Naked in School
Freedom to be Free
Chapter 15 - Farewells
All during that week, students were being summoned to the little conference room next to the office to be interviewed by the Program officials. The two teens heard from some of the kids who had been interviewed on the first few days, and indeed, they had been asked to justify their religious exemptions. The students had followed Slater’s advice and told the officials basically nothing. Many had responded to the questioners with one biblical verse after another until the questions stopped, while others had simply stone-walled the officials and said nothing at all. At the week’s end, both Drew and Connor learned that, indeed, they had been selected for the Program.
On Friday morning, their home-room teacher handed both of them official notice letters that their interviews were scheduled for Monday morning and they could have their guardians present—that’s how they first learned that they had been a potential Program participant. They found out that their names had been posted on the office bulletin board on two different weeks in January, but since nobody ever looked at those lists, the two of them weren’t aware that they had been selected. Since they had previously filed their written claim for a religious exemption, their participation was waived when they didn’t appear in response to their names being posted. That was a strange way of handling the Program participant selections, but it’s how the process had developed.
After discussing the pending interviews with Frantz, they decided to act as each other’s “guardian” and Frantz gave them a short letter to formalize his “appointment.”
Drew was summoned for her interview first, at the beginning of the second period, and Connor went along with her. There were two people waiting in the room, a man and a woman.
“Who are you?” the woman asked as Connor entered. “This interview is to be with Drew Harper.”
“Our guardian designated me as his representative for Drew,” Connor said, giving the woman his letter.
“You can’t be her...” the man began but Connor interrupted, holding his hand up.
“Stop. You can’t dictate who a student has for representation. And what you’re doing is essentially illegal, asking us to justify our religious beliefs; it’s a violation of the federal injunction. We’re here, so start your interview. Oh, to save time, you can ask us both, because you scheduled me for this morning too.”
After a bit of grumbling and paper shuffling, the man began.
“You... well, both of you... were chosen to take part in the Naked in School Program here but you both claimed a religious exemption. What church do you belong to and what’s the basis of your claim for modesty?”
Drew looked at Connor and he nodded.
“Those questions violate my right to practice religion free of governmental interference,” Drew answered. “Next question?”
The woman asked, “Why do you believe that your religion gives you the right to ignore the law?”
Connor spoke up. “I’ll answer for the both of us. Refer to the Supreme Court’s decision on the Yoder case and the federal appeals decision in the Stony Brook Mennonite Church case. That’s all I’ll say on that question.”
“I agree,” Drew said. “Do you have anything else for us?”
“All of the students here refuse to answer these questions—and now you are too. You are required to answer them...” the woman began but Drew cut her off.
“Required by who? If you claim that you, as a rep of an agency of the U.S. government, are requiring answers, then we will cite the Fifth Amendment to the U.S. Constitution as our basis for refusals. That’s all, we’re done. Any further answer is ‘no comment.’”
“But you...”
The objection was cut off as Drew closed the door when they left the room.
“I wonder what they intend by this fishing expedition?” Drew mused.
“Only thing I can think of is intimidation,” Connor responded. “Hey, why didn’t I think to contact Wayne about this? Let me send him a text and a copy of the notice to appear for the Program interview.”
He did, and when school ended in the afternoon, Connor got the reply. He showed the text to Drew.
You’re correct; what they’re doing is a violation of the federal court injunction. I had my governmental affairs specialist contact the federal district court. The lead judge in this case was highly annoyed, so the court is invoking the federal Rule of Civil Procedure 4.1(a); those interview activities actually constitute criminal contempt, and your Program interviewers can expect a visit from a deputy U.S. marshal tomorrow or Wednesday. He or she’ll have a summons and a cease and desist order. Let me know if something else happens.
“Super!” Drew exulted. “Too bad you didn’t think of that sooner.”
“So where were you, darling? You’re the one who’s got the brains here.”
At lunch Tuesday, the room was buzzing with excited conversation. An earlier interview session with one of the kids had been interrupted when two federal marshals entered the room, served the summonses, and escorted the two Program officials out of the school. He was telling everyone all about it, in detail. One could forgive him if some of the details were slightly embellished.
