by Tom Perrotta
“Larry,” I said, “I think we have a problem.”
11
MR. M.
I REGRETTED IT IMMEDIATELY, but even that was too late. Larry and Walt were watching; there seemed no recourse but to finish what I'd started.
“I've got Paul by one. Two-oh-five to two-oh-four.”
“That can't be.” Larry was adamant. “I double-checked. Tracy won by a vote.”
“Maybe I'm wrong,” I told him, “but that's my tally.”
Walt frowned at the clock. Fifteen minutes remained in the period. I expected him to throw a tantrum, but he just withdrew a handkerchief from his coat pocket and blew his nose.
“Tell me,” he said, pausing to switch nostrils. “Why does everything have to be such a goddam melodrama around here?”
Walt usurped my desk to count the votes, so I had little choice but to join Larry by the window. He didn't look at me or say a word, but I could sense his hostility, the angry bewilderment of a teenager who suddenly suspects that the fix is in from the adult world. Under different circumstances, I might have tried to comfort him.
At least for the moment, though, Larry's agitation had the paradoxical effect of calming my nerves. Seeing myself through his eyes brought me back to the rock-bottom reality of the situation: he was the student; I was the teacher. If it came down to my word against his—absent any physical evidence—I would win.
For several minutes, the only sounds in the room were Walt's heavy breathing and the whispery shuffle of paper. At the far end of the parking lot, students in gym clothes volleyed lazily on the tennis courts, reaching and swatting at a swooping green dot. It was ballet from this distance, pointless and beautiful.
My regrets just then ran in a couple of directions. I wished I hadn't done what I'd done, and I also wished I'd thought of a less obvious place to dispose of the ballots. Even my pants pocket would have been safer than the trash can. But the truth, of course, was that I hadn't thought at all. I just saw my opportunity and took it.
Walt cleared his throat and stood up.
“Jim's right. Paul Warren's our new President by a single vote. I can't remember an election this close in all my years at Win wood.”
Larry turned slowly away from the window, shaking his head with a bitter certainty that froze the moment.
“No way. It doesn't make sense.”
“Sorry.” Walt dismissed him with a shrug. “My figures work out exactly the same as Jim's. Two-oh-five for Paul, two-oh-four for Tracy.”
Larry wasn't buying it.
“How many Disregards?”
Walt referred to the palm of his left hand.
“Two hundred thirty.”
“See?” Larry spread his arms wide for emphasis. He was turning into a lawyer right in front of our eyes. “It doesn't add up. You counted six hundred thirty-nine votes. But our ledger shows that six hundred and forty-one people voted.”
Walt looked pained, as though he were attempting the math in his head.
“Two votes are missing,” Larry added helpfully. “You can check the register.”
“He's right,” I said. “Two people must have pocketed their ballots in the booth. There's really no way for us to prevent that.”
“They were there,” Larry insisted. “I counted six hundred and forty-one votes.”
I patted him on the shoulder, a fatherly and forgiving gesture.
“It happens, Larry. People make mistakes.”
He glared at me, offended by my touch.
“I didn't make a mistake. Every vote was there when you sat down.”
“Whoa.” Walt's voice carried a sharp note of warning. “Easy, DiBono. Don't say anything you'll regret in the morning.”
Even then, Larry wouldn't back down. He was starting to scare me.
“I'm telling you, Mr. Hendricks. Every vote was accounted for.”
“Okay,” said Walt. “Take it easy. Let's use our heads here. Where could they have gone?”
Larry drilled me with a look of undisguised contempt.
“Under the blotter,” he said. “Maybe they slid there by accident.”
Walt lifted the blotter and shook his head.
“Check inside the ballot box,” I suggested.
The bell rang, signaling the end of seventh period. Walt turned the box upside down and gave it a shake. Nothing fell out.
“Under the desk.” Larry spoke quickly, knowing we were pressed for time.
A powerful adrenaline rush shot through my body as Walt knelt to the floor. For the first time all day, my head was clear. For the first time in what felt like months, I made a smart decision.
