Daria Gender Flip From Not So Different JTL Version
54. Turning To Account
'You owe me hugely for making me miss the biggest football game of the year', Jane said to Sonny.
'You hate football.'
'Hey! Don't try any of your twisty-turny mind games on me, Morgendorffer.'
Stacy seemed nervous as she followed the two. "Why are we here again?"
They were taking another look at the announcement on the bulletin board before going in to the auditorium for the meeting: the school review meeting which Ms Li had called for Super Bowl Sunday. At that, 'called' was an overstatement: Li's announcement over the public address system, asking students to tell their parents about the meeting, had been barely over the threshold of audibility. Admittedly, her explanation for not distributing a written invitation had some plausibility: the school had been genuinely running short of many things, not just paper.
Defoe had run out of red paint and hadn't been able to afford more. Onepu had grieved bitterly, and at length, about the deprivation for her students represented by the cancellation, for lack of funds, of their excursion to the planetarium. DeMartino had been trying to teach about the war in Chechnya with a map so old that it didn't even show Chechnya. So far the only teacher who seemed happy about the situation was Mr O'Neill's replacement, Mr Taylor. (Kevin's brain had still not fully integrated the understanding that sharing a surname didn't have to mean he was related to Brittany, although the fact that the two stood at opposite extremes of humanoid diversity would have been a clue to any normal intellect.) Unable to afford real printed copies of the play he was teaching, Doctor Faustus, Taylor had instead distributed photocopies produced on the school's one ancient machine, and when several students had complained about their legibility, or lack of same, he had told them that they had all been mollycoddled long enough and that they needn't expect any weak-minded touchy-feely nonsense from him: it was about time they all toughened up and learned to cope with the real world.
Anyway, it might well be true that the principal couldn't afford to send letters to parents about the school review meeting. But that didn't explain why she'd made the announcement just after the bell rang, and in the softest possible voice. It also didn't explain why she had scheduled the meeting for a date which Sonny calculated to be a Sunday, engendering in him a suspicion which was inflamed further when Kevin and Brittany pointed out, what would not have occurred to him unaided, that the nominated date was, specifically, Super Bowl Sunday.
So the principal had something she wanted to spring on an unprepared Lawndale High, and therefore wanted nobody to come to the review meeting where she announced it. Figuring that out was the easy part. The hard part was when Sonny told his mother that she should make a point of going to the meeting and paying extra-close attention, especially if Principal Li started talking very quietly. His parents had to go to his mother's office Super Bowl party. Helen had even gone to the trouble of calling in favours from no less than five of her colleagues to get them to promise to talk with Jake. She suggested that if Sonny was so concerned about the review meeting, he should go himself.
Damn! thought Sonny. I really should have known better than to light the fuse on that petard.
"Ms. Li is hiding some thing. I want to know what."
Stacy fidgeted with her hands as she followed him inside.
Apart from Sonny himself, Stacy, and Jane, there was nobody in the seating area of the auditorium—until ninety seconds after they'd taken their seats, when Mr Taylor materialized like a pantomime demon, as if he'd been on lookout for them, and took a seat behind, above, and just slightly to one side of them (Jane didn't even notice until Sonny clued her in). On the stage there were only Li and a landshark Sonny didn't recognize. After explaining the context of the meeting, which was the acute budgetary crisis of which the entire audience was already only too keenly aware, Li introduced the congealed lump of toxicity she had invited to speak to the meeting as a Mr Leonard Lamm. He submitted for their consideration—in other words, Li had already sold out to him for—a proposal to secure additional discretionary funding for the school in exchange for an exclusive contract with a soda company to distribute and promote its product in the school and at school events and functions. In other words, as Sonny privately translated, there'd be vending machines everywhere and the school would be turned into a series of gigantic advertising billboards. Being the son of a marketing consultant was like a course of vaccinations.
At the completion of Lamm's pitch, Li appeared to have been translated to bliss, but her pep-rally performance for an audience of Sonny Morgendorffer, Stacy Rowe, and Jane Lane was an enigma. Sonny knew Li had met them both before. Maybe she was driven by an anxiety induced by the presence of Taylor, to which Sonny also found himself unpleasantly sensitive. Or maybe she just couldn't think of an alternative, and also couldn't think of an alternative to allocating time for 'public' comment, even if it was only three minutes.
Sonny rose (because otherwise there would have been no point in coming at all) and was not recognized. Li was on the point of wrapping up, so he opened his mouth.
'Excuse me?'
'Um, yes, Mr Morgendorffer?'
