Chapter 70
Elena and Veronica sat in Ron’s classroom. The building was emptying out. Each of them was holding a red library book that Ron had gotten for them.
“It’s a lot of work,” he said. “And you both know already that you are getting great grades from me. This isn’t about that.”
“I think it would be fun,” said Veronica.
“You have the harder decision to make,” said Ron. “It’s not going to be easy to play all of these male roles.”
Veronica grinned. “I know I’m a girl, Mr. Tuck. It’s not like you have two guys in front of you and you are asking one of them to play all the female roles.”
Ron smiled. “Two guys would never have the guts to do what I am asking the two of you to try to accomplish.”
“Do you really think that we can do it?” said Elena.
“I’m gonna be honest with you. I’m not sure. I directed one play in college and I acted some back then, but I never tried anything like this before.”
Elena grinned. “We have no scenery, no budget, no stage and most of the teachers in the school thinking that we can’t do it. What’s the problem?”
The three of them shared a conspiratorial grin. But what Elena was saying was true. For the first time, Ron was really out of favor with both the nuns and the other teachers. When the college admissions letters started arriving, the school was at first shocked and then pleased and then distrustful and now resolutely convinced that Ron had somehow conspired to have these girls apply to colleges that were way over their heads. Bernadette and Ron had their most heated argument ever, and now they were barely speaking to each other. It had started because of Elena. Two months earlier she had burst into Ron’s classroom before the day began waving a letter from Princeton. It said that she had been accepted and that the school wanted her to visit and meet with a financial aid counselor to help her to work out a financial package. Bernadette and Ron had been having coffee in his class. Ron was thrilled when he heard the news. He hugged Elena and she said, “I could never have had the guts to do this without your help.”
Ron said, “You have brains and talent and you can do whatever it is that you decide that you want to do.” They were the same words that his mother had always said to him when he was facing a challenge.
Elena turned to Bernadette. “Isn’t it great, Sister?”
“It’s a lovely honor,” said Bernadette with a tight lipped smile.
“They said that I can bring two guests with me. Will you come, Mr. Tuck? My father said that he would come with me.”
Before Ron could answer, Bernadette said, “What about your mother?”
“She doesn’t mind and I really want you to meet my father, Mr. Tuck. My mother will visit lots after I start going there.”
“Elena, I would be really honored to go, but I think Sister is right. It should be someone else from your family.”
“I already told them that I wanted you,” blurted Elena.
“Then it’s me you get,” said Ron smiling. She hugged him and ran off.
Bernadette was very quiet after she left. Then she stood and said, “Are you really sure that you know what you are doing?”
“What do you mean?”
“Rutgers, yes. Montclair State would be better, but I could understand Rutgers. She has a full scholarship to St. Josephs. But you’ve convinced that girl that she can go to Princeton.”
“She can go to Princeton.”
“And how is her family supposed to manage that?”
“I’m thinking that she is going get a full ride.”
“She’s not that bright, Ron. She’s clever and she works hard and she has overcome the cultural disadvantages, but you had to have her shoot for the moon.”
Ron’s face hardened. “Not only her. Wait until the rest of the acceptances come in. Wait until you see the colleges that these girls are going to get into.”
Bernadette made a fist and pounded it down in the air like she was striking an imaginary table. “Getting in is not the point!” She raised her voice. “This is more about you than it is about them. You just refuse to see the realities.”
“You’re right,” Ron shot back, “because their realities suck. They need dreams, and they can make some of those dreams come true.”
“What you really mean to say is that you can make their dreams come true.”
“I can help,” said Ron.
“You did help! But that wasn’t enough for you. You have to think of them as extraordinary because you want to be extraordinary.”
Ron stood with some amount of defiance in his posture. “Maybe we all are, Bernadette.”
That was really the last meaningful conversation that they had. When Veronica got into Rutgers and Elizabeth got into NYU and Donna decided that she would attend Brandeis, Bernadette avoided Ron more and more. They no longer had coffee and even the girls noticed that their two favorite teachers were not as friendly as they had once been. They speculated that Ron and Bernadette had been lovers and that now they had broken up. Bernadette used to speak glowingly of the guy across the hall, but now she never mentioned him. And Ron seemed to never be with her in the mornings anymore.
