The Eight Year Ledger novel · Chapter 13 of 32

Chapter 13: The PTA Meeting

"Spoken to," I said.

"By me. Privately. This week."

"Then I'd like to speak to her too," I said. "Publicly. Next Thursday."

"Mrs. Whitford, I really don't think..."

"It's the November PTA meeting," I said. "It's open to every parent in the school. I've never missed one."

I hung up before she could find the next line in her script.

Ms. Talley came back to 3B on Monday.

Gabe told me at dinner.

"She has a new cardigan," he said. "It's purple. She gave everybody a pencil."

"Mom, is she allowed to be our teacher?"

"Not for long," I said.

He nodded.

The PTA met in the Brookside cafeteria at seven.

Usually twenty people came. That Thursday, there were cars parked on the grass.

By five past seven, there were a hundred parents in a room that smelled like tater tots.

The PTA president stood at a podium by the milk cooler, holding her clipboard.

The principal sat at the end of the front table.

Ms. Talley sat beside her, as the teacher representative, in the purple cardigan.

Todd wasn't there.

Beau was there.

He'd come straight from the store in his flannel, and he stood at the back by the trash cans with his arms folded.

The meeting started with the book fair numbers.

Then the PTA president cleared her throat.

"We do have one item of business, regarding our treasurer position."

She looked at me in the third row.

"Kristen has asked for a few minutes."

I walked to the front with my canvas tote and a thumb drive.

The custodian had set up the cart with the projector.

I plugged in the thumb drive.

"Three weeks ago, the district suspended me as your treasurer," I said. "Last Wednesday, the district cleared me."

I held up a printout of the second email.

Then I put it on the front table, right in front of the principal.

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