The Latte Rebellion (25 page)

“Welsh,” she said. A bunch of people looked up in surprise.

“Right on,” Ayesha said. “How did you know?”

“A lot of Welsh people have Jones as a surname.” Carey smiled proudly. Carey, College Bowl trivia champion, who also happened to have a Welsh great-grandmother. Carey, who hadn’t even wanted to be associated with this event. I frowned. I’d given her ample opportunities to be part of this with me, and
now
she decided to speak up?

By the end, Ayesha was revealed to also be part Cherokee, part Irish, part French, part German, and part Salvadorian, and an excited group had crowded closer to the podium-tree. A few people started unwrapping their prizes and I saw Mr. Malone stand a little straighter.

“My point,” Ayesha said, “is that if you judge a book by its cover, you might easily be wrong. I’ve been in so many situations where people make racist comments about Spanish speakers without knowing I have a Latino grandfather. And it makes me feel like they didn’t bother to get to know
me
. Let alone different cultures. Thank you.”

There were cheers and whoops as Ayesha went back to her seat.

Maria was next. She talked about being 50 percent Mexican, 50 percent Scottish, and 100 percent misunderstood. Hers and the next speech went by in a blur. I hardly remembered who spoke or what they said, I was starting to get so nervous about my upcoming moment in the spotlight. By now, the crowd was excited and loud, and we’d attracted even more students who’d wandered in, wondering what the fuss was about. The picnic tables had people standing on them in order to see better, and I saw Mr. Malone shake his head sharply at a guy who made as if to climb a tree. I twisted my hands behind my back to keep them from trembling.

The speaker right before me was Shay Saintmarie—the one cheerleader who seemed to be at all interested in what we were about. I was shocked to see her there. I figured that by now, Kaelyn would have talked her out of whatever interest she’d once had in the Rebellion, or threatened to have the Bimbocracy blackball her or something. When Shay got up from her picnic bench to go up to the front, I saw Kaelyn and Roger Yee slouched in the back of the quad, glaring. Why they’d even bothered to show up was anybody’s guess.

“Hi, guys!” Shay was wearing her cheerleading uniform and her boyfriend Darnell’s varsity track jacket. There were wolf whistles from some of the guys in the crowd and she did a little twirl, showing off the fake lacy panties under her cheer skirt.

“God, this is
not
a strip-tease,” I muttered to nobody in particular. “Somebody save her from herself.”

“I just wanted to say that my sisters on the pep squad are
so great
because we’re all shapes, colors, and sizes!
Woo
!”

Miranda rolled her eyes. A few people snickered.

“In some places, like on this one episode of
Orange Coast
, you wouldn’t even be able to get on the squad if you weren’t white and blond. And some people don’t think it’s right if you marry someone who isn’t the same color or race,” she told the crowd. “When we lived in Arkansas, some kids threw mud at me because they said that’s what color I was, mud, and that’s what happens when you mixed dirt and water.”

My jaw dropped. So did Miranda’s. The crowd was silent now, staring. Even the cranky janitor looked outraged.

“Well, my name is not
mud
,” she continued. “It’s
Shay
. And I have just as much right to exist and be proud as anybody else. Thank you.” She did a little curtsy, flashing her lacy panties at everyone standing behind her—including the webcam—and flounced to the back of the crowd. It looked like Kaelyn and Roger were already gone. Still reeling from that bizarre experience, I tried to gather my thoughts, but there was no time. Maria was already back in front of the group announcing … me.

“Asha has been special to us from the beginning, as many of you know, and she has something shocking to share with you. Please give her your attention and respect.” Maria flung one arm out and I got up on cue, walking to the tree.

I looked at the crowd but I couldn’t single out any faces. It was all a blur now. I could tell that people had taken out their cell phones, ready to take pictures or film clips, so there went my last shreds of hope for anonymity. Still, I knew that Miranda and Carey were behind me, and that was all that mattered.