Drew and Connor looked at each other and smiled, then exchanged a high-five salute. Jennifer and their other table mates looked at them with puzzled expressions and Drew leaned over to Jennifer.
“Tell you later. It’s kinda secret,” she whispered.
Drew told her later in private what they had done.
“But you can’t tell anyone. We don’t want any notoriety, okay? Besides, after what you told us happened to Emma, we don’t want kidnappers hunting for us.”
“Oops, that’s for sure,” Jennifer nodded. “Say, do a couple more of those things against Program officials and you’d catch up to Emma’s record,” she giggled.
“Ah, no thanks. The fewer contacts with those morons, the better. She can be the reigning champ. I give my definite permission.”
They both laughed.
As the end of the school year approached, Drew, Connor, and Jennifer were spending a lot of their free time with their friends and Drew with her teammates. About half of their closest friends were seniors and were graduating. Many were going to Penn State; a few had chosen the nearby Elizabethtown College, and others would be attending several of the other local colleges. Some had chosen schools in Philadelphia or Pittsburgh. The twins, Jason and Justin, had chosen Drexel; it was their father’s alma mater, they wanted to study business, and they liked Drexel’s program. They all promised to try to keep in touch with each other.
When the movers got the Ritters’ house packed up and her mother and brother left for Maryland, Jennifer moved into Drew’s and Connor’s apartment for the two-and-a-half weeks remaining in the school term. Frantz had left the family’s SUV for their use and Connor had his bike crated and shipped to Maryland using a motorcycle moving service.
All the farewells were over. Drew and Connor made their rounds, visiting Pastor Richardson and his wife, Connor’s supervisor and co-workers at the chocolate plant, Drew’s boss at the ice-cream shop, Drew’s coach, and finally, their attorney, Wayne Gelb.
“Wayne, your advice and mentoring has been wonderful; you basically saved us from all kinds of bad things that can happen to runaways,” Drew told him. “I’m sure we’ll need legal help with switching our guardianship to Maryland—should we continue to use you for anything related to that?”
“Actually, Frantz has already begun that process and has the judge’s permission to move. He needs to get a Maryland lawyer to start the guardianship process there. I told him that I’d be glad to consult with an attorney that he selects locally, Drew. Perhaps you could check with Frantz and see who he plans to use; he might have gotten recommendations from the attorney he used for his house purchase. But you wouldn’t want to use a real-estate lawyer; you’d need one specializing in family law.”
Connor spoke up then. “Say, Drew, isn’t Wilma’s father a lawyer?”
“Oh, right, he is. Wayne, one of the good friends of the Ritters in Maryland is a lawyer. We could ask him.”
“That’s excellent. Do you know if he’s in a firm or in solo practice?”
“Um, Wilma said he’s a partner in a law firm.”
“Ah. Give me his name and I’ll look him up. With everything being on line, my professional life’s much simpler.”
“Jay Robbins? His firm’s in Baltimore.”
Gelb worked his keyboard for two minutes.
“Okay, I found him. Tyler, Scott, and Robbins. Full service firm, but they specialize in corporate law. He’s the managing partner. Sure, ask him. Here’s my card to give him; if he takes over your guardianship legal work, I’ll be happy to share what we’ve done.”
It was an emotional farewell when they departed.
Saying farewell to the Robertsons and to Mrs Neumann was the hardest of all for Drew and Connor. In many ways, they had become surrogate parents for the teens and had done so much to help them. They were the last good-byes for the teens before they drove off toward a new life in Maryland.
“We’ll be right back in the thick of the action in the fall,” Jennifer predicted as Connor drove south on I-83. “Dealing with that damn Program.”
“You could play your religion card—the exemption—you know, and avoid all that garbage,” Drew told her.
“Sure, I could, but it seems so... like cap to do that. I know that just about everyone at Etown High used that exemption, but after moving away from that Bible-quoting area, I think it would feel kinda wimpy to take that way out. And you know that the nudity part isn’t that scary for me—it was the sex shit they heaped on top. Damn, that’s just the right image... pile of shit. So if Wilma and Sherrill get that plan you came up with to work, I’ll be right in there with them making it work.”
