Freshman Just Wanted Dinner — Until Three Bullies Made a Mistake That Cost Them Everything
Chapter 22
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"Any institutional action that disproportionately targets, penalizes, or seeks to remove scholarship recipients identified under this agreement without full independent adjudication shall constitute a breach of this gift agreement. In the event of such breach, the donor or the donor's designated heir retains the right to seek legal remedy, including but not limited to recovery of the unspent principal of the fund."Claire read paragraph seven twice. She set the document down. She looked at Dot."She designated an heir," Claire said."Read the last page," Dot said.Claire turned to the last page of the gift agreement. There was a codicil—a small addition handwritten in Eleanor's own script, dated March 14, 1989, the same date as the letter on the wall. The codicil read:"In the event of my death, all rights and interests under this agreement shall transfer to my granddaughter, Claire Elizabeth Matthews, born this day."Claire's name—her own name, in her grandmother's handwriting, written the day she was born. Eleanor had put her name in this document before she could hold her own head up; before she had taken her first step or said her first word or had any idea what the world was going to ask of her. She had named her. She had said,"Whatever happens to me, she has the right to protect what I built."Claire's hand was flat on the table. She did not trust herself to speak for a moment.Dot sat down across from her. She had never sat down at a customer's table before—not in thirty-five years. It simply wasn't something she did. But she sat down now.Neither of them said anything for a while. The diner hummed. A few tables had customers; the cashier was making quiet sounds in the back; the jukebox stood dark in the corner."She thought of everything," Claire said finally."Eleanor always did," Dot said."She thought of this," Claire said. "She thought of exactly this: a complaint, a pattern, someone trying to use the scholarship as leverage.""She had been turned away once," Dot said simply. "She knew how systems worked. She knew that a door you build can be closed by someone else if you don't build a lock into it."Claire looked at paragraph seven again:Disproportionately targets, penalizes, or seeks to remove scholarship recipients.Three students in eighteen months, all scholarship students. All gone."Can I take these?" Claire said."They're yours," Dot said. "They've always been yours. I was just holding them until you got here."Claire carefully slid both documents back into the manila envelope. She set it in her backpack. She picked up her coffee and drank what was left of it; it had gone cold while she was reading. She did not care. She sat for another minute."Dot," she said."Yes?""The camera system in here, the security cameras..."Dot looked at her steadily. "What about them?""How far back does the footage go?""Two weeks," Dot said. "It overrides automatically unless you save the file manually."