My nerves had kicked into high gear, and all I could focus on was what I was about to do. I took out my index cards, patting my pocket to make sure the other item I’d brought was still in place. I took a deep breath. The air smelled like scorched hamburgers from the cafeteria, which didn’t help my nausea any.

“Okay, people,” I said, glancing at my notes. “I know you’ve been standing here for a long time, listening to people talking, so I’ll make this short.” As I expected, that earned a small chorus of shouts.

“My name is Asha Jamison. Some of you might remember me all the way from sixth grade, when I was the spelling bee champion. Some of you might even remember when I was on the soccer team. You might think of me as an athlete, a nerd, a ‘shrimpy Asian’ ”—I briefly looked up and gave Lou Pratt a significant glance, and his football buddies laughed and thumped him on the back—“or, if you’re more open-minded, something in between. Reality is always more complicated than black and white, right?

“Like many of you, I have my ups and downs when it comes to grades, and I’ve always been lucky to have more ups than downs. I’m still hoping to be able to speak in front of you at graduation, right next to my best friend and future valedictorian, Carey Wong.” I waved at Carey, who tried to hide behind her tree. Some best friend. David Castro, in the front row, whistled.

“Despite all of that, the college application process threw me a curve ball. I thought I did everything right. But some schools still rejected me. A few of them were incredibly competitive, so that, I understand. But for two schools right here in Northern California, I was placed on the waiting list—schools which supposedly admit their freshman classes based mostly on academic merit and extracurricular activities.” I took a deep breath.

“Well, as it turns out, I heard from a reliable source that if you don’t meet
other
standards for admission—such as overcoming hardships, or even being part of a particular social group or ethnic minority—then you might not be as competitive as other students. If you’re a good candidate but you don’t fit into the college’s categories … then maybe you’re at a disadvantage. Maybe, like me, you just won’t quite get in.” There were gasps, which was the reaction I was hoping for. I felt a momentary surge of adrenaline.

“Now, I want to finish up by saying that maybe ethnicity isn’t the cause here. But I think that because we, as individuals of mixed race, don’t easily fit into check-box categories, I think that we are being overlooked and underestimated. I think we are underestimating
ourselves
.

“Well, I’m not doing it anymore. I won’t be overlooked, and I won’t let anyone underestimate me. Last night I wrote a letter of appeal to my top choice college, where I was wait-listed, telling them how I
deserve
to be a student at their school!”

There was a rousing round of clapping and a few cheers from Miranda and Carey. But I still had one more task, possibly the most nerve-wracking of all. As I concluded my speech, I noticed that somehow, imperceptibly, more teachers had gathered and were “stationed”—if that was the right word … if it was deliberate—at various points around the quad. I wondered if someone had blabbed about our plans. Or if the teachers had been keeping tabs on the Rebellion forum.

“Oh, and one last thing, before our group declaration of solidarity,” I said to the crowd. Here was the part that nobody knew about, the part I had agonized over during the early morning hours when I couldn’t sleep. I reached into my pocket, drew out the folded object inside, and opened it up.

Slowly, deliberately, I put the paper bag over my head. By hiding my face, there was a good chance I’d be
revealing
my identity as Agent Alpha. But things had changed. I’d changed.

I couldn’t see very well now—my peripheral vision was pretty much shot—but I heard a quickly spreading murmur.

“Now, before we gather in front of the webcam so the world can see what a great turnout we had, I would like those of you who agreed to participate in our T-shirt-wearing event to please reveal those T-shirts!”

I knew that Miranda and Maria were coming up behind me, ready to be the ones that the webcam saw up close, though it wasn’t really necessary now that my face was covered. Mouth dry, I unbuttoned my suit jacket and tossed it aside, revealing my Latte Rebellion T-shirt. Dozens of other people had done the same, and I could see a whole rainbow of Latte-related shirts—from Mutts Rule! to Fear the Latte! A few people besides me were even wearing paper bags on their heads. It took me a moment to realize that part of the swirling feeling in my chest was pride.