“Don't forget the garbage can,” I called out.
Walt stood up after only a few seconds had passed, not long enough for him to make a thorough search of the wastebasket, which was filled with a day's worth of wrappers, memos, and paper cups. He dusted off his pants and straightened his tie.
“Sorry, gents. Negative on both counts.”
PAUL WARREN
IT WAS LIKE the Oscars, only worse. Tracy and I were made to sit together on stage in front of the whole school so everyone could watch our reactions when Larry announced the winner. It was a needlessly cruel arrangement, and I vowed to abolish it if I were lucky enough to be elected.
Tracy seemed like a different person now that the voting was over, no longer the fierce opponent I'd come to fear and dislike in recent weeks. She smiled as I took my seat and graciously offered her hand.
“However this turns out,” she told me, “I want you to know that you've run a wonderful campaign. It's been an honor competing with you.”
I shook her hand without hesitation, moved by the generosity of the gesture. It's probably a defect in my personality, this eagerness to forgive and forget.
“It's been a long road,” I said. “I'm kind of glad it's finally over.”
“Not me.” She took a moment to survey the rows upon rows of faces spread out below us. “I'll miss all the excitement.”
“I guess I like it dull.”
“Huh.” She made a face. “Your life doesn't seem all that dull to me.”
“All this glitz and glamour's just a smokescreen,” I told her with a laugh. “At heart, I'm a very boring person.”
She leaned closer. Her expression was hard to read.
“I get so jealous watching you and Lisa in the hallway. It's been a long time since anyone kissed me like that.”
I tried not to show it, but I was startled by her remark. Not only because she'd been watching me and Lisa, but also because I was pretty sure she was referring to Mr. Dexter. He'd disappeared overnight, without a word of explanation, but everyone knew that it had something to do with Tracy. In one story, her mother caught them fucking in her bedroom; in another, a janitor opened the door on a supply-room blow job. Neither story sounded quite right to me, but even so, it was a strange moment to raise such a delicate subject, the two of us on display in front of close to a thousand people.
I felt guilty, too, because I didn't really deserve the benefit of even that much of her trust. Like everyone else at Winwood, I'd gotten a lot of mileage out of last year's scandal, mostly at Tracy's expense. Mr. Dexter was one of the most popular teachers at school; for weeks my friends and I had obsessed over the riddle of his behavior.
“How could he fall for Tracy?” we asked ourselves over and over, in the incredulous tone we reserved for unsolved mysteries of the highest order. “For Tracy!”
But just then, to my immense surprise, I thought I understood what he saw in her, aside from that amazing body. It was something that had never occurred to me before: she was unhappy. On stage that afternoon, this simple fact struck me with the unmistakable force of truth. Tracy Flick needed someone to cheer her up. So did Lisa, now that I thought about it; so did Tammy and my mother and my father. Maybe that's what we look for in the people we love, the spark of unhappiness we think we know how to extinguish …
My reverie dissolved in a sudden burst
of applause as Mr. M. came trudging up the steps to join us on stage, looking pale and haggard. I tried to make eye contact with him, but he shuffled past us without a glance and took his place behind the podium. Tracy grabbed my hand.
“I'm so nervous,” she whispered. “I think I'm going to wet my pants.”
TAMMY WARREN
I LEANED MY BIKE against a tree and sat down on the curb across the street from the main entrance, momentarily startled by the sight of my skinny legs poking out from the skirt. I straightened my droopy socks and wiped some dirt from the tip of my shoe.
It felt good to be far away from Win wood, the treadmill of familiar faces and boring routines, the strait-jacket of people's expectations. The school always reminded me of a warehouse or factory, this long low rectangle set far apart from everything, surrounded by an enormous parking lot and acres of athletic fields. The building itself is plain and impersonal, with no real ornamentation except these gleaming ventilation units rising like silver mushrooms from the flat roof.
