In the end, after everything they’d been through, there was only one thing the residents of Sandpiper Township could agree upon: that all the fighting, all the commotion, all the rallying came down to how a person chose to read a single sentence.
The sentence in question was:
At that moment Rick knew just how deeply he loved Oliver, and Oliver knew just how deeply he loved Rick, and the understanding of this moment would lead them to much of the happiness and adventure that came next.
As sentences go, it was a bit long, and you had to read an entire book in order to get to it. Many of the residents of Sandpiper Township wouldn’t have noticed it if it had been said during a TV show or appeared as a quote in the middle of a newspaper article. But because it was the last line of The Adventurers, and because The Adventurers had been assigned in Mr. Howe’s fifth-grade class, people did take notice. Only one person at first, then considerably more.
It’s worth reading the sentence again before I begin to tell you what happened.
At that moment Rick knew just how deeply he loved Oliver, and Oliver knew just how deeply he loved Rick, and the understanding of this moment would lead them to much of the happiness and adventure that came next.
It would be a good idea for you to stop and consider what you think about this sentence. This will be the last time you get to read it without other people telling you what they think about it.
That’s how it was in Sandpiper Township that November. I know this because I was one of the first people in Sandpiper Township besides Mr. Howe to read the sentence. Unfortunately, I didn’t read it as soon as I could have. I brought the book home with me and only read the first few pages. Then I left it on the kitchen counter and went to eat a snack in front of the TV.
From there, it only took an hour for my life to spiral out of control.