The candidate (Ezzy's Education: Part 38), by Garrett Murch
That Friday before the special election, Ezzy walked the Ebbing High School hallways with a newfound ease. Whispers meant for her to hear—”There goes the domestic terrorist sympathizer,” “She’s a closet Patriot,” “secret white supremacist”— they bounced off her.
She waved to those Justice whisperers, sometimes saying “Hi Dizzy,” or “Hi Lucinda,” even if Dizzy or Lucinda were not with the whisperers.
When Trendon Bravissimo’s boys stalked her between classes, she addressed them with statements along the lines of, “Let’s go, boys, you gotta keep up!” When they called her a fake Patriot, she swung her hand toward her classmates and said, “We’re patriots with a lower- case p. We’re going to win; want to come along for the ride?”
Early that afternoon, Ms. Scales and Ezzy’s English teacher, Mr. Catty, cornered Ezzy in the hallway between classes. “Ezzy,” Mr. Catty said, “we’ve seen the abuse you’ve taken today, and we’re concerned about you.”
“Deeply concerned,” Ms. Scales said. “We believe the stress at school lately has taken an awful toll on you emotionally—and psychologically. We would truly hate to see your grades suffer even more than they already have.”
“We think it would be best for you if you dropped out of the race,” Mr. Catty said.
Do they think I’m so gullible I’d take them at their word, or do they assume I understand their thinly veiled threat? Doesn’t matter I suppose. “Thank you so much for your expressions of concern,” Ezzy said. “They say so much about you. Now if you’d excuse me.” Ezzy wedged herself between them, stepping back into the center of the hallway and continuing on her way. That was desperate. They must think I’m going to win. That’s because I am going to win.
When school ended, Ezzy walked to the student parking lot. A large group of students stood at her Jeep, cheering her on.
“How can we help?”
“I voted for Lucinda last time, but…”
“I don’t know why I voted for Trunk last time, but now…” “I didn’t vote last time, but…”
My word! I know it’s not me, these guys really don’t want someone like Lucinda or Trunk.
“Vote on Monday,” Ezzy said to her classmates. “We can do this. You can do this.” Scattered amongst the crowd were Kayla, Link, Kelile, Jasmine, Sheila, and Madison.
Kayla, Sheila, and Kelile are going to be late to their sports today. Aww.
“Make your voices heard!” Madison yelled.
Madison can yell? Who knew? You go, Madison!
“Ez-zy! Ez-zy!” a student began chanting, with others joining.
No, that’s not right. Flattering but not right, I’m not Lucinda or Trunk. “Please stop!” Ezzy shouted. The students stopped chanting. “It’s not about me. It’s about you. Do you want politics out of our classrooms and out of our school?”
“Yes!!”
“Hell yes!”
I’ll take that as a yes. Ezzy sort of laughed to herself. Good. “So do I!” she yelled back and the crowd erupted with cheers.
“I’m not going to promise the world,” Ezzy said. “I’m nothing special: just a young adult like you who wants school to get better.”
“Yes, you are!” a student hollered.
“Flattery will get you nowhere, Simon,” Ezzy said, smiling at Simon, the student who had hollered.
“Look, I will have more to say soon, but I will say right now as your president, I’ll work tirelessly with you to get school life back to normal. First the COVID pandemic, now a pandemic of toxic politics, it’s been too much on all of us and we’re falling behind because of it. That is an injustice if there ever was one. I understand this may not sound like much of a promise. But we’re at school to learn how to think, not be told what to think. Learning how to think might be harder, but I guarantee if we meet this challenge it will pay off for all of us— big time.”
“Sounds frickin’ good to me!” a student yelled.
“Sounds good to me, too!”
“Great,” Ezzy said. “I know we can do it.” She moved toward her Jeep.
Ezzy’s core supporters huddled around her at the driver’s side door. “Okay guys,” Ezzy said. “See if you can get all your weekend schoolwork done tonight. You can do it. Let’s meet at my house at seven in the morning and get to work. Kayla and Sheila, need your help with athletes. Kayla, also with Lucinda supporters who might regret voting for her. Madison, you’ve got bio and chem students on board already, but will be good to touch base with them. Kelile, you’ve got the math connection, and of course the football players.”
“Most of the team didn’t vote last time,” Kelile said. “They will this time, right?”
“Oh yeah. I’ll make sure of it!”
“You’re the man, K,” Ezzy said. “Link, you’ve got Advanced Political English class and patriots turned off by Trunk and Trendon.”
“Advanced Political English?” Sheila asked.
“It’s an inside joke,” Link said. “I’ve got it, Ezzy.”
“Great, and we also need your mother’s brownie recipe, Link.”
“Uh—” Link said.
“Get it!” Madison yelled.
Ezzy laughed. Where’s all this Madison spirit coming from?
“They’re just so good,” Madison said. “Sorry.” Everyone laughed.
“True story,” Kayla said, smiling at Link.
“Alright. Schoolwork tonight. See you bright and early. Adios.” Ezzy hopped in her Jeep.
* * *
Saturday morning came quickly. Normally still in pajamas if she wasn’t wading in a river, Ezzy wore dark-blue jeans and a dark-green fleece with matching merino wool socks. Her hair was a mess, but her hair had not crossed her mind. The doorbell rang. “I got it,” she called to her parents who were still in their bedroom.
Ezzy opened the front door. “You’re on time! All of you!”
“Ezzy, we have an issue,” Madison said.
“What is it?” Ezzy asked. “Guys, come inside. Sit down, have a brownie. My mom made them last night.”