Immaculate Mary was built on a more human scale, a two-story brick building on a tree-lined street near the edge of downtown Cranwood, with a sloping lawn and a flight of wide concrete steps leading up to the main entrance. Above the door was a marble frieze of the Virgin Mary gazing sadly upon the world, the wrinkles of her robe so real-seeming you could hardly believe they were made of stone.
Aside from Jason, who didn't really count, I doubted anyone would miss me in all of Winwood, least of all Lisa. I would disappear and that would be it. No one would stop by my locker and scratch their head, wondering where I'd gone. I was tired of that, tired of being Nobody, Paul's Sister, the Girl Who Made the Speech. All I wanted was a chance to go somewhere new, make some real friends, be my true self. It didn't seem like too much to ask of the world.
The bell rang at two-thirty, and the girls of Immaculate Mary came streaming out the door and down the steps, fanning across the lawn like a flock of blue-gray-and-white birds, heading for the fleet of school buses parked at the corner. The afternoon swelled with their voices and laughter.
I picked myself up and strolled across the street into the thick of the crowd. Moving against the flow, I threaded my way through a maze of unfamiliar faces—black, white, and brown girls, girls with pimples, smiling girls, fat girls, all of them dressed like me, all of us part of the same happy exit.
Dana was standing at the base of the stairs, talking to a chubby girl with frizzy red hair. I stopped for a few seconds to admire her and gather my courage. She wore black tights instead of knee socks, and had a navy cardigan draped over her shoulders, the empty sleeves flopping across her chest. One of her shirt cuffs was unbuttoned, and it flapped around her wrist every time she moved her hand.
I walked right up and tapped her on the shoulder. Her mouth opened slowly into a question she couldn't seem to ask. The red-haired girl looked worried.
“Oh my God,” said Dana.
“I know,” I told her.
TRACY FLICK
I SHOULD'VE REALIZED I was in trouble as soon as Mr. M. made his entrance. It was Larry's job to announce the winner, and he wouldn't have surrendered the opportunity to speak my name and hug me in front of the whole school unless something was seriously amiss.
But who was thinking of Larry or trouble? I was too busy concentrating on my acceptance speech, making sure I struck the right notes of gratitude and modesty and mentioned the names of all the people whose help and support I might need in the future. Though I'm told I'm a natural, public speaking has never come easily to me. The prospect of doing it always puts me in a weird hyper state. I can't really focus on anything but the words in my head; the rest of the world dissolves into a thick dreamy fog.
“Some contests are so well fought it seems unfair for someone to have to win and someone to have to lose.” Mr. M.'s voice reached my ears with a wobbly quaver, as though he were speaking through water instead of air. “Both candidates before you are highly qualified; both embody the virtues of leadership and integrity we expect and deserve in a school President. Either one of them, I believe, would make an excellent chief executive.”
God, I thought, would you get on with it! Shake Paul's hand, I reminded myself. Walk slowly to the podium. Try not to look too happy …
“That said,” he continued, “the whole point of an election is to choose a winner, and that you have done, by the margin of a single vote. You the people have spoken; you the people have selected your next President.”
He withdrew the envelope from his back pocket and began tearing it open. I'm not sure why they do it like that, maybe to make the whole process seem more official or something. Smile at your constituents. Thank them for this incredible honor …
“Without further ado, it's my pleasure to announce the next President of Winwood High. And the winner is—” He hesitated just a second or two at the crucial juncture, long enough for me to completely lose my patience. In that unexpected bubble of silence, as if my name had already been called, I rose from my chair and stood smiling in my red dress in front of the entire school.
“—Paul Warren!”
12
MR. M.
I SMILED like a bad actor through Paul's acceptance speech and clapped along with everyone else. You go on autopilot at moments like that, blanking out all the things you can't possibly afford to think about, knowing you'll have time enough later for shame and regret.
When it was over, all I wanted was to flee the mess I'd made, to rush out of the building like waking from a bad dream, but I was too careful for that. I forced myself to return to my classroom and retrieve the missing ballots. There was no getting around it. As long as they existed, I was vulnerable.
