I WAS THE outstanding student, during my time at Midtown High School. Jason King won all sorts of academic honors, won a science fair prize, aced the SAT and the ACS tests. However, Jason was a social zero. My academic standing and my social standing were not unrelated. I spent almost all of my time in high school studying.
Linda was not an outstanding student, during her time at Midtown High School. Linda barely got enough classroom credits to graduate. She was, however, the princess of Midtown High School. She was the prettiest girl in school. She was a Homecoming Princess and then the Homecoming Queen, her senior year. She was a cheerleader and even a model for a local department store.
As it does, each year, graduation time came to Midtown High School.
Jason had no girlfriend and was not about to spend the kind of money that it takes for a boy to take a girl to the prom.
Then came Linda. She got me in a conversation, about the prom, how neat it was to attend the biggest social event of a high school career, and so on.
Somehow, I wound up asking Linda to the prom. I’m still not sure exactly how that came about. However, I was going to take the prettiest girl in Midtown High School to the prom and, social zero or not, I was going to turn the other guys green with envy. However, once I was committed, the Jason brain kicked into gear. I arranged to rent a limo, along with two other nerd boys. I managed to get the school to pay for the rental of my tux, since I was to be presented with an award at the prom. I did have to buy Linda a corsage, but I managed to cleverly avoid the worst of the economic toll.
I rode in the limo and picked Linda up. Where Linda lived wasn’t exactly a slum. No, the slum dwelling people looked down on the area where Linda lived.
Linda wasn’t at all happy about sharing a limo ride with two other couples. However, she had no choice in the matter. When we did get to the prom, Linda made her grand entrance.
I escorted Linda into the prom and then she pretty much ignored me. Well, when time came for me to accept my award, suddenly Linda was draped all over me. When the last dance came, I danced with Linda. However, for most of the prom, I was forgotten by my date.
I then rode. with Linda, in the limo, back to her parent’s place. I walked her to her door, got a goodnight kiss and I figured that was the end of it.
That summer, I got a real job, mainly because of my science fair project. I then went to a close by junior college, so that I could live at home and stay close to my work. I continued to work part time and I not only got credit for my college classes,
I also got college credit for some of my work efforts.
I didn’t see Linda for the year after my high school graduation. The second year after graduation went pretty much like the first year. By the end of the second year, I had completed a bit more than three years of college credits. I went away for my third year of college and graduated from a four year college.
When I graduated from college, my parents got jobs with a cruise ship line where they would live and work on board a cruise ship. My parents wanted to sell the house that we lived in, but they found out that it was worth just about what was owed, considering the sales fees and such. So, they sold the house to me, for the sum of one US dollar and I take over the monthly mortgage payments.
The company where I had worked during junior college, then hired me at a nice salary. Well, they didn’t exactly hire me. I had developed a device, during college, and I had my own corporation, for business reasons. The company rented my services from my own corporation. (This last was to prove to be very important, later.)
Linda suddenly appeared again, in my life. Linda looked even better than high school Linda, the sex was incredible, and I fell for her. I thought that I wanted to marry Linda.
However, I have a government security clearance, because of the things that I work on. The government didn’t want me to marry Linda. (Linda had been bankrupt twice. Linda had faced prison over some sort of felony crime situation, and she escaped only because she turned state’s evidence. There were a few other negative things in Linda’s recent past.)
The government, Linda and I finally worked out a deal. Linda’s finances and my finances had to be entirely separate. No joint bank account, no joint credit cards, no joint ownership of property.
Linda was very unhappy. However, she could see that she couldn’t convince the government to do it any other way.
