24 August
The alarm on James's phone pierced through the silence of the early morning. Rainbow Dash was still sleeping on his chest, so he had to be careful in order to reach over to his nightstand and turn the alarm off.
His moving about roused the mare on top of him. She sat there, slightly awake, as he trudged down the stairs and gently made his way towards the kitchen.
With all the lights still turned off, he took his mug off the hook on the side of the cupboard. He filled it with water, flipped open the lid on the Keurig, and poured the water inside. He went for another cabinet and retrieved a coffee pod and two packets of sweetener.
He returned to the Keurig machine and tore open the sweetener before preparing everything else. He pressed the Brew button and went back upstairs to wake up Dash.
“Wake up, honeybuns,” James said. In response, she rolled over onto her back like a dog and groaned under her breath.
“Just five more minutes…”
“Come on Dash, you know we have school in the morning. I explained it, like, a thousand times.” She remained motionless.
“Alright… I guess we'll have to do this the hard way…” James hopped up on the bed and tentatively tickled Dash’s belly, making her toss and turn, laughing softly. Eventually, she was wide awake.
“I've got coffee downstairs,” he told her.
“Awesome,” she said.
In the kitchen, James's coffee was ready. He took his mug, went to the fridge, and poured in a splash of creamer, swirling it around to ensure it was fully incorporated. He then went back upstairs while Dash made herself coffee.
He set his coffee on the nightstand, picked up the TV remote, and turned it to the local news; he often had this in the background while he browsed Reddit on his tablet, sipping his coffee all the while.
About a half hour later, he gulped down the last of it, then went into the bathroom, Rainbow following him in. The two brushed their teeth, and he helped her brush her mane and tail.
When she offered to take both her and James’s coffee mugs back to the kitchen, he went back into their shared bedroom, where his clothes for the day, a bright green polo shirt and cargo shorts, were laid on Rainbow’s bed since she no longer had any intentions of using it. He slid those on and turned off the TV.
He prepared his school bag by stuffing inside it all of the school supplies that he and Rainbow bought the week prior (she had her own saddlebags to carry what she bought). He also mentally reminded himself to take his phone, tablet, and the chargers to both.
He descended the stairs into the living room, where Rainbow Dash was raring to go; however, James popped into Chris and Kath’s bedroom, where they were both still sleeping, to say goodbye.
“Mom… we’re going now.” He gave Kath a brief, but loving kiss on the cheek.
The two that were awake went to the garage with their school supplies in hand (or hoof). James pressed a button on the wall to open one of the garage doors.
“Soooooo… how do you like my wheels?” he asked of Dash, pointing to his shiny (and slightly seductive) BMW M3, which sported an exquisite red paint job, twenty-inch rims, a retractable roof, leather seats, and chrome detailing.
She instantly fell in love with it.
“Wow! You're such a cool guy,” she exclaimed, which made James grin from ear to ear.
He unlocked it and opened the back doors to load their collective stuff before he and Dash hopped in the driver’s and passenger’s seats, respectively.
He started the car, jammed the transmission into first gear, and pulled out of the garage.
“I’ll turn on the radio as soon as I shut the garage door,” James told Dash.
“Sure, I'd like that.”
He ran back in, closed the door, and came out the front. As soon as he got back in, he tuned the radio to his favorite morning radio show before shifting the car back into gear and prepared for the drive into town.
James made a left, then took his nifty little piece of German engineering down the mountainous, curvy one-track road, passing his old elementary school. Once he reached the road’s intersection, he turned left again, this time slamming the gears at high speed for a touch of excitement (especially on Rainbow’s part), but calming down slightly coming into town.
James had to stop behind a school bus at one point, causing him to stew a little. Luckily, the bus wasn’t too much of a worry coming into town. At Rainbow’s request, James opened the retractable roof as he made his way down the main street and downtown.
He turned right onto the main road, crossing the railroad tracks, until he reached the donut shop that he swung by every morning before school, aptly named the House of Donuts.
The drive-through window was deserted when James pulled up. A nice lady noticed the two in their car.
“James! Can it be…?”
“Yes, it's me. I'd like my usual, please,” he said instinctively.
“Who's the other one this time?”
“This is Rainbow Dash, from Equestria.” Meekly, she said hello.
