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conversations with the reporters. I was about to say that, but I stopped because Mom and Dr. Bratton were staring at me as if they couldn’t quite figure out what I was doing there, or if I was speaking English.
    After a pause, Dr. Bratton said, “I wish I could claim this was my idea. But to be perfectly truthful, the inspiration first occurred to one of our more creative parents, who also happens to be one of our most supportive and generous donors. He was reading the paper, and he saw the article about you two, and he immediately called me and said, ‘This is the kind of student, the kind of moral fiber, the kind of wisdom and maturity we want inour Baileywell population.’ Naturally I agreed right away.”
    Wisdom and maturity? What were they talking about? Two planes flew into a building. My dad died. I had the flu. My mom stayed home. What was so wise and mature about that?
    â€œSo,” he went on, “we would like to offer Brad—”
    â€œBart,” said my mom.
    â€œOf course. Bart,” said Dr. Bratton. “As I believe I mentioned in my letter, we would like to offer Bart a full scholarship to Baileywell, all expenses paid, even including transportation in the van we run for our day students.”
    â€œThat’s so generous of you,” said Mom. “Everyone knows that Baileywell is such an amazing school!”
    Dr. Bratton smiled shyly—and proudly. “This is not the moment, I know, to burden you with the statistics of how many of our graduates go on to Harvard, Yale, and Stanford, and other similarly elite institutions.”
    â€œStanford’s awfully far,” said Mom.
    â€œColumbia,” said Dr. Bratton. “Harvard.”
    â€œHow marvelous,” said Mom
    Great, I thought. Just what I want. An elite institution.
    â€œWhat’s more important even than college,” Dr. Bratton continued, “are the lifelong friendships that Baileywell students form, relationships that are not only sustaining in every way, but are incredibly helpful as our graduates find their path through a world that gets scarier and more threatening every day. Sadly, it’s not the same world we knew when you and I got out of college.”
    â€œYou can say that again,” said Mom.
    Could she and Dr. Bratton really be the same age? He acted about a hundred years older.
    â€œAnd what’s most important”—Dr. Bratton seemed to be on automatic pilot, so that I wondered if this was a speech he gave all the time—“is the kind of young men we are graduating. Men who feel sympathy for the underdog. The little guy. Who can see things from the little guy’s pointof view. Our hope is that the Baileywell experience will produce the sort of compassionate, feeling, deeply human men who will lead us into a brighter and more caring future.”
    â€œCompassion. The future could use that,” Mom said, and there was another loaded silence.
    â€œBecause we are essentially a boarding institution,” Dr. Bratton said at last, “we have a rich afternoon program. A whole range of after-school activities, though of course it’s not after for our boarding students. We have a wide variety of athletics to choose from. Theater. Art.” He looked at me as if he was trying to tell if I’d be a rugby player or a theater or art type. “Of course, the day-student bus would bring Brad—”
    â€œBart,” I said.
    â€œThe bus would bring Bart home probably around the same time you’d be returning from work, Mrs. Rangely.”
    Work? What work? Obviously Dr. Bratton knew nothing, nothing about us.
    â€œThat would be great,” said Mom, as if there were a job that she went to every day and would perform more efficiently knowing that I was getting soccer balls kicked in my face by the bullies up the hill.
    I sent her an urgent mental telegraph: Please, no. Forget about it. Let’s pull the plug on this right