Drew chuckled, “Jennifer Ritter, the making of the legend. You go, girl. I’ll be on the sidelines rooting for you all. Say, anyone think of getting input from Emma on the plan to take over the Program? She’s almost a legendary figure herself. Maybe she’d like to hear how Andrew’s idea’s being used.”
“No clue; we’ve been busy with our exams and saying goodbye, so I haven’t been in touch. Maybe I can see if Wilma can talk.”
Jennifer sent a text to Wilma and about five minutes later, her phone rang. She connected the speaker to the car’s audio.
“So hi, Wilma, we’re on the way!”
“Hurray!” Wilma cheered. “How soon will you get here?”
“Connor says with the expected traffic, not quite ninety minutes. It’s been sooo busy with final exams, packing, saying goodbye to everyone, that I haven’t had any time to think about you guys and the planning.”
“Hi, Wilma!” both Connor and Drew called.
“Yeah, hi guys! Can’t wait... this’ll be so, so dope to have you here. Yeah, we have lots of kids interested in the Project... that’s what we’re calling it... but maybe only two dozen who’ll definitely get nude so far. We’ll need hundreds to make it work, though. Lots more kids say they might do it.”
“Drew was wondering if Emma knows what you’re doing, since this, um, project, is based on what Andrew said at the resort.”
“Um, no, we didn’t talk to her about that; maybe Sam did. Me and Sherrill were in touch with Sam about what she’s been doing to resist the Program at her school... she lives in Langley Park and that’s at least a half hour away, or more when traffic’s bad. Ha, traffic’s always bad, heading into D.C.”
“I kept in touch with Sam too, Wilma, and told her what you two were trying to do. I’m sure she told Emma about it, so maybe Emma can suggest an idea about how to get kids to go bare for the cause? We need at least a third of the kids in every classroom to be naked—maybe even half—to take control. You think?” Jennifer asked.
“We didn’t get into the numbers yet. Sherrill and I are still in recruiting mode. About ten to fifteen others are so energized by the idea that they’re recruiting too. And, yeah, there’s the whole incoming freshman class we couldn’t talk to, of course; they’re coming from the two middle schools near us. A number of high school kids here have siblings in those middle schools, so we’ve been tapping those contacts. Emma? Maybe. I’ll see what Sherrill thinks. Oh, that’s right. I think that Andrew mentioned that his family goes to the resort on weekends starting late June. But we probably should contact her before that.”
They chatted for several more minutes and then Wilma disconnected to call Sherrill. And just as they arrived in the Baltimore area, Wilma called back.
“Hey, we spoke to Emma and she loves what we plan doing. Actually it’s her... ha, adopted sister Sam, who says the idea’s bussin’. She has some recruiting ideas too, and wants to meet us.”
“When can she meet?” Jennifer asked.
“Weekends. She’s working at a lab in Laurel, a physics lab. Part of Johns Hopkins. She’s actually a professor there now.”
“No cap? Wow. She’s how old? Fifteen now?” Jennifer exclaimed.
“Um, yeah. Remember, she got a Nobel Prize.”
“Oh, that’s right. You did tell us that. You know, we should get right on this ‘cause fall will come real fast if we’re not ready.”
“I hear ya, girl. I’ll see if we can set something up for next weekend. Talk soon; ’bye.”
They disconnected and Jennifer asked Drew, “When does your camp start?”
“Monday. Coach sent directions to the club where the camp’s held. It’s about three miles from our new home. It runs from 9 a.m. to 7 p.m. Monday through Thursday.”
When they pulled into the driveway to their new home, Frantz, Eva, and Timmy came out to greet them.
“Hi, kids,” Frantz said as Eva hugged them all. “Let’s give you a hand unloading the back.”
“How’s the new position doing?” Connor asked. “Is it what you expected?”
“It’s far better than I had hoped for, Connor. The people and facilities are simply outstanding. How was your trip?”
“Very smooth, until we got near Baltimore. Reminded me of the traffic back near Boston, but at least the drivers here are courteous. In Boston, the roads are like a war zone; aggression everywhere.”
Frantz chuckled. “I’ve heard that said before.”