“And what would you like?”
“I guess… I’ll have a jelly donut,” Rainbow said, unsure of what was going on. “... with sprinkles and chocolate icing.” She quickly focused her attention back to James. “Who was that?”
“The folks who work at the donut shop?” Nonchalantly, he shrugged and answered, “Most of them know me. Same thing happens when Jeremy comes here. Since we’re both on the Student Council, they’re always happy to go the extra mile whenever we need it.”
“For, like… dances and stuff?”
“Pretty much,” he said. “Jeremy knows most of the people that own the shops in town, so they do us favours all the time.”
At this point, the worker handed a paper bag through the window for James to grab.
Once he paid the appropriate amount, he opened the bag and reached inside to give Rainbow Dash her jelly donut. While she was happily munching away at it, her host brother took a massive gulp of the piping-hot coffee in his hands before shoving one of the two glazed donuts left in the bag into his mouth and breaking off a sizable bite.
“This jelly donut is so awesome,” the mare squealed in delight.
“I know!” James said, echoing her sentiments as he shifted the BMW back towards the main road and closed the roof back up. “This place makes the best damn donuts in the state.”
Rainbow then took an unusually large bite out of her donut, which squirted the filling out of the other end with enough force to land on James’s sleeve.
“Oh, come on!”
Being the jokester that she was, she laughed out loud. James wasn’t amused, grumbling under his breath as he went up the hill.
The route to school traversed a few more hills and passed a big warehouse before he reached the approach road, at which point he’d consumed both of the donuts and the coffee was beginning to take its miraculous effect.
Easing up the hill, there it stood: an imposing, two-story, boring beige brick school building with a number of accoutrements sprouting from it to accommodate the gym, the auditorium, and the art and music wings.
The athletic complex was close by, consisting of a good-sized stadium for football, soccer, and other games of the sort, an Olympic swimming pool that the locals often used during the summer months, a few tennis and basketball courts, a baseball/softball field, and a pair of intramural fields for various purposes fringed with picnicking pavilions and barbecue spits; on top of that, the school was ringed on three sides by woods, which made it perfect for hikers, bikers, and cross-country runners.
Farther off, a farm, complete with a barn and a few sheds, was used by the Future Farmers; there was also an amphitheatre on the other side of the stadium, although both places were difficult to see from a distance.
Right beside the school, the parking lot flanked both the stadium and the school building itself. He parked in his preferred parking spot - right next to one of the side entrances, within sight of the courtyard. He was a giggling little schoolgirl inside, knowing that this spot was truly his after having to fight off the underclassmen and a handful of teachers for it. He shifted the BMW into neutral, turned off the engine, and he and Dash gathered everything they needed to start off the school year off right.
He and Dash made their way through the door, where a teacher let the two in. James then set his bags down in the base of the nearby stairwell to retrieve his schedule; she was doing the same with her saddlebags.
“Let’s see… I’ve had the same homeroom for the past three years,” he said to himself. “That’s upstairs. But as far as Dashie…”
“I’ve got it!” she half-shouted, causing James to have to pause his train of thought.
“Ah, there you go.” He went over to her and pored over Dash’s schedule, comparing the two before making a startling discovery.
“Well, would you look at this… we have the same homeroom.” The young mare’s eyes grew wide, and a smile crept onto her face. At this point, she couldn’t wait another second.
Luckily, he knew the exact location of the room in question, so she let him lead the way. They went up the stairs and found room 216, which was in an incredibly easy-to-miss-if-you’re-not-careful sort of hallway. Inside, students’ work, motivational posters, school-related announcements, bookshelves, cubbies, and other various storage devices lined the walls. Most of his friends and closest acquaintances were already sitting at the three tables, most in varying stages of consciousness, others already hopped up on coffee and chatting amongst themselves.
John was fighting off sleep at the same table as Chris and Jason. David fist-bumped James on the way in. At the next table, Lyra was texting away on her phone alongside Bon Bon and Christina, a fellow senior. Richard, who would sit at this table, made many fruitless attempts to woo Christina over the years.
Dash shook off her saddlebags and set them under the third table at which James preferred to sit. He did the same thing with his own bags, setting his binder and notebooks in front of him.
