Chapter 21: Three Points

The State Exam Board met on Thursday in a county hearing room that smelled of carpet glue.

Five people sat behind a curved table.

The chair was a thin man with half-glasses and a stack of papers squared in front of him.

My mother sat next to me in the second row.

Drew sat on my other side, and under the bench his knee was touching mine.

Neither of us mentioned it.

Across the aisle, Keeley's mother sat with the lawyer and a stack of folders.

Keeley sat at the end of the row in a gray sweater, looking at her hands.

Her father sat three seats from her, with his work cap in his lap.

"We are here on a petition for retake," the chair said.

"The petitioner asks that Miss Keeley Satterlee be allowed to sit the exam now."

"She also asks that Miss Haverty's makeup result be set aside."

"Set aside," my mother said under her breath, and I put my hand on her wrist.

The lawyer stood.

He talked for ten minutes about emergency conditions and an unsafe bus.

He talked about a child who had only wanted to reach her exam.

He did not say the word walk once.

When he sat down, the chair turned a page.

"Thank you," he said. "I have read the petition. I have read the exhibits."

He picked up the first folder.

"Rule four of the examination handbook says a candidate who leaves a supervised group without permission forfeits the sitting."

"The driver told the class to stay on the bus, and eleven of them left against it."

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