Connor’s and Drew’s new home was a small apartment somewhat separate from the rest of the house. It shared just a single wall with the main house and had two levels. There were two bedrooms and a full bath on the upper floor and a kitchen, half-bath, great room, and utility room on the ground floor, a total of almost 1000 square feet. The apartment in Mrs Neumann’s home was slightly larger, but this layout was much better for them. Since their former apartment was furnished and that furniture had to remain there, the Ritters had equipped the new apartment with the furniture from their basement apartment. Connor told the Ritters that he planned to furnish the second bedroom with second-hand items; he refused letting the family pay for any of it. Meanwhile, he and Drew would share a bedroom. They were getting used to sharing a bed.
That evening the three teens visited Sherrill’s house; her house was only a half-mile away and not far from Wilma’s.
“Hi, Sherrill,” Drew greeted her and then Jennifer and Connor did. “We’re kinda moved in but we took a break to come see you and where you lived.”
“Yeah, I saw your new house; it’s dope. Love the private apartment there. Hey, here’s the tea from a bunch of kids in the Project. There are about fifty upperclassmen now who are willing to go naked and several dozen middle-school kids, their sibs mostly, who’ll do it too. And there are over a hundred who’re sitting on the fence. If we can get them to hop off, that will swing a whole bunch more ‘cause we’ll have the momentum then. That’s what Emma and Sam will talk about when we get together. There are more than twenty kids in the Project group who want to meet her.”
“Jeez. Where can we all meet? That’s a huge group,” Jennifer exclaimed.
Sherrill giggled. “Yeah. That’s the surprise. Emma really set up this totally rad arrangement. She’s reserved a clubhouse and we sent out invitations by text to a whole bunch of kids. About eighty said yes, they’ll come. And here’s the invite.”
She grabbed her phone and showed the others the text.
Hey, GBH squaddie! You’re going to be STRIPPED NAKED in school very soon, you know. It’s coming to town this fall. Want to be prepared and not be scared? Find out how next weekend, Saturday, June 17 at 10 a.m. Come to Pine View Lodge and learn about the Project to Survive the Program. Heads up! Pine View is a nudist resort but you don’t have to be naked there, except in the pool. But you do need an ID and if you’re under 18, a signed parental note. The note should state that you have permission to go to the Pine View Lodge and the responsible adult is LtCol Stuart Marshall, Royal Marines, chief military attache, British Embassy. You will get to enjoy the resort’s facilities FREE. If your parents want to come too, they’re invited, and their reduced daily fee will be only $10 for two adults. See the link below for the resort’s website. It contains all the details you’ll need plus directions to get there. Learn how we’ll BEAT the Program! But doing that needs YOU!
“Goddamn—did Emma arrange all that?” Connor asked in disbelief.
“She’s subsidizing the kids’ and their parents’ fees, actually,” Sherrill told him. “She convinced the owners that doing this could bring in a large number of new visitors, plus be great PR for social nudism too. Her family will be there and Stuart is Andrew’s dad.”
Drew had a thoughtful look and Sherrill noticed it.
“Hey, Jen did tell us that you’re not a fan of nudism, but it’s really important for you to come, ‘cause you suggested the idea that became the Project and you’ve got all those first-person stories. And the resort’s clothing-optional.”
“Sure. But there’ll be lots of naked people too, and ... well, I gotta have a sit-down discussion with my personal religious beliefs. Ha, it’ll be a real ‘come-to-Jesus discussion with myself.”
“You’re really funny, Drew. Oh, almost forgot, so listen to this. Virtually the whole girls’ soccer team has signed on to the Project! And they’ll be there too. Half of the boys’ team is with us too, so far. The resort’s sports field has soccer markings and nets, and when the girls found that out, they said that they want to play. They won’t play nude, though, since they said that the jersey and shorts give some protection. Besides, if everyone’s nude, you can’t tell who’s the opponent.”
“That’s true, the clothes do help from getting all scraped up. Shit. Now I’m really conflicted. I’ll think about it. Okay?”
“Sure. Hope you will, though. Hey, did you guys get registered at the high school yet?”
