Desert Moon

Chapter 29

In April, we were travelling to St. Louis for a competition. There wasn't much to it, we just got to wear these dopey looking robes and sing some gospel piece and were given notes on how well our sound quality is and stuff like that.

The trip alone was fun though. The adrenaline we got at those competitions couldn't be matched with any other type of euphoria. Singing on the bus, and usually going to McDonald's or something on our way back. It felt forever since we had one of these, and it was sad that it was our last one.

Also along with that, was the spring show we always did. At the end, all the seniors got to line up on the stage, introduce themselves and tell the audience what they planned to do after high school.

"My name is Jamie Riley and I'm going to Suffolk University in Boston," he paused, "and I'm going to be a choir director."

There were at least three people between me and him. There was Daniel Thomas, who was going to be a lawyer. Big dreams. Lucy Anderson was going to be a nurse, and Janine Thomas, Daniel's twin sister, said she was just going to get married and have kids. Fair enough. And then it came to me.

"Uhm" I began nervously, "I'm Winston Flynn and I'm going to the Illinois Institute of Technology... to be an architect."

There were dozens of people after me, and I didn't really pay attention. If I was being completely honest, I didn't really care. Then of course, Mrs Wells came onstage to introduce and thank Mr Gray for being there, and while she was there, she announced her new baby. Her husband walked up onstage with the baby, who was as white as a glass of milk, but her husband was very dark. I don't think any of us had seen Mr Wells before. He was a tall black man with a big beard. This created a big contrast to Mrs Wells, who was short with dark hair and blue eyes. The audience was silent, so we felt the need to speak up.

"Congratulations Mrs Wells" we all said, and I expected baby David to cry because we were so loud, but he didn't.

"Thank you guys" she said, and Mr Wells smiled. She brought us all back into the choir room, just the seniors, to tell us how proud she was of all of us. She had something to say for each of us individually about how important we were to her as an educator.

"Winston, you're very, very talented, although typically your effort level is not what I would consider one hundred percent, one hundred percent of the time. But that's how the majority of students are, it's okay. You actually remind me a lot of me when I was still in school. Despite the fact that you're not necessarily an overachiever ALL of the time, I've seen how younger students look to you for guidance, and that is very special. Hell, I've even seen older students looking to you for help in the past. If I'm being honest, if any of you were going to go on to teach choir, I thought it would be you, Winston."

I wasn't sure what it all meant, but I would never forget it. I thought Jamie might have been offended that she said that to me, but he wasn't. He came to me afterwards and said that he agreed with her. I couldn't get over the fact that I had so little time left as her student.

Senior year was very quickly coming to an end and I found it quite overwhelming. It was just weeks before graduation, and we were trying to get through our last classes ever.

Smith was reading through a chemistry book during lunch, "Well, I'm sure not going to miss this once we're gone."

"Tell me about it," George agreed.

It was warm enough to go back to Desert Moon, and while we were there, we discussed graduation.

"I have this white dress I'm going to wear under my gown" Elliott said, which brought us some mild shock. I wasn't sure she'd ever worn a dress. If she did, I sure wasn't there.

"I'm just going for normal clothes," I said.

"What if we didn't wear anything?" George suggested.

"I'd rather not," said Elliott.

"Yeah I'll have to agree with you on that," I said to her.

The other three said nothing. They did not agree, nor did they disagree. This worried me.