more problems with him."

She smiled, and said "I don't think anyone is going to have any more problems, once the Bishop gets through with him!"

I grinned at her, and when she turned to head toward her class, I gave her a pat on the butt. A nun saw me, and looked horrified at what I'd done. I couldn't resist it, and grinned at her before heading back out to my car, shocking her even further.

Only two things came out of the situation. First, a few days later, Kelly got a letter from the Bishop – not just his office, but the Bishop himself, handwritten – telling her that he'd read her speech, and found it "provocatively honest" and "thoughtful"; he also said that he looked forward to actually hearing her as she gave it. The other was that some of the teachers that had seemed to delight in singling her out in class had eased off, considerably – apparently lest they come to the attention of the notorious (infamous?) Mr. Marshall.

In the final weeks leading up to the prom, I found out that none of the other girls at the sleepover had accepted dates from any of the boys at school. I discretely asked Kelly about it, and she said that all of them had told her that after me, none of the boys at school had any interest to them – at least, not enough to go to the prom with one. She also told me that she'd done everything she could to convince them to accept and go anyway, but none would. I let that rattle around in my head for a couple days, and finally talked to Kelly again, asking if she would mind if they went with us. She smiled at me, and said that she'd already thought of that, but didn't want to say anything to me for fear of making ME think SHE wanted them to go with us. We both laughed at that, and I asked her to get them all over after school one evening – that I wanted to have a 'chat' them.

A couple of days later, I got home to find all of them in the living room, chatting away. When I went in, Kelly saw me, and discretely moved herself out of their sight – she knew I was going to lay into them a bit, first. I looked down at them: Jan, Susan, Candice, Robyn, and Sandra all looked up at me, expectantly.

"First off, it's nice to see all of you together again. But there's something I think I need to say, and get things straight between all of us."

They smiled at the welcome, but quickly realized something was going on, and got serious.

"I want you all to know that you're being foolish. Your Senior Prom is a special event in your life, and not something to miss. I remember mine, like it was yesterday; and I'd hoped that all of you would have enough sense to realize what you were setting yourselves up for by not accepting dates."

They looked mildly surprised at my words, and I went on "You're all also being a pain in the butt – not just for me, but for Kelly. Every last one of you knew that I was already going to take Kelly to the prom, and all of you have had ample opportunity to see the dress and jewelry I got for her to wear. How much did you think she was going to enjoy going, while she knew that all of you had turned down dates?"

They all looked at each other, and realized that what I'd said was true – and knew that Kelly wouldn't have fun at the prom without her friends there, too.

"From what I understand, all of you turned down dates because you didn't think the boys were as good as me. That implies that you think I'm a pretty good person. But if I'm a pretty good person, why would you refuse dates, and not go to the prom, when it would make Kelly unhappy – and through Kelly, me? If I'm good enough that you would turn down other dates, then why would you choose to act in a way that would hurt me like that?"

Clearly, they hadn't thought of that, and a few started to get a little wet around the eyes – despite the presence of the kitten (we'd finally just named it 'Cat') rubbing up against them as it trolled for attention.

"*Every* last one of you has forgotten, or ignored, the ONE thing that I'd hoped you would learn: that everything you do has an impact on other people – and the closer those people are to you, the greater the impact. you decided none of the boys at school were good enough -but how good were you when we first met? How many frogs are out there, versus how many princes? All of you know that not everyone is like you, or us – and got so full of yourselves that you're now without dates for what should be the most memorable night of your lives. Every one of you told me that you would repay what you learned from me by showing it to others – but how the hell are you going to do that if you never spend any time with them, or find out which others are willing to learn from you?"

By then, all of them had tears running down their faces with the realization that they'd well and truly stepped in it.

I let them stew for several seconds before saying "It's a good thing for you that WE – Kelly and I – love you as much as we do; WE have decided that we're willing to give up OUR time together so that you can still go to the prom."