They Left Me Out of Their Group So I'll Leave Them Out of My Life novel · Chapter 20 of 24
Chapter 20: Class of Nothing
Nobody in the Harbor Room moved.
Colby stood up from the head table.
His chair scraped, and the sound went all the way to the back wall.
"Corina," he said. "Give me the microphone."
I held it out to him.
My mother put her hand over mine on the microphone.
"Honey, sit down," she said, brightly. "He's nervous, everyone. This is a lot for him."
"I'm not a graduate."
The room went very quiet.
He had said it into the air, without a microphone, and it carried.
"I'm not a graduate, and I haven't been a student in two years. I stopped going in the spring of my sophomore year. I work nights at Hartwell Distribution. I've worked there ever since."
Somebody near the front laughed, uncertain, and stopped.
"Colby, stop it," my mother said.
"I'm not going to stop." His voice shook, but it held. "There's no degree. There isn't a diploma. There's a lanyard in my car."
He pulled the folder from inside his suit jacket and held it up so the room could see the stack of pay stubs.
"Every one of these is mine. Mom told me to hide it. She told me what to say at every dinner. She wrote me a schedule to take a picture of."
"He's confused," my mother said, to the room, to the church women, to anyone. "He's been under terrible pressure. Russ, tell them."
My father had come across the floor without my seeing him go.
He stood at the end of the head table with his hands at his sides.
"Bernice," he said.
"Russ, you know our son. He's exhausted."
"Show me the bursar's paper."
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