Jeremy (the student body vice president) came stumbling in, situating himself on the adjacent side of the table from James. Firefly arrived shortly after.
The last one in was Ashley, a beautiful long-haired girl who was James’s longtime neighbour and, from time to time, lover; this history became apparent from the way she sauntered over towards James, caressed his meticulously clean-shaven jawline, and leaned down to give him a steamy kiss on his lips before taking her seat on the side adjacent to Dash.
The mare was visibly confused, her eyes bulging out, and her ears bending downward.
“Umm… who was she?”
“I’ll explain later who she is,” James dismissed.
Their homeroom teacher of three (going on four) years, Mrs. Beaumont, entered the classroom, large coffee in hand, just before the tardy bell rang. Her maturity and wisdom, as well as her pixie-cut blonde hair and sharp physique, served as the only reminder of maturity in a school environment that changed from year to year, or month to month.
“Good morning, scholars,” she called out, acknowledged by the faint, half-arsed mumbles of the barely-awake students.
“I hope we have a fantastic year,” she said, with a hint of optimism, perhaps because of the coffee. “I’m going to run out to my car to grab a few things, I’ll be right back…”
“She’s a really cool teacher,” James told Dash. However, the mare’s mind was fixated on only one thing at that moment.
“But… who was that girl who kissed you?”
James went into near-shutdown mode for a minute, scratching his chin at times, before explaining: “Ashley… is my next-door neighbour. She moved here when I was in the… fourth or fifth grade, if I recall correctly, and she liked me. A lot.” Rainbow’s ears perked up.
“The summer before we both started middle school, we did things, we fooled around, we even dated. Her parents were cool with everything…”
“On top of that, I had my friends, she had her friends, and we both had our significant others. We were always there for each other, and she was like a sister to me. Every breakup, every breakdown, every problem, I always confided in her.”
Dash processed all the information while Mrs. Beaumont was passing revised class schedules around the room. “Wow… she must be really special.”
“Putting it lightly,” James replied. “She also made my eighth grade promotion really special.”
Her head was already swimming in thought, despite the early hour of the morning. “Did she…?” James nodded in the affirmative.
“Wait… don't high school relationships fail after the first two weeks?”
“I've no idea whether or not that's true,” he said, “and while it may be true back home, over here, we tend to stick with the one person we see ourselves spending the rest of our lives with.”
“That’s cute…”
James mumbled at a level that Dash couldn’t hear; he didn’t take into account her sensitive ears, which detected his noises.
“What was that, dude?”
He tapped the table, sighing heavily. “Now I remember you telling me that you were… polygamous or something.”
Dash facehoofed, rocking her head back and forth. “I’ll explain that later…”
• • • • •
James’s first class that day was Health, in room 131. The teacher, Ms. Tuohy, knew James for about three years; she possessed jet-black hair, perfectly sculpted makeup, and flawless eyebrows. Inside, Christina was sitting in the front row, so he took his seat directly behind her. Several other seniors, the lot of whom were little more than acquaintances, rushed in and claimed all of the seats at the front of the room. The two Equestrians in the class (Argie, a colt with a grey coat and a brown, slightly orange colored mane, and Derpy, the incredibly ditzy one) settled for seats closer to Tuohy’s desk.
This class lasted from 8:20 to 9:05.
James’s lit-comp English class was in room 105, in the other corridor. Her ladyship, Ms. Courtney, the old battle axe, ran an incredibly tight ship in the English department; she knew James well, because she served as the student council advisor at one point. The decorations were few and in-between, mainly a few discolored motivational posters from the 70s, a bookshelf that was falling apart from years of neglect, and tables littered with carvings, Sharpie graffiti, and dried-up gum stuck underneath them.
James sat beside Jeremy at such a table. Jason and Chris filed in shortly after that, taking the table directly in front. Everyone else were either acquaintances or nobodies. This one lasted until 9:55.
His next class was in the science department, in room 208 to be exact. Mr. Sweeney, James’s chemistry teacher, was another one of these battle-axe types. He was slightly bald, and very well respected despite him being somewhat of a mad hatter. Cabinets stocked with equipment lined three corners of the room, with lab stations in the middle where the class were to sit.
Chris sat beside James at one of the lab stations at the middle of the room just as the latter was putting his binder in a compartment underneath the counter.