“Yep; Mom took care of doing that for me, Drew, and Connor,” Jennifer told her. “Etown High had sent a copy of our records to the school here, so she checked them over, had a copy of each page made, and had the office date-stamp each page. Their lawyer said for her to do that; it makes certain that the school can’t say like they never got the record if, for example, we don’t get credit for a class we took in PA. They told Mom that our counselor will be setting up our senior schedules in a few weeks. Then we’ll get a welcome packet with the schedules.”
“Cool. I just can’t believe that you moved here, girl. We’re gonna have a blast at school next year.”
The conversation turned to other topics of interest to high-school kids and soon it was time to leave. On the way home, Jennifer asked if she could do anything to help Drew make up her mind about her going to the nudist resort with them.
“I don’t know, Jen; no cap, people there do wear clothes sometimes?”
“Oh, sure they do. Some adults will wear something occasionally; many women wear cover-ups some of the time, except in the pool, of course. Some teens do, especially girls going into puberty; they get embarrassed at their new boobs. Um, oh, one time, I think it was the season before... no, two seasons ago. Yeah, when I was fifteen. I mention this ‘cause she was about our age, maybe sixteen. Her parents won a cruise on a fund-raising raffle so she and her brother had to stay with her aunt and uncle for ten days.
“I noticed her walking around the grounds only because she was always dressed and always alone and looked really sad. So I introduced myself and Sherrill and Wilma to her and we got to talking. Her aunt and uncle were nudists, and they weren’t gonna skip their vacation time there just because of her. So she had to go to the resort with them and she totally hated the idea. Her brother was ten, so he was just fine, she told us. He found kids his age and was having fun.
“The three of us tried to make her comfortable but she had a very hard time even looking at us—if she did, she’d blush and look away. We got her to wear a bathing suit when she went around the resort instead of clothes, and we did coax her into the pool a few times...”
“How? If she wouldn’t get naked?” Connor asked.
“Right, so she took the suit off and did her shower in private, then she wrapped a towel around herself and sat down at the side of the pool, on the edge. And then she would slip out of the towel into the water.”
“And this is supposed to help me?” Drew asked. “Talking about a girl with the same mind-set as mine?”
“Coming to it. After a week of her doing that maybe four or five times, she told me and the cousins that she had noticed that she was getting stares whenever she got in the pool that way and she felt that it was attracting attention. She asked us to help her and told us what she wanted. She would take her towel off at her lounge chair and walk to the pool and hop in and we would kinda surround her so she wouldn’t be walking alone. That’s just what we plan to do in the Project, in fact.
“So we agreed, she did it, and for her next couple of days there, she was a little better with the nudity. She didn’t go fully naked away from the pool area, though; she wore a cover-up and that was no different from all the other women who did. See, she noticed that when you’re nude, you become essentially invisible. So my message is that sure, you can wear clothes or a swimsuit, but people will notice you. No one will ask about it or try to embarrass you, though. If you do get embarrassed, it would be ‘cause you’d be the one standing out.”
“Huh, that’s a story with a mixed message if I ever heard one. Look, I’m a performer of sorts. As an athlete, I want people to notice me. So if folks stare at me ‘cause I’m dressed, so be it. I’ve got this big concern, though. See how the cousins reacted to me—and Connor—when we first met?”
Jennifer laughed, “You mean Conan and Xena? Sure.”
“Okay, it’s not only them. In the girls’ locker room, did you ever notice where all the other girls would look when I was naked in there, like in the shower?”
Jennifer’s eyes widened. “Shit. You’re right. Everyone watches you. You’ve got that killer body; you’re tall, ripped but sleek—you don’t have that ugly muscular-female look. Actually you could be a fashion model with your figure now. Is that what you mean?”
“That’s straight fire. It’s kind of another reason why I ran away to escape the Program. Back at my first high school, I looked about the same as I do now but without the tits, and I got the same reaction from the gals in the locker room then too. Just think of how boys would react to seeing me walking around the school, totally naked.”
