Jeremy Iversen - High School Confidential: Secrets of an Undercover Student

Going back to high school in your midtwenties is so incredibly difficult that it isfor all intents and purposesimpossible. Its the kind of thing that only happens in movies and dreams.

But when faced with the incredible faith, trust, generosity, kindness, help, and goodwill of a number of exceptionally wonderful and courageous people, the laws of probability were confounded, and the dream become real, just once.

Right now I want to thank as many of those people as I possibly can.

First and most important, I would very, very much like to thank the administrators of Mirador who allowed me to become a senior again. Although your names must remain unwritten, without you nothing could have happened. You made a brave and difficult choice, and I know that you have paid a price for your courage. May the world always know that you had the noblest and purest of intentions, and that any fault is mine and mine alone. I am forever grateful to you, and I will forever remember you.

My thanks to my real parents and my grandfather for everything.

My thanks to Christopher Schelling and Peter Borland for liking the idea at the beginning and seeing it through to the end.

To Gregory Newman for showing me it was possible, and Sarah Carpenter for helping make it so.

To Heather R. for a charming evening.

To Dulcie Younger and James from the Valley for being my family.

To Cousin Steph for finding me a home, and Laura for providing it, dinner, and a trip to the post office.

To Andie Lewis, Michele Avignon, and Emily Rawlings, for trying their darnedest.

To Patrick and Jed, for getting the whole thing started.

I also want to thank M.M., G.P., L.P., B.M., the two R.A.s, S.R., S.J., L.M., and J.N. for speaking to the powers that be, Ashley Read for the infamous letter, and Jason Powers for making some phone calls. I gratefully acknowledge MC Lars, and Chris Jay and the Army, for letting me include their words. I appreciate the tireless work of Felice Javit to keep everyone safe and I honor all the wonderful Atrians who place their monumental effort into these pages. Thanks as well to Julie B., Corrie V., Mike T., Haille L., Pamela C., Peter G., Paul S., Ed K., Kyo Y., Maggie R., Josefa Menndez, and God, because in the end, the whole thing was a total miracle. The fact it actually happened still leaves me blinking.

See you all after last bell.

Jeremy Watt Iversen
Los Angeles, California

High School Confidential is a true story, within limits.

The world is round, and cartographers make sacrifices to draw it on a flat page. The majestic lands of the Earth have qualities like size, shape, and spacing, but when you project a map, some of those sublime traits are going straight into the circular file.

Take your standard Mercator design. Everything has the right spacing and shape, but humble little Greenland looms over the globe like the new breakout geopolitical superpower. Size took a hit. You can only pick a few elements to preserve at the expense of the others.

The world I drew contained hundreds of real people who did and said many things over a span of many months. Most had not turned eighteen. Not only did I want to protect their privacy, but everything had to fit within these pages.

So, as explorers have done ever since ships passed from sight of shores, I chose guide stars.

Almost every word was spoken exactly as you see it. The events youre about to witness actually happened.

I made my compromises with characters and chronology, blurring identifying details and collapsing dispersed events and personalities into composite scenes and people. No specific individual is recognizable inor should be held responsible forthe thoughts, words, and actions on the following pages. So what a French teacher says or does may well channel an English faculty member, a college counselor, or both plus the vice-principal.

And imagine you see a flashback that happens a month before I am present. You know the events occurred and that the dialogue is copied verbatim. So its safe to assume I combined words I actually heard people say, together with their quotes from sources like the school newspaper and their online journals, and put them in the mouths of composite characters in composite scenes.

Now that you know all the details, you can safely forget the mechanics of the engine room and prepare to explore.

Like Gerardus Mercator, I drew a map, to the best of my ability.

You can use it reliably to discover another world.

I had a dream, which was not all a dream.

Lord Byron, Darkness

This night, a silvery, swollen moon floated in a heaven of diamond stars. Beneath the graceful silhouettes of tall palms, water bubbled slowly into a Moorish reflecting pool of rough stone, rocking a bed of fragrant lilies.

A steady beat resonated from the adobe arches and crumbling walls that surrounded a wide square of tables and dripping sprays of red bougainvillea. This court formed the heart of an ancient mission where Father Junpero Serra, driven unstoppably onward by a vision only he understood, had elevated the host and established the future County of Orange. Tomorrow the bells would toll over the chapel as they had for centuries. But here lay no space for yesterday or the morning. Here only the moment unfolded.

This night, my date turned to gaze lovingly into my eyes. Her long blond hair blew in the soft, warm air, danced above her sparkling white gown. I in my tuxedo put an arm around her shoulder as we advanced slowly along the flagstone pathways.

A hundred people stood scattered across the grass, talking and laughing in couples or groups, resplendent in their evening wear. As we passed through them, my date put her hand on mine.

Nice! I said, smiling tenderly. I love it. Nice touch.

See? she said. Were such a happy couple.

We shared another vulnerable grin.

Jeremy! Alexis Newton wore a tight pink Dior dress with her hair pulled back into two pigtails. She sipped Diet Coke from a plastic cup through a straw and waved. Her friend Padma hovered nearby, giggling.