At the lab stations behind him and to their right, respectively, sat Billy and Gilda, and Hoops and Quarterback. Three of them were bulky, athletic, and muscular-types; Gilda, from the Griffonian confederation within Equestria, was in an on-and-off romantic relationship with Billy, the jock that was sitting beside her.
While Mr. Sweeney was explaining expectations and the like, Billy kept pestering James by reaching a hoof over his lab station, poking him on the back, to make him squirm in his chair; this caused Gilda to chuckle under her breath. Next to him, the other two were sputtering with amusement. The teacher simply ignored the lot of them and continued with his lecture throughout the entirety of their taunting of James.
At one point, Chris turned around to face Billy and ask him nicely to stop in order to keep James from blowing his top. Luckily for James’s sanity, Sweeney paused and marched to where the brown-coated bully was sitting.
“Not in my class,” he said, simply and sternly. Billy seemed to get the message. Thankfully, the rest of the class, which lasted until 10:45, transpired without incident.
James had to rush down the stairwell and through the cafeteria, bags in hand, to the realm of Mr. Rochester, the school’s resident art aficionado. In his stupor, he bumped into Rainbow, causing him to fall flat on his bum and his belongings to scatter.
“You okay, dude?” Rainbow asked him, concerned.
“Ah’m alright,” he said. He got back on his feet without any difficulty. Firefly, who was just behind him, helped James with his stuff; he scratched her ear as a token of thanks.
Once inside the art room, one could see just how chill the art teacher was. Soft, relaxing music was playing in the background, the smell of fresh, wet paint, the way the sunlight naturally illuminated the room without the aid of the fluorescent lights, his overall easy-going demeanor -- all dominated the senses, the tension in James’s body from the jocks’ teasing and taunting vanishing from his mind and body.
Believe it or not, James nearly fell asleep during Mr. Rochester’s introductions. He managed to get a fifteen-minute nap in before suddenly being shaken awake by the vibrating of his phone. He fumbled in his pocket to pull it out, unlocked it, and a smile could be seen on his face to see a text from Dash; she had apparently figured out how to take a selfie. Said selfie happened to be first in a long string of pictures of either herself, Firefly, Gilda, or a combination of the three.
Until 11:35, when that class ended, James exchanged selfies with his exchange sister and her friends, paying scant attention to what Mr. Rochester was saying. He left that room with a smile on his face, the jocks’ taunting far behind him.
• • • • •
Like a homing pigeon, he found his way to the table where he and the “lunch bunch” ate every lunch period. James’s self-packed paper bag lunch stood out amongst the rest of the gang, who carried identical plastic blue trays after filing their way patiently through the lunch line. Because of this, he was always the first to arrive.
He dug out the pulled chicken sandwich he’d prepared the night before from what was left of the barbecue leftovers; he also produced a bag of chips to accompany it along with a bottle of sweet tea.
While he was eating and scrolling through Twitter with his phone, Rainbow Dash found him. She was carrying a fully-stocked tray of salad in her maw, so she gingerly set the tray down on the table, occupying the seat next to her host brother.
“What’s up, big guy?” she said.
James set his phone down. “I’m doing great. Liking my classes so far.”
Richard and Jeremy approached the table shortly after, setting their pizza and breadsticks down in front of them, directly across from Dash and James.
Chris, David, John, and Jason took their places as James finished his chips and took a big swig of his tea.
The lunch bunch chatted about classes for a while before another figure came to the table. Judging from the cobalt-blue hair, one would easily notice that Firefly was about to join the lunch bunch…
And so was Surprise and Derpy.
James’s sandwich was about three-quarters of the way consumed when Derpy warmed up to Jeremy, accepting his offer to scratch her ear. Firefly allowed Richard to pet her and run his fingers through her mane.
“I heard that you two are sleeping together in the same bed,” Jeremy said teasingly to Dash and James, to their surprise.
James was not very amused. “Oi… not like you’re thinking,” he rebuffed, eyebrows tense and scowling as he pulled out a pair of cookies from his lunch bag.
“Maybe I like sleeping on his chest,” Dash added, coming to his defense, “while his hands move up and down my back. Did you think of that?”
