Parkland - Dave Cullen Page 0,61

with a piece of paper taped on either side. Each was creased twice, where it had been folded inside a business envelope. The notes were written with a thick Sharpie, in the same hand. The one on the left was addressed to Alfonso, who had shown it off eagerly on his phone earlier in the week:

DEAR ALFONSO—

SAW YOU ON CNN!

PLEASE DO SOMETHING ABOUT YOUR ACNE

—IT’S REPULSIVE!

YOU SHOULD NOT BE ON TELEVISION

Alfonso did have a harsh case of acne. And he was a very attractive young man. Delaney Tarr had no acne problem, and was outright beautiful, so her note was simpler:

DELANY—

SAW YOU ON CNN

SHUT THE FUCK UP YOU STUPID

FUCKING CUNT!

☺

They had been getting mean tweets daily, but this guy had taken the time to stamp and mail these to the school—with his return address. Alfonso said they didn’t post the address, because why be mean? But there was no name on the notes, so it was safe to post. He and Delaney had each photographed and tweeted theirs and then donated them to the wall for the whole team to enjoy.

The prized possession in the office was a gold-colored bust of Robert F. Kennedy. The boys had raved about it during our group interview a few days earlier.

“Robert—such a great guy,” Alfonso said.

“Was he?” I asked. “Cool? I never know.”

“I’m fawning over him in my head.” Alfonso said. The RFK Foundation had about four busts of his head, so they gave the group one, he said.

“Joe Kennedy the Third gave us a statue of Robert Kennedy,” Ryan Deitsch said. “Looks like a macaroni art—”

Alfonso repeated the line to not quite finish his sentence, and they bounced back and forth: “It looked like macaroni art, but we were very—”

“Appreciative.”

“Joe Kennedy escaped a snowstorm to give us the head of his grandfather,” Alfonso continued.

“That’s actually true.”

“He brought it to a Democratic dinner we were also invited to. He had a duffel bag with him. Everyone was just like—”

They all made horror-movie faces, including Daniel, who sat back, gleefully watching the older boys riff. “But it’s amazing,” Ryan said. “He was the keynote speaker and he controlled that room. Kennedy charisma.”

They gushed about Joe for a while, but lamented that he slipped into politician bullshit at one point. “But you know, he gave us some pretty good answers,” Alfonso said.

They were still getting used to the office—to any office, for many of them—and there were lots of functional items. A handwritten key roster, with seven color-coded keys, six of them signed out. A big whiteboard mostly dedicated to instructions on operating the printer. A corkboard with a before you leave list printed in large type:

Please make sure you turn off the air conditioner

Turn off all lights

Lock front and back doors.

Thanks!

Another version, taped to the front door, had a handwritten addition squeezed in:

Make sure trash/recycling go out.

A blue Post-it was stuck to the front door, with an arrow pointing to the latch that read this shocks you every time.

Some bullhorns were stacked up, still in the boxes. Someone had donated them after seeing the kids hop up on cars. Very nice intentions, a little too late, but maybe they would need them again.

3

I circled back to the main room to say goodbye, and meet the redhead—who still seemed to be directing. He introduced himself as Matthew Deitsch.

“Oh, Ryan’s brother?”

“Yes.”

“You’ve even got the same red hair.”

“Nah, his is much more red than mine.”

That didn’t seem possible.

I asked if I could interview him before I left town, and he said, “How about now?” I explained my promise to leave quickly, and he waved that off. He had a brutal schedule and right here would be most efficient. And he could clear me to stay.

We headed toward the writer’s room. The guy who had called the space cramped looked up from his laptop and called after Matt, “Do you have explosion on here?”

“No, but you could download a green-screen explosion pretty fast.”

“Should it be an anime explosion?”

Matt didn’t hear. He was already wheeling a chair into the writer’s room. He motioned me toward it and flopped into a beanbag chair. When I asked if it was OK to record, he leaned forward and yelled toward the main room, “Guys! We’re going to be recording, so just don’t yell any racial slurs!” He watched for my reaction, and only then grinned.

Reporters were still wondering whether the kids could really pull this march off so quickly. I peppered Matt with logistical questions and he shrugged. No idea, why would