It seemed like a simple enough operation—reach in, grab, and go. Once in my possession, the ballots could be disposed of in any number of ways: I could burn them, drop them down a storm drain, rip them into confetti, flush them down a toilet.
Detective stories are right about one thing, though: once you've committed a crime, nothing is simple. The whole world bends to your exposure. Before you know it, you're on the eleven o'clock news, wearing a jacket on your head.
The moment I reached into the can, someone knocked on the door. I withdrew my hand as carefully as possible, praying as I turned that it wasn't Walt or Larry. Luck was with me. Paul and Lisa smiled through the window, their faces glowing with triumph. I signaled for them to come in.
Lisa hung back a step as Paul marched up to my desk and thrust out his hand. It was cool and dry, a striking contrast to my own.
“Thanks, Mr. M. If it wasn't for you, none of this would have happened.”
“Don't thank me,” I muttered. “You earned this on your own.”
“It was her,” he said, reaching for Lisa's hand. “She was the heart and soul of this campaign.”
Lisa seemed giddy, like she'd been drinking champagne.
“I can't believe we pulled it off. By a single vote, it's so crazy. I almost feel sorry for Tracy.”
With the tip of my shoe, I nudged the wastebasket farther under my desk. The ballots were huge in my mind, as obvious as money.
“It can't be easy for her,” I said. “She's a real competitor.”
Paul's face clouded over with sympathy. “I tried to talk to her, but she wouldn't even look at me.”
Lisa gave a small shudder, hissing sharply through her front teeth.
“It was so embarrassing, the way she stood up like that.”
“Like what?”
She seemed surprised by my question.
“When you announced Paul's name, Tracy stood up. Didn't you hear everyone laughing?”
“I missed it,” I said. “So much was happening at once.”
An awkward silence overtook the conversation. I had a feeling they expected something from me.
“Well … congratulations.” I rose to my feet. “To both of you. I look forward to working with you next year.”
I stuck out my hand, but Paul
didn't take it. A bashful smile seeped across his face.
“Mr. M.,” he said, “could I give you a hug?”
How could I say no? I stepped forward and limply accepted his embrace. I felt small in his arms, hollow when he slapped me on the back.
“Thanks so much,” he whispered.
I saw them to the door, checked both ways to make sure the coast was clear, then hurried back to my desk to finish what I'd started.
The only explanation for what happened next is that my nerves were shot. I couldn't think at all, let alone straight. Instead of reaching for the ballots, I slumped forward onto the desk, resting my forehead on the cool green of the blotter. It felt good to close my eyes and forget.
I woke with a start a few minutes later. Walt was clutching my shoulder, grinning like a madman.
“Jimbo! Caught you napping!”
“Not really,” I mumbled. I had to stop myself from swatting at his arm. “Just gathering my thoughts.”
“Come on,” he said. “It's been a long day. Let me buy you a drink.”
“No thanks. I've got some quizzes to grade.”
His face softened into a pout even as his fingers tightened on my arm.
“Come on, Jimbo. Don't make me beg.”
JOE DELVECCHIO
I'M THE HEAD of Maintenance. I supervise the crew, purchase the supplies, sign off on the time sheets. It's not my job to clean the toilets or empty the waste-baskets.
What happened that afternoon, Howie Garber took a two-hour liquid lunch and came back shitfaced, ranting about his mother. I yelled a little, then sent him back to my office to sleep it off.
Howie's like a lot of guys on my crew, a good worker when he's not pissed off at the world. You might be pissed off, too, if you were a forty-year-old janitor who lived with your mother and spent your days cleaning the school you used to attend and the kids snicker behind your back ‘cause you're overweight and your pants have a tendency to slide down and expose the crack of your ass. I tell him all the time, “Howie, pull up your goddam pants. Have a little dignity.” So he gets drunk a few times a year and sleeps it off in my office.