The curly-haired one stood there, dumbstruck. Richard’s cheeks heated up, and a smug smile grew on Surprise’s face. James patted Dash’s head lightly.
The conversation turned to teachers and the freshmen; Dash, Firefly, and James were in the middle of a debate over whether Ms. Courtney was rude, incredibly dense, or both.
At 12:25, with lunch consumed (for the most part), the bell rang for multipurpose period.
For multipurpose period, James would attend a meeting of the school’s service club twice a week, with the other three days being reserved for “field guidance” as part of his duties as Student Council president.
To clear up any confusion: this is when any number of the Student Council officers drops in on another club or meets with the members of a sports team (the football team, for example) to have a look around, or, perhaps, to give short speeches. When the Student Council began the tradition of “field guidance”, it was originally a responsibility given to the President; nowadays, all the student body officers took part. He had some idea of what to expect when he was secretary… he now felt that it was up to him to put his own spin on the practice in a way that felt natural to him.
Before last year’s president was elected, “field guidance” was a boring, uninteresting affair; this time around, the bar was raised sky-high. Besides simply advice and suggestions, the Council actually made an effort to connect with the students that elected them to their office. The new style of leadership proved to be popular with the teachers as well as the students -- so popular, in fact, that such events were scheduled more often, from once a week from the start, to twice a week last year, to three times a week this year.
As the new Student Council president, he was prepared to make the best of these visits and use his sociability and outgoing personality to his advantage.
For the time being, however, there was more important matters to attend to.
• • • • •
James's maths teacher, Mr. Brown, was a bit old-fashioned. He occupied room 115, he always wore a dress shirt and tie (and a vest on occasion), and his brown hair was always slicked with hair grease that made it shine under the fluorescent light.
He had a fancy projector and a mobile computer lab; other than that, the room itself was as bland as a dry biscuit.
Mr. Brown was sitting at his desk silently in front of his computer, taking care of business from the morning. He knew about eighty percent of the people that were in there, which pleased him, but only just; John and David sat on either side of James at a table right beside the window.
Each table had one computer, which was connected to his own through a network in a way such that Mr. Brown could see what was happening with each computer and the students could see, at least on their screens, what he was doing at the front of the room.
Knowing that cell phones were strictly verboten during his lessons, so James made sure that his phone was on silent before he stuck it in one of the various pockets on his cargo shorts as class began. The next forty-five minutes passed in a blur, accented only by the occasional confiscation of some poor chap’s electronic device for one reason or another, concluding with the bell ringing at 1:45.
Government and politics was certainly James's forte, so he got along well with this particular teacher, Mr. Davis. He taught at the school for many, many years, and his age, physique and his slight tinge of grey hair proved it; he was also the head football coach, so football memorabilia lined his desk.
Samantha, the senior class president and the school’s cheer captain, took a seat right beside him. On his other side, Lyra nuzzled the side of James's face before taking the other empty desk. Directly across from him was Bonbon. When he turned behind him, he laid eyes on a girl he'd never seen before; her green eyes, wavy blonde hair, and curvy, well-developed womanly physique were ingrained in his memory like a photograph.
“Uhhh… hi,” James said in his nervous state of mind.
“Call me Alizia,” the girl replied. He could pin down the accent fairly well, which sounded somewhat European, but couldn't figure out any specific nationality.
Not knowing what exactly to say next, he clammed up, pattering his hands on the desk in front of her before sloppily tossing together his next question.
“Soooo… uhh… where d’ya come from?”
“Cosarara,” she said simply. “I’m from Southampton.”
James was overtaken with excitement at the idea of a foreign student from Cosarara, his parents’ old stomping grounds, his native land. He had to step back, tense up his entire body, and squeal as if he were a nine-year-old girl at a One Direction concert. He hyperventilated intensely. He didn’t calm down until the bell rang at 2:30, at which point he sat down in his seat with a second-grade smile on his face.
James was still shaking with excitement on his way to the Student Council room as Rainbow Dash split off down the hall to her last class of the day. He rounded two corners before reaching room 210, the door of which was already wide open.
Four office-style desks, complete with state-of-the-art computers and -- much to his surprise -- separate phones, surrounded a small conference table situated in the centre of the room.