“It’s InstaTok,” Madison said. He removed his glasses and stuck them in his big brown hair.
“Is it down?” Ezzy asked.
“No,” Link said. “The Justices and Patriots seem to have teamed up overnight. They’re all calling you a power-hungry narcissist. Saying some pretty nasty stuff. It’s the first time I’ve seen them work together in like, well, ever.” He sipped from his small can of Red Bull.
“We have to counter them with a statement to Luci Lipps right away,” Madison said.
“Nope,” Ezzy said. She took a bite of her brownie.
“Nope?” Madison asked. He put his glasses back on.
“Yeah, what do you mean, nope?” Link asked.
“Look guys, you know I love you. But that’s not what we’re doing. I don’t plan to waste our weekend on InstaTok. That’s the Trunk and Lucinda way, not mine.”
“Never complain, never explain,” Link said. “I like it.”
“What’s ‘never complain, never explain?’” Sheila asked.
“It was said by a British Prime Minister, Benjamin Disraeli, a long time ago,” Link said. “Queen Elizabeth has used it for decades. It means when you’re being attacked, don’t complain about it and don’t try and explain yourself. The attackers will hate you no matter what you do.”
“That’s not really what I was after, Link,” Ezzy said. “But it’s close enough. Look, students who buy into that garbage Trendon and Dizzy are spreading would never vote for me anyway. And I doubt it’s all that many of our classmates.”
“Fair enough,” Madison said. He scratched his head.
“The plan is simple,” Ezzy said. “I will personally reach as many students as possible this weekend. Let’s say three hundred. By phone whenever possible. Everyone knows their people. Reach out to them yourselves, but we also need lists of the rest of the students, with ways to reach them. Divvy up the responsibilities as you see fit, just do it quickly. Make the lists as Google docs we all share.”
”Let’s get on it!” Kayla said.
They all pulled out their laptops and found places to sit—the couch, the rocking chair, the dining table, the kitchen counter. Ezzy started sending messages as she judged it too early to call anyone. At nine, she asked her friends to share the lists they’d created so she could start making calls. “Keep adding to them and I’ll keep track of who I’ve spoken with.”
For the next eight hours, with scarcely a break, Ezzy made calls to her classmates while standing in the corner of the living room, occasionally stepping outside and sitting once in a while on the couch.
“Thank you so much.”
“I appreciate your support.”
“Yes, I know it’s going to be hard; will you help me?”
“Do you believe Dizzy Jabs when she says that?”
“Yeah, I know we kind of lost touch after elementary school.”
“Oh, I agree; the Justices are also divisive.”
“Gazpacho is a soup; I think you meant Gestapo.”
“Yes, fly fishing is awesome.”
“That is a great point; I’m writing that down.”
“If that’s what you truly believe you should definitely vote for Trendon: I don’t want that kind of support.”
As Ezzy made her calls, her friends sometimes stared at her in wonder. She was on fire. At one point that afternoon Jasmine said to them, “We need to just let her go. She’s in the zone.”
Around four, Ezzy’s father placed a small, wireless speaker on the kitchen counter.
“What are you doing?” Echo asked him. She wore a white kitchen apron stained with brownie batter.
“Just watch,” he said. “Or rather, listen.”
Fleetwood Mac’s “Second Hand News” began playing from the speaker.
“Stop it!” Echo said, turning the speaker off. “Ezzy’s on the phone. And I doubt her friends even know Fleetwood Mac.”
“Oh c’mon, Echo, let me have a little fun will you? Bill Clinton played Fleetwood Mac in 1992, remember? He played ‘Don’t Stop Thinking About Tomorrow.’”
Echo removed her apron and handed it to Mateo. “I’ve made three batches. Your turn.”
Ezzy held her phone at her hip and said, “We can have music, just not too loud. Kayla, you’re in charge. Dad, stay away.”
Echo knocked her hip into Mateo’s and laughed.
Kayla played “Born this Way” by Lady Gaga. Ezzy, back on the phone, gave Kayla a thumbs up. Kayla continued performing her DJ and campaign duties with ease. “It’s easier than man- to-man zone defense in field hockey,” she said an hour later, after Link complimented her multi-tasking skills.
Around a quarter past seven, everyone took a break when Mateo walked inside with four large pizzas. “Went all the way to Portland Pie Company for these,” he said. He lifted the lids of the pizza boxes he’d set on the counter next to paper plates and napkins.
“You’re my hero, Mateo,” Kelile said. “I love that place.”
“How many calls have you made, Ezzy?” Mateo asked.
Ezzy looked at her laptop. “A hundred and fifty-three,” she said. “I don’t want to be overconfident, but I’ve gotten mostly positive responses. A few nasty ones. Left a ton of messages.”
Her friends cheered with pizza in their hands—and mouths. “Nothing to cheer about yet,” Ezzy said. “Except pizza, of course!”
“Ezzy,” Madison said.
He looks serious. “What is it, Madison?” Ezzy’s hair was still messy, especially at the sides of her head where her phone had spent much of the day.
“Verica Navratil said on InstaTok she is voting for you.”
They all stopped chewing pizza. Ezzy set her slice on her plate. “Well, that’s just, uh, awfully surprising,” Kayla said.
“It is,” Ezzy said. What’s that about? Did she have a falling out with Lucinda or Dizzy? With the Justice Party?
“Do you want to call her?” Link asked. “I can get her number.”
“I have it already,” Ezzy said. “I’ll call her.”