There was one moment of utter silence. Then sheer pandemonium broke loose.

Suddenly, right in front of me, there was a series of loud cracks and smoke began pouring from another smoke bomb. Multicolored sparks flew into the air as the firecracker next to it detonated. I jumped back, falling on my butt. Miranda and Carey rushed over and crouched next to me, pulling me up and back toward the table, all of us coughing from the noxious stench.

In the shelter of the picnic table, I tore off my paper bag hat and straightened my glasses so I could see what was happening. There were screams and some students started running from the area, and the loitering teachers had snapped to attention. Mr. Malone and Mr. Rosenquist started toward the scene of the melee.

As the nasty, sulfurous smoke cleared, I could see David Castro wrestling with someone whose paper bag had half-fallen off. It was Roger Yee. In retrospect, I shouldn’t have been surprised that he’d been behind the firecracker incidents. At the time, though, all I could do was stand there between Carey and Miranda, trying to make sense of what I was seeing and shaking the ringing out of my ears. An even bigger shock was that David—immature, goofy, always-mellow David—was so angry. I couldn’t quite hear what he was growling at Roger, but it sounded like “you goddamn hypocrites have nothing better to do.”

I heard Roger breathlessly grunt something about us being wannabes who had nothing better to do than steal membership from other people’s legitimate organizations. Incongruously, I wanted to laugh. Was that really his problem?

David didn’t seem to find it funny. He wrestled Roger underneath him and was about to throw a punch, his face red, when Mr. Rosenquist grabbed his arm and yanked him back. Meanwhile, Mr. Malone was practically sitting on top of Roger to keep him from going after David.

“That has to be uncomfortable,” Miranda said under her breath—Mr. Malone was about six feet five and very muscular. I nodded, and coughed again. I really didn’t feel bad for Roger, though. It was David I was worried about, because he’d obviously come to our defense, or at least tried to do the right thing. I was afraid that now he’d be blamed for something he didn’t do, that his actions would be misinterpreted and Roger Yee, Mr. School Aristocracy, would get off scot-free.

By now, a ring of people had gathered around the erstwhile combatants. But before Mr. Malone could make one of his dictatorial pronouncements, there were shouts from across the grassy area. A girl screamed shrilly. Somebody else was fighting, over between the social science and English buildings. It was hard to see because people had rushed over there too, crowding around and gawking. It seemed like there were a couple of fights going on in different parts of the quad. Carey and I stood there in shock, immobilized. Miranda had the presence of mind to grab the computer, and she kept the webcam on, pointing it at the fray. With all the cell phones already out, she wasn’t the only one filming.

After a few minutes, the melee calmed down. The fights were stopped, and a number of people, including David Castro and Roger Yee, had already been hauled to the office. I wasn’t sure where the principal was going to fit them all.

I felt horrible, and not just because I’d been scared half to death by the firecracker going off right in front of me. I felt responsible for all this. What if, by putting on my paper bag and showing my Latte Rebellion shirt, I’d dropped the straw that broke the camel’s back, making Roger and his unknown cronies do their thing?

Holding hands, Carey, Miranda, and I sort of half-crawled behind the picnic table.

“You!” Vice Principal Malone barked. “You three! Stay right there.” He was surveying the aftermath of the whole mess, watching as students huddled together in small groups talking excitedly, or gathered their books together, frantically talking on the phone.

The three of us froze and got up slowly, as if held at gunpoint by a policeman. My heart sank. We weren’t going to get out of this without a trip to the principal’s office. I hoped against hope that they wouldn’t call my parents, but I was pretty sure it was inevitable. Mr. Malone talked to the campus guard, nodded, and then walked over to us.

“We need to talk to you girls in the office.” He waited a fraction of a second while we gathered our bookbags. “Good. Now, come with me.”

As we were escorted away, I was horrified to see actual police—wearing face shields, with batons at their waists—taking up positions throughout the quad.