XIV

So far, our main focus has been the development of a vague blackmailing scheme, wherein we would target the various students who constituted threats: gathering the goods on, say, Baba’s incontinence, Bib’s boy-band past, and Dottie’s cutting for Christ.

I didn’t like it.

“Don’t think of it as blackmail,” she’d say. “Think of it as an insurance policy.”

And: “Even Batman resorted to vigilantism.”

I thought it seemed like bad karma. I know what shame feels like; I didn’t want to inflict it on others. It seemed counterproductive and un-Superfreakish. I didn’t want to inspire hate. And besides, Batman is SO NOT a role model for us! Way too grumpy and gloomy.

 

But NOW!

Well, this just changes EVERYTHING, doesn’t it?

I mean, the existence of an underground network of support suddenly opened up a whole new world of opportunities. . . .

Knowing I had the support of others got me to thinking. . . .

HMMMM . . .

Just maybe . . .

I looked at the calendar . . . then went online to check out a few things. . . .

 

I took my still vague, still unformed idea to Mary Jane. “Wow,” she said, and whistled, when I laid it out for her. “That would really be something. But is it feasible?”

I showed her my preliminary research, and she took it from there. Within twenty-four hours she had devised a fully workable plan of action.

So it was Mary Jane who took my embryo of an idea and gave it form and substance and made it into a real possibility.

It was Mary Jane, for instance, who realized how big it could really be, and how far we could take it.

And most important of all, it was Mary Jane who contacted Clancy Duckett.

Clancy Duckett?

The Channel 7 Action News anchor?

I never would have had the nerve!

I never would have thought my little announcement was newsworthy!

But Mary Jane had once done an interview with “the Voice of the Southland” for the Eisenhower Dispatch and had kept her phone number and e-mail address for just such a reason.

And Clancy’s response, God bless her, was one of immediate support.