At the table, Jeremy was already sitting beside a middle-aged man with just the slightest touch of orange in his blonde hair, the teacher-advisor; the vice principal, Mrs. Wallin, was standing nearby. James placed his things on the table.
The teacher-advisor, Mr. Harper, introduced James and Jeremy to the student body secretary, Lisa Christiana, and Amy Katrinka, the student body treasurer. They were both high-energy juniors; Amy was the captain of the girls’ soccer team, and Lisa was an active member of the art club at the school.
Concerning the desks, Mr. Harper explained that the vice president’s desk was the closest to the door, and facing directly across from the president, in accordance with Student Council tradition. The secretary and treasurer also sat across from one another. James, caught up in the moment, whipped out his phone to snap a pic of his new desk while the other three were attentively listening to their new advisor.
As he was preparing to text Rainbow Dash, Mr. Harper added that the desks and the areas surrounding them could be decorated to suit the councilors’ fancy. James perked up even more at the realisation and increased the pace of his texting. Once he was done, he sent his massive wall of text, picture attached, to the mare he was sharing his room with.
The orientation ended as briefly as it started, with Mr. Harper quickly retiring to his classroom. Thoughts of marble paperweights, plastic palm trees, and mini-fridges danced in his head when he pulled up a chair and squeaked in next to Jeremy.
“So… how was today?”
“I'm liking my classes so far,” he told him. “My art teacher kinda reminds me of Bob Ross.”
“I can see that. I've seen him smoking grass in the parking lot before, so I'm not that surprised.”
“Also, everybody tells me that my maths teacher’s a bit of a dick, but once you really get to know him, he's actually a really chill guy.”
“That's easy for you to say,” Jeremy rebutted.
“Really?”
“Sometimes, he has to scream at the freshmen,” Amy said. “Speaking from experience, of course.”
James chuckled at Amy’s comment, then reached for a packet of paper that Mr. Harper had dropped on the table during the orientation. Upon further investigation, it contained preliminary information concerning Homecoming (which was approaching quickly), a list of class officers, as well as elections for the other various representatives on the Council.
“How’re we doing these?” Jeremy asked. James was still mentally buried in the packet. Lisa and Amy both stared at him intently, awaiting some sort of response, until he suddenly slapped the papers down onto the table and rose out of his chair.
“I’ve got an idea… and it’ll take a while to explain, so just bear with me.” He made his way towards a cabinet behind Jeremy’s desk and retrieved a dry-erase board and marker.
“Oh boy,” Jeremy said, “Here he goes…”
James scowled at the vice-president for a moment before beginning his lecture.
“I was thinking that we could have…” He began scribbling and chicken-scratching on the board. “all the homeroom reps, club reps, the class officers, the sports reps, and perhaps an exchange student rep or two -- that is, if we manage that -- every one of them, be elected through secret ballot…”
“Bullshit,” Lisa interrupted.
“Just wait for it,” he told her.
“They’ll meet in the auditorium, shall we say, once a week. We’ll run the whole thing much like the Legislature, complete with the bells and whistles and all that shit.”
“That’s good and all,” Amy commented, “but I have just one question.”
James paused for a second, preparing to answer.
“Will we have teachers and the principal watching us?”
“Naturally, they’ll want to ‘supervise’,” he explained, using air-quotes for emphasis. “I’ll have Harper and a couple other teachers help me maintain order.”
“You mean like a sergeant-at-arms?”
“Exactly.” He resumed his drawing. “As far as the delicate question of alliances…” He roughly tapped Jeremy’s shoulder, causing him to grumble slightly.
“Can you remember, Jezza, the alliances we had in the Student Council? I can’t remember for the life of me.”
The curly-haired one’s response was like rapid-fire. “The Liberal-Progressive Coalition, the Middle Road, the Conservatives, the Buccaneers, the American Patriots, and some independents here and there.”
“Now you know that even though the principals just barely tolerate that sort of thing, it’s just for show, right?”
“Suuuuuure…” Jeremy said, mentally relishing in the fact that the LPC (the group that himself, James, and the others were part of) were the ones truly in charge.
After that, James explained further that each candidate could affiliate themselves with any one of the above groups and be elected to the Student Council. As far as oversight, Mr. Harper and the Executive Council would be responsible for making sure elections are conducted fairly and honestly.