“Take the play home and read it over. We need to make a decision by the end of the week and then I have to get permission for us to do it.”
The next morning Ron met with Sister Donna Maria and explained his plan. She looked at him with startled eyes. “You want to do a Shakespeare play?”
“Not exactly,” said Ron. “It’s a collection of Shakespeare scenes that have been put together on a theme. It’s called Shakespeare’s World of Love.”
Sister Cheesy got up from behind her desk and began to pace. She tugged at her waistband and then at her headpiece. “I don’t understand your need to do these things, Mr. Tuck.”
“What do you mean, Sister?”
“Your creative writing class is doing a literary magazine is that not right?”
“Yes, but we are doing that as part of the class and I am paying for the paper. It is only costing the school the price of the ink.”
“And now you want to do this?”
“I’m not sure that I see what one thing has got to do with another,” said Ron.
She threw up her hands in exasperation. “Where are we supposed to put this play on? We have no stage.”
“I think that we can do it in the gym.”
She looked at him with disbelieving eyes. “And just who would we put this play on for, Mr. Tuck?”
“I was thinking that we could do it for the other students and maybe the eighth grade kids. It could be good public relations for next year’s incoming class.”
“It could also be a disaster that humiliates everyone involved.”
“Ok, tell you what. We’ll put it together and show it to you and some of the other teachers. If you don’t think it’s good enough, we won’t do it.”
“No, no, that’s not a good idea. Word will get out about what you are doing and then if the students don’t get to see it, we will look like the bad guys.”
“Have you spoken to Miss Scarpelli about using her gym for this activity?”
“No Sister. That would be presumptuous. I came to you first.”
“She looked at him with exasperation. And you would never be presumptuous would you, Ron?”
“Look, I’m trying to do a good thing here. I’m trying to get the kids excited about learning and to show them that it can be fun too.”
“And you aren’t forcing these girls into this?”
“Not at all,” he said. “They are both top students. They don’t need the grades. They are both accepted into colleges.”
“Well I can’t fault your enthusiasm. But why Shakespeare?”
Ron looked at her evenly and said, “Because no one else thinks that they can do it.”
“Have you ever contemplated the sin of Pride, Mr. Tuck?”
“Being proud of these kids is no sin Sister.”
“We have no money to give you for this.”
“I know that.”
“Well,” she threw up her hands in an expression of exhausted defeat. “Get started and let’s see how it goes, if Miss Scarpelli agrees. I’m not commandeering her classroom for this effort.”
Grace Scarpelli was a short woman in her late 20’s with reddish brown closely cropped hair, freckles and a slight twist to her nose that gave her face an unusual contour. Ron didn’t know her at all but was fairly certain that she was gay. They had said hello over the years and once shared a cafeteria duty. She kept to herself and had been there longer than Ron.
Ron made his way over to the gym with some sense of trepidation. She was sitting in her office with the school nurse when he arrived.
“Hi, Grace.”
“Hello, Ron. You don’t often make it down to this part of the school.”
“I know,” said Ron, feeling a blush heat his face. “They keep me pretty busy up on the other end.”
Grace laughed. “I’m sure that they do.”
The nurse stood up. “Well, I’ve got to get back to my office. We can finish this up tomorrow Grace.”
“Hello Mrs. Babio.”
“Hello and goodbye, Mr. Tuck,” said the nurse without smiling.
Ron felt slapped and he was not sure why. He explained to Grace what he wanted to do and watched with delight as she said that she thought that it was a cool idea, and also that she thought that he was crazy for doing it.
“Well that seems to be the popular opinion,” said Ron.
“You know that they all will be watching and waiting for you to fall on your ass so that they can say that they told you so?”
“Yeah, I know,” said Ron. He was a bit startled by her language. But what the hell, it won’t be the first time that I’ve fallen on my ass.”
“When do you want to rehearse?”
“We’re going to come in an hour before school starts.”
Grace Scarpelli chuckled. “You are a glutton for punishment, huh?”
“I guess,” said Ron. He would have agreed with anything that she said right about now.
“You won’t be in my way,” Grace shrugged. “Good luck with it.”
Ron reached out to shake her hand. It was warm and soft and she stood closer to him when he slid his palm into hers. “I appreciate it,” he said.