August was born in the month of August, a 14-year-old boy that's young for his class.
August Righteous is... the name his parents gave him.
Writer’s note
They say that high school freshmen are in a difficult place emotionally, intimidated by the older kids. The seniors are practically adults. If a boy is not prepared for everything he is going to have to face, then he is looking for an out or an angle.
This is the story of high school freshman August Righteous, who will lie, cheat, and steal to get his name on the dance card of a boy he wants to meet. The school dance looms on the December calendar, a date for a fresh set of rules: you have to dance with the person they write on your card. The old-fashioned setup was never supposed to turn out like this, two boys shipped by the dance committee.
Passage at Amazon A Sensible Young Man
The beginning of the story…
MY HIGH school doesn't let boys dance with other boys.
But that's who I want to dance with and the school has got nothing for me. I think they actually wrote it in to what they call their stupid bylaws: boys shall not dance with boys.
They make it sound so biblical, don't they?
I don't know what got into me but I didn't want to play by their rules.
Probably what really happened was that I saw an opportunity. You see, some girls in my 9th-grade class got this idea. After I thought about it, it was a pretty cool idea.
They had seen some dumb movie or something from the olden days. People in the movie had dance cards. I mean, what? You arrived at the ball, then people wrote their name on other people's cards - next to a song.
The girls got the activities coordinator to approve their version of a dance card dance. That's the name they gave it. Dance Card Dance.
Well, I got myself on the student coordinating committee of the Dance Card Dance. Pretty cool, right? I mean you know what I was gonna do.
There's this boy named Lindy.
My plan was to get my name written onto his card. My name is August. It's the month I was born in. Geez, my parents really went all out thinking up a name for me. They check the calendar, "Okay, let's call him August."
Well, both of our names, me and Lindy's, can be for a girl or a boy. I was gambling that the activities coordinator, who is a teacher named Mr. Russell, was not going to know what was going on.
That's the nice thing about the faculty. You can always count on them to be clueless.
Mr. Russell is the head enforcer at our dances. He goes around with a bucket of water that he throws on couples that are too close. When he does he goes, "There's no fun allowed!"
Okay, I made all of that up. But he is my homeroom teacher and he doesn't allow talking in there, a place where he is a shill for the school administration.
"It would behoove you to pay attention to these announcements."
Mr. Russell is not going to like it if I actually get to dance with Lindy. I think he really will have that bucket of water.
The thing is to get the second dance to the last, with an option for the last dance as well. Trust me, these girls on the planning committee have thought of everything. I'm sure the old-time dances never had card rules as defined as these. What's more, the rules are strict. You have to dance with the person assigned to you, no ifs ands or buts about it or any other out you think you may have.
The committee, under the guidance of Mr. Russell, doesn't want the best looking people to turn down a dance with some schlump that is way beneath their dignity. Mr. Russell believes in fairness. What's more, he believes in common decency.
Since it's so close to the end of the evening, I'm just hoping that everyone will let it slide, including Lindy. I want him to be like, "Oh, I looked at this name and..."
Then I will say pretty much the same thing about his name. And then we agree that the whole thing is really wacky and we start dancing together.