“It's brilliant,” Jeremy said of James's plan. Lisa and Amy fully agreed.
“So it's settled, then.” The discussion turned to dates. “The only question is, when will the election be?”
“I’m thinking sometime in September,” Lisa said. “That way, we’ll have time to get into the groove before we take on the whole council.”
“The middle of September, perhaps?” Amy added.
Jeremy pondered this for a moment, while James was cleaning up a few details on the whiteboard drawing he’d made.
“I think that’s about right,” he finally said. “Somewhere around the third week… yeah, that’ll do nicely.”
James was already putting the timetable together in his head.
“Right… I think this is what we’ll do.” He proposed a week-long campaign period: candidates would declare the Friday before the election, with three days for campaigning within homerooms. Voting would occur on Thursday, with the results announced on Friday afternoon. Lisa proceeded to write down a draft of the plan on a piece of notebook paper. The plan was approved unanimously, James offering to type up the final copy within the week.
On Friday, they would present this plan to Mr. Harper, Mrs. Wallin, and all of the freshman, sophomore, junior, and senior class officers to formally vote on the plan.
James paused the meeting momentarily to check the time, and to text Rainbow Dash, who was currently in Physics, trying (for the most part) to stay awake in class.
[Once class lets out, meet me at my Beemer.] Send.
“Okay, now that we have that out’ the way… let’s talk Homecoming!”
• • • • •
At 3:15, James was waiting by the red BMW for Dash’s arrival, his school bags already packed in the backseat. Unbeknownst to him, the blue mare was sneaking up behind him while he was twirling his keys in his hand. She waited for the right moment before she pounced.
“Boo!”
Dash interjected, causing James to leap in the air and scream.
“Damn, you nearly scared me,” James said. The mare laughed incessantly, while her host brother didn’t seem amused in the slightest.
“Just get in the car already…”
With that, the pair hopped in James’s car. When Dash tossed her saddlebags into the backseat, the two made their way back towards home.
After the twenty-minute drive (attributed mainly to the after-school traffic rush), Dash made her way inside while James parked the car in the garage. Dinner was already being made at this point, so he went back out to the Beemer and retrieve all the school related materials so he could set them upstairs in the room that they shared.
James felt his phone vibrate in his trousers as he arranged all his binders and folders on his desk. Digging it out, he could see that it was Ashley calling.
“Hello?”
“Hi, James…” Ashley could be heard saying over the phone. “I was just wondering if I could come over tonight.”
“No, not tonight,” James let her down gently. “Dash has football practice tonight, and I’m driving her over.”
“Oh.”
“But are you still on for this weekend?”
“Absolutely. I’ll get a reservation together and everything. Does Basil’s sound good?”
“That sounds splendid,” James said. “Does Friday work for you?”
“Friday’s good...”
“And you’ll give a call if plans change?”
“Certainly.”
“Then I’ll see you Friday… buh-bye.”
“Buh-bye.” James then hung up and went downstairs for dinner.
Once dinner was consumed, Rainbow Dash gathered up all of her football stuff in her athletic bag. She and James, after telling the parents that they’d be back before nightfall and making sure the critters were fed, hopped into the BMW. They arrived at the stadium with no problems.
While Rainbow was in the middle of warm-up stretches alongside Richard, Firefly, Derpy, and the rest, James was chatting with Jeremy on the phone.
“I’m at football practice with Dash, and I won’t be home till dark. What’s up?”
“Well, I just got off the phone with Amy,” Jeremy said.
“Yes…”
“And she told me of a rumour that’s been going around that the principal could be hand-picking the class officers.”
“Why would that be?” James queried suspiciously.
“Here’s the thing… She told me that one of the other vice-principals -- not Mrs. Wallin, it’s somebody else -- somehow wanted the class officers to stay as they are…”
“You mean the ones that were elected before school let out?”
“Yeah, but apparently they want us to be non-partisan, meaning we’d have to drop our party affiliations. All of us.”
“Wait a minute… that must mean…”
James’s head was spinning around in circles, and he was trying to steady it by waving at Dash as she was pushing a particularly heavy impact sled down the turf. He got back to the subject fairly quickly.
“...they’re wanting to appoint student councilors!”