Connor had been quietly listening but interjected his thoughts now. “Sure, Drew has an awesome body; you’ve seen her naked. And you should know that she abhors self-display for what she looks like. She thrives on self-display for her athletic abilities, her soccer. Drew also saw what happens when a smokin’ hot gal goes around a school naked. At our first high school, one of the gals there, a senior and actually a soccer player too, had a body kinda like Drew’s but stacked on top, and she got put in the Program the first week. Fortunately, she was muscular like an Amazon like Drew too and she was able to physically defend herself—and she had to, because she had to threaten a number of hormone-crazed boys who kept pestering her. Drew, honey, Jen should know that what scared you back then was that you kept seeing yourself having to be on constant guard against the abuse you saw that week, if you had to be naked in school. Right?”
“Totally, that was one of the many reasons I felt that I had to escape being put in that horror.”
They had been sitting in the car talking, parked outside the Ritters’ garage and Frantz came out to see if everything was all right.
“Oh, sure, Dad,” Jennifer answered. “We found out at Sherrill’s that the whole high school group from here has been invited out to Pine View next Saturday, and Drew is trying to decide if she can get herself to go.”
“As I am,” Connor said. “I haven’t been as vocal about it as Drew is, though.”
“That’s fine,” Frantz replied. “Say, I think we’ll all go out there then. I heard two weeks ago that our cabin is ready and I’d like to check it out. We’ll go Friday. Drew, Connor, the invitation for you kids is still open, you know.”
“We’ll see, sir,” Connor said and Drew nodded, a thoughtful expression on her face.
At an office in a federal building in Suitland, Maryland, five miles southeast of the Capital in Washington, D.C., a woman was reading files on a computer monitor, when a man stopped at her desk.
“Hey, Beverly, you get to those summary reports yet?”
“Working on them now, boss. Incoming reports from the schools are much lighter, now that school’s out for the summer. But, hey, one item caught my attention because it’s local and unusual too. Let me find that report... okay, here we go. Baltimore area school. A Program coordinator was recently assigned to the school, which will begin the Program in the fall, and he reports that he’s working on setting up the admin and physical details. All routine there. But then he reports that there are several student transfers who will be starting there in the fall, and get this, they all have a declaration of religious exemption in their transferred permanent high-school records.”
“Hmm, okay, they must be coming from that problem area in central Pennsylvania. Listen, please get as many details about that matter as you can and let me know what you find. We need to keep that exemption cancer from spreading.”
“Will do, Bill. I’ll keep you informed.”
By that afternoon, Beverly Gordon had gotten some preliminary information and went to see her supervisor, William Garcy, the director of Operations for the OSA, the Office of Social Awareness.
“I’ve got some info now. The subjects in question were enrolled in a high school in Lancaster County; that school, plus about twenty-five other high schools in the entire region, have religious exemption declarations filed for every single student in attendance at every one of those high school. Our Enforcement branch has determined that this was an anomaly since they are convinced that statistically it’s impossible for 100 percent of a community’s children to be so religiously observant that they’d claim to have a ‘deeply held belief’ in modesty that Bible believers must follow.
“So Enforcement dispatched six teams of investigators to area schools to interview students and within one week, the team which was sent to our subjects’ school was served with a federal court’s arrest warrant for criminal contempt of court and a cease-and-desist order was served against all of the Enforcement investigators. The Enforcement people think that it was odd that two of the subjects, two who had been selected for participation but refused for religious reasons, were attending that same school, so those two teens have become ‘subjects of interest’ now.
“They have now obtained the home addresses of the subjects, but the Enforcement chief doesn’t want to move against them as yet. But they do want to follow their activities and movements to see if the subjects are spreading their exemption ideas in the Baltimore area. Tech services is attempting to use cell phone records and location tracing to determine the places that the subjects visit, but they can’t find any cell-phone subscriptions in the subjects’ names, just others in the family.
“As you are aware, Enforcement has been having a number of serious difficulties with students at a number of high schools in the Baltimore area; all those difficulties were traced to that nudist-park incident last summer which involved the arrest of four enforcers and their conviction for assault and attempted kidnapping. The convictions are currently under appeal.”
“Thanks, Beverly, well done. I take it that Enforcement will continue to pursue this problem?”
“That’s their plan, Bill.”
“Good. I’ll check with them for progress updates. But please include this issue in your monthly activity summary.”
“Will do. See you later.”
She left his office.
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