'If Lawndale High gets this deal with a soda company, the way it was explained, then any money received under this contract can be spent for the school's benefit, any way the school sees fit?'
Lamm stepped back to the podium to field the question. 'Yes, it's all for the school's benefit, and all you kids have to do is what you'd do anyway, drink soda.'
'So if, purely for the sake of example, the school wanted to use the money to sponsor a new student club, there would be no objection from the soda company?'
Li got an uneasy expression on her face, reassuring Sonny that she did remember him, but before she could interpose, Lamm gave Sonny the affirmative response he'd been hoping to springboard off.
'Then there would be no problem with the soda company's money being used to sponsor a Gay-Straight Alliance at Lawndale High, which currently doesn't have one?' Lamm's expression changed, and he hesitated for a moment, even throwing a glance at Li, who started to move forward to the podium again. Sonny went in for the kill. 'As I understand it, if the school sponsors other student clubs, it could lay itself open to a legal challenge if it refused the same recognition to a Gay-Straight Alliance. I'm sure my mother could confirm that.' He could see Li whispering in Lamm's ear, and knew she was telling him about Helen Morgendorffer as Sonny changed tacks. 'But this proposal is an opportunity, not a problem! Lawndale High could have the first Gay-Straight Alliance in the county. It could lead the State. Let's think about how that could redound to its reputation. And it could all be thanks to the generous sponsorship of whichever soda company enters into the exclusive contract. We could design banners and logos combining the school colors and the company's advertising colors for its soda. The soda would get the credit from being linked with its proud sponsorship of the Gay-Straight Alliance! You could design something like that, couldn't you, Jane?' He inclined his head towards her.
Jane stood up. 'Sure! That could be a great art project for the school and fantastic free advertising for the soda company. And for the Gay-Straight Alliance, of course, at the same time.'
Sonny was surprised when Stacy stood up and spoke. "The school needs to expand its views!"
Sonny gave her a concealed hand signal of approval. What was happening on stage between Lamm and Li, although the actual words were inaudible in the middle of the auditorium, made it needless to continue. Their gestures and their postures were not those of happy people. They seemed to have forgotten their audience once it fell silent. Then they seemed to remember it. They both straightened up and cleared their throats, and then Li stepped back to the podium and grabbed the microphone.
'I'm sure we can all agree that some interesting points have been raised in discussion, but darn it, our time is up. I've got Super Bowl fever! Go, team, go!'
Sonny and Jane stood and watched as Leonard Lamm walked off the stage, with Principal Li following and visibly still trying to talk him round. Then they turned to leave the auditorium, only to start at finding Mr Taylor unexpectedly right in front of them.
Am I getting that careless? Sonny thought.
Taylor turned a careful stare of inspection first on Sonny and then on Stacy and Jane, then retracted slightly and spoke.
'Planning on a career in marketing, perhaps? Devising a brand recognition strategy for Queer Cola?' His jaw tightened and he moved his head very slightly from side to side. Then he turned and walked out of the auditorium, casting one brief look at them over his shoulder without halting on the way.
Jane asked Sonny, 'What was that about?'
'He was saying that he saw what we'd done there to torpedo Li's plan, that he knows that we think we're clever, and that he'll be keeping an eye on us.'
'Huh.' After a pause, Jane said, 'He almost makes me miss O'Neill.'
'You don't miss O'Neill.'
'No, I don't. Anyway, do you think he's right about your torpedoing Li's plan?'
Sonny nodded. 'Yes, the school is not going to be further commercialized this time. It's not a bad result, but I've exhausted that ammunition now. I'll be disappointed if a better occasion to use it comes up later in the year. I can't afford to risk having Li trap me into actually having to start up a Gay-Straight Alliance.'
'You wouldn't want that', concurred Jane.
'A genuine extracurricular activity? An official school-sponsored club?' Sonny shook his head.
Stacy shared a look with him. He wasn't sure what it was. If, when, they spent more time together he might in the future. "Especially since none of us are gay."
"As far as the Fashion Fiends and this school are concerned, I am." The three walk out together.
Some dialogue from 'Fizz Ed' by Glenn Eichler
A/N Rereading original version, and saw several times original flirted with Sonny/Jane/Stacy. When he was working on his writing assignment in episode 26 he started doing a short story involving him and Stacy "Talking, not dating" then threw it away and thought to himself "Where did that come from?" Or all the times Jane gave him "a look" or thought a guy was cute, like the Ruttheimer cousins, who she mentioned had same hair color as him. And the author even stated he didn't originally plan on making Sonny gay. So who knows, maybe I just picked up on all his thoughts for his original idea.
