Page 16 of Love is Angry

We go inside, and I’m smiling with my whole heart. It feels like it’s the first time that I have truly smiled. Like it’s coming from deep within my very soul, bathed in light and hope and the love of living. I’m not alone anymore. I had Lindsey and Rita backing me up just now. I got through it. Maybe I was never alone to begin with.

Maybe good people were just waiting to cross my path.

After all, my biggest mistake was almost falling in love with the wrong guy. That was it. And I’m still paying for that “horrendous” crime.

Chapter 8

Back in Highschool: Madison

This isn’t my first group tutoring lesson, but it’s my biggest, and I’m a little nervous. I’m already doing more than any other nineteen-year-old tutor, and having as many students as I do definitely takes the cake. I’m loving this. Ten attendees; five seniors, three sophomores, and two juniors; the latter from Lincoln High, two districts over. Word travels fast when there’s a good tutor in town, I suppose.

I’m trying really hard not to glow with pride right now, but I can’t help it.

Ever since Mom left, I’ve been trying to stand out, somehow. To be something that makes my father proud. Something that brings a smile back to his face. In a sense, it feels like I’m trying to erase the disappointment –– or at least overshadow the pain –– of mom not being here. It’s been two years and we’ve suffered tremendously. He deserves a break. So do I. Guess this is mine. The peak of my tutoring endeavors. Ten students at once, each of them starry-eyed and paying enough for the year to cover one semester’s worth at any Ivy League school of my choice.

It’s time for me to consider academic advancement, now. There are only so many gap years I can take before a superior education becomes irrelevant for someone like me.

This particular tutoring session is taking place in Jamie Tancredi’s dining room. It’s a huge house on three levels with fourteen bedrooms, sprawling like a 19thcentury Spanish-style villa. Out front, wrought iron fences and a massive double gate separate this place from the outside world. Even sitting here, I can hear the artesian fountains gushing outside.

As for the interior, it is the epitome of sumptuousness and nouveau riche, remarkably tacky though it does a decent job of impressing those of lesser taste. There are one too many gilded decorative objects, and the wood paneling on the bottom half of the walls is further weighed down and complicated by the floral wallpaper on the upper half. The crystal chandeliers with gold metal elements aren’t helping, either, but hey, it’s Tancredi money. I’ll spend mine more wisely when I make it.

“How is everybody doing on this fine afternoon?” I ask as I take my seat at the head of the dining table. It’s a massive thing made of lacquered mahogany, and the middle is loaded with Bohemian glass pitchers and elegant tulip glasses for us to enjoy Mrs. Tancredi’s peach and watermelon lemonade. It’s not really hers, though. Marnie, the maid, prepares it, and I love every drop of that refreshing concoction. It’s like fusing one’s soul with an orchard under a cooling rain in the middle of the scorching summer.

My students greet me with broad smiles. I like that. It makes my work so much easier knowing that they enjoy themselves in my presence.

“It’s been a crazy week,” Sarah, one of the seniors, says.

Some of the students nod in agreement, some sigh, some laugh, before taking their seats and whipping out their notepads and workbooks.

One of the juniors takes it upon himself to pour Marnie’s magical lemonade into our glasses. I admire how they work together without having to be told. Despite being creatures of privilege, they’re all respectful and decent towards one another. It’s a rare thing to behold.

“Mr. Manning was savage. Gave us a pop quiz on Monday. It nearly decimated us.”

“What were your test scores?” I reply, then give Millie a thankful nod for the lemonade glass she places on the table in front of me.

“Oh, I passed. Eighty out of a hundred,” Sarah says. “Jennifer and Cole weren’t as lucky. Something tells me their parents will be reaching out by the end of next week.” She pauses for a brief giggle. “I recommended you. I hope you don’t mind.”

“Not at all, thanks!” I reply.

I’d be a fool to say no to more business. The math in my head is fired up. The figures dance through my brain, the synapses firing their connections, linking cause and effect with regards to how every dollar is going to be spent once I get into the school of my choice.

My GPA is astronomical, and I’ve got enough extracurricular activities to pass any form of academic scrutiny. All I’m missing is the money, but if Mr. Manning keeps screwing students over, I’ll be in business for another year or two, at least.

College is so close, I can almost hear the laughter down the hall from my dorm room.

“Pop quizzes are a bitch,” I tell my group study as they get comfortable and sip their drinks.

I usually give them a few minutes to unwind before we get down to business. I’m quite intense in how I teach, so I allowthem as much breathing room as possible prior to pouring information down their throats.

Oddly enough, I’m only a year older than the seniors, yet I feel ancient by comparison. Something happens once you finish high school. The world opens up. Your prior universe is suddenly small, isolated from the endless sea of potential experiences which unfold before you once you walk the stage. That moment of realization, the acknowledgement of the largeness of the world—it’s a catalyst for a new kind of maturity.

“But pop quizzes are also the fires in which champions are forged. I know you might find this hard to believe, but high school is a lot like a gladiator pit, and you’re all fighters just waiting to be summoned. You have to be ready at all times. It’s a battle to the death in there, but as long as you live to see another day, you’re good. Think of your teachers as the Roman overlords. They’re just waiting for you to slip up. Waiting for you to make a mistake so they might feed you to the lions. If, by some miracle, you’re still standing at the end of the day, then you’ve earned yourself another day to fight.”

“Jesus Christ, that is dark,” Sarah mutters, wide-eyed and definitely scared.

It makes me laugh. “I know. I’m using hyperbole a lot, but my point stands. Teachers mean well. Most of them, anyway. Those who wield pop quizzes like weapons, however, are absolute dicks. They’re the ones you have to watch out for. Lucky for you, I know their style well enough that I can predict what each of the flash tests will be like, 90% of the time. They get the structure off the internet and tweak it.”

“Oh. Are you serious?” one of the juniors asks, genuinely surprised.