He felt cold. “You’re saying I should suck up to that…” He substituted an acceptable word to avoid a lecture. “Girlfriend of his for money.”
His mother reached across the table and put her hand over his. “I’m saying you should do whatever you need to do to get your tuition.”
“Maybe you can get financial aid or something,” Mel said.
“In the next six weeks?” John looked at her across a dining hall breakfast.
“Aren’t there emergency loans?”
“Capped at $800,” John said grimly. “I already looked. That would leave me with nearly six thousand dollars still to find.”
Mel grimaced. “Out of state tuition?”
“Out of state tuition. My legal residence is in Nevada.” He toyed with his scrambled eggs. “Aren’t you paying it? I thought you were from Arizona.”
“I’m on a full ROTC scholarship,” Mel said, taking a long drink of her coffee. “My rich Uncle Sam is paying.”
Maybe they would be better with more ketchup. “It takes two years to establish residency,” John said. “So if I drop out and work, I’ll be eligible for in state tuition in spring 1990. To get federal financial aid I have to be unclaimable on my dad’s taxes for two years, so I’d be eligible in fall 1990.”
“Two years out of school at least,” Mel said. “Don’t you have any rich relatives or something?”
“Other than my dad? No.” John looked across at her jaunty little hat. “Maybe I should just drop out and enlist or something. It would answer the question of where I’m going to live in six weeks anyhow.”
Mel shrugged. “You’d be better off trying for a ROTC scholarship.”
“I thought you had to be a freshman and apply when you got into school.”
She shook her head. “You can. That’s what I did. But you can crash into the Professional Officers Course at the beginning of junior year. You have to do boot camp the summer before, but if they want you, you can get a scholarship then. Then you’ve got two years of the POC before graduation, keep your grades up and your nose clean, and you get your commission.”
“What’s the catch?”
“Four years active duty, ten years reserves. Minimum.”
“And be an astronaut?”
Mel grinned. “Not likely. That’s more of a mid-career move. With poli sci instead of a sciences degree you’d probably be a paper pusher.”
“I’d rather be a fighter pilot.” Four years of that didn’t sound too bad.
She actually laughed. “Yeah, and I’d like to flap my arms really fast and fly around in circles! You have to get top marks on the AFOQT to even get qualified for TAC. That’s tactical aircraft, the most desirable designation for a cadet. I’m TAC.”
John raised an eyebrow. He’d thought she was sharp. “I thought girls couldn’t fly fighter planes.”
“Women can’t fly them in combat situations. It’s prohibited by Congress. But how long do you think that ban will last?” Mel looked at him over her coffee cup. “I’m twenty. It’s not going to last my whole career.”
“So can I take this test…thing?”
Her face sobered. “I don’t know. They gave it in October. I’m not sure they’re giving it again this semester. And we have to have our summer camp paperwork in by the beginning of break.” She shrugged and put her cup down. “You could ask Lt. Col. Raymond. He’s the detachment commander. I’ll go with you if you want. It can’t hurt to ask, can it?”
He sat in an empty classroom by himself the week before exams, listening to the clock tick, answering questions. After all the talk about it, John had thought it would be hard. But he was good with standardized tests, and some of the questions were really obvious. Ok, the military protocol ones weren’t, because he hadn’t been doing two years of this stuff like Mel had, but the math and history and science were easy. And the situational questions were really totally obvious. He turned the paper in and went to catch Mel for lunch.
“Ok?” she asked.
John slouched into a chair. “Yeah. It was just a test. I went in expecting the Kobayashi Maru.”
“You are a geek,” Mel said, unpinning her sandwich from the little frilled toothpicks.
“Yeah well.”
“I mean that as a compliment,” she said. “You have an inner geek. Underneath your preppish exterior.”
“Thanks, I think.”
“And you’re brooding again.”
“Sorry.” He gave Mel a forced smile. “I was just thinking that even if this works I still have to figure something out about the spring semester. I’m betting this whole scholarship thing depends on being a full time student in good standing.”
“Unfortunately, yes.”
“So I’m still going to have to suck up.” John closed his eyes. “Or just walk away.”
“And who does that hurt?” she asked gently.
“My mom.” He waited a second, a thought bubbling through. “Sucking up just hurts me.”
“Then I think you know what to do,” Mel said.
“Dad?” The phone connection sounded scratchy. No reason it should.
“John.”
He swallowed. “I wanted to tell you I’m sorry.”
There was a long pause. “That’s not good enough.”
“What?” John moistened his lips.
“I said that’s not good enough,” his dad said. “After the things you said to Linda. I’m sorry won’t hack it.”
He’d never considered this. He’d never imagined it. He was his dad’s son, a chip off the old block. His dad had been proud of his grades, proud that he was good enough to play halfback in high school. They did stuff together. They were tight.
Something constricted in his chest. “Dad?”
“You called her a bimbo and a whore. You had the whole lodge listening while you called her a slut, a home wrecker and a high class call girl. She cried for days. She said she’s never been so embarrassed and hurt in her life. I’m ashamed to call you my son.”
“What the hell did you think would happen when you brought her there?” John choked.
“I wanted you to meet her. I wanted you and David to see what a wonderful person she was. I wanted you to understand why I love her.”
“What about mom?”
There was a silence for a moment. “Your mom and I haven’t had a lot in common for years.”
“So what?” John demanded. “I mean, so she doesn’t like to ski. You had to dump her because Linda likes to ski?”