“That’s unbelievable,” Jeremy could be heard exclaiming. “Y’know, I also heard that some of the teachers didn’t like how the LPC won almost every single student body officer and class officer spot, so they’re trying to hijack our plan so that it invalidates all that and lets the faculty appoint replacements for us.”
“You’re on crack!”
“No, I’m not… I’m not kidding. The first day, and already, people are wanting us gone.”
James exhaled loudly through his nose, as the rumoured upheaval affected him personally. “I’ll tell you what… I’ll talk to Mr. Harper and see what he knows, and you can talk with Lisa, Amy, and maybe Samantha and ask them about it.”
“Alright, will do,” Jeremy confirmed. “Mrs. Wallin, too?”
“Better safe than sorry,” said James.
“Anyways, are we still on for this weekend?”
“Yeah, sure… I’m going out with Ashley on Friday. I’m taking her to Basil’s.”
“Nice!”
James smiled a bit. “She’s gonna love it.”
“I know she will… you always treat her nice. Come to think of it, Rainbow Dash seems like a nice pony. We should do lunch on Saturday or something, and invite Richard down.”
“That sounds great… I'll ask her about it after practice.”
“And I'll be damn sure to quash this rumour.”
“Alright…” At this point, James felt a tap on his shoulder. “I've got to be going now. See ya.” He hung up and looked over his shoulder to see Mr. Davis standing right beside him.
“Would you mind coming with me for a moment?”
“Sure.” James followed his teacher/head football coach into the football building, then into the weight room. The door swung shut behind the two with a heavy metallic thud.
“I’ve been talking with Richard and a few of his friends.”
“And?”
“They’re telling me all these wonderful things about you,” he said unwaveringly.
“Why would they not?” James retorted with a chuckle. “I’m the president of the Student Council, an awesome student, and my life’s great. What more could you want?”
Mr. Davis paused for a moment, clearly thinking about what he was going to say next.
“Listen… they really want you to be the football team manager. Rainbow Dash literally begged me to offer you the job.”
“But why me, when I know nothing about football? I’m not the kind of guy who likes sports, or even cares about sports!” James raised his voice, slightly irritated at the suddenness of it all.
“Our first game is in two weeks,” Mr. Davis began to explain. “Every year, we have to get sponsors, maintain our equipment, and arrange transportation to all of our games, among other things. The Boosters, thankfully, take care of most of it, but what we really need is a foundation… a cornerstone, if you will… that’s where you come into play.”
“How?” James felt compelled to ask.
“Richard thought that you, being the Student Council president and having all this logistic experience, would be the perfect fit for such a job.”
James simply stood in place and let the machinery in his head run at full power. “Well, I do have experience, what with helping with prom and Homecoming…”
“That's a start. You might personally know some of the business owners, so you could secure sponsorships for us.”
“Maybe I could.”
“You could also help with practices; that is, helping with equipment and uniforms and securing refreshments -- ”
“Like water?” James interrupted.
“Yes,” Mr. Davis said, “now we're getting somewhere.” He had James's full attention at this point.
“The biggest role you would play, besides the sponsorships and stuff, is cheer on our boys -- ”
“And girls,” James was quick to correct the record, acknowledging the fact that Rainbow, Firefly, Derpy, Surprise, and the others were now considered players.
“Can't forget the girls… that's right… the biggest job here would be cheering on our team and being a big supporter and advocate for us. You'd also be working closely with team leaders and the boosters for arranging fundraisers, dinners, transportation to games and things like that.”
James exhaled and rested his back against the concrete wall. “That's quite a tall order,” he said with a hint of concern.
“I personally think you can handle it. Can you?” James nodded his head up and down.
“I take that as a yes, then?”
“I'll certainly have to think about it, that's for sure…”
Sensing the hesitation, Mr. Davis offered one last parting olive branch.
“Oh, and James?”
“Yeah?”
“If you can let me know about your decision by Wednesday that'd be great,” he said.
“Sure.”
They both left the weight room.
During the drive home, his head was spinning with doubts -- about how to incorporate this new job into his current responsibilities as Student Council president and not become a complete bloody nervous wreck by the end of the year.
But that took second fiddle at the moment to giving Rainbow Dash the best experience of her life in the little slice of America he called home. Knowing this, a smile crept onto his face.