“Rachel,” he said.
“Admiral,” she said.
He looked at me.
“You must be Lucas,” he said. “Your mother talks about you.”
I did not know what to say to this. I said: “Yes, sir.”
He smiled — a real one, which was not what I expected from a face that composed itself so carefully. “Good things,” he said. “Only good things.”
We went up the steps.
Principal Harris had the expression of someone who has lost control of an agenda and has decided to let the current take her where it’s going, which was probably the right call.
Admiral Carter took the microphone again.
“I was given a program this afternoon,” he said, “with a note attached to the student presentation segment. The note was from a teacher in third period who wanted to flag, in his words, ‘a student who may need gentle guidance about the difference between fact and fiction.’” He paused. “The student’s name was Lucas Miller. The fact in question was that his mother flies an F-22.”
