Page 19 of The Tartan Thesis

Professor Drummond is already there and smiling, welcoming everyone as we take our seats. He claps his hands and rubs them together. “Now, I believe everyone has their exam papers back, aye?”

He waits, presumably to see some nods, before saying, “Let’s recap some of the finer points of how you did on the midterm.”

He launches into a quick, pointed lecture about the topics covered, highlighting common weaknesses and offering suggestions for improving our analytical writing. I take notes, despite having a perfect score. Across the room, Beau seems zoned out. He’s usually so focused. It’s odd to see his lack of attention.

After answering a few questions, Professor Drummond writes our discussion topic on the board. “Let’s begin with Mr. Fleming’s paper.” Instead of opening the discussion up to the floor as he usually does, his gaze sweeps the room before settling on Beau.

“Mr. Fontenot, what are your thoughts?”

Beau’s head jerks up, and Maeve stiffens beside him, her hand shifting toward his knee.

“Me, Professor?” Beau asks. The tremor in his voice has me squirming in my seat.

“Yes, Mr. Fontenot, I’d like to hear your thoughts on Mr. Fleming’s paper.” The professor stares expectantly.

“Oh, um—” Beau shuffles the pages in front of him. The hesitation stretches. Beau flips another page.

I need to rescue him.

“Professor, if I may—” but he cuts me off with a raised hand.

“I believe I asked Mr. Fontenot,” he says, barely sparing me a glance.

Heat creeps up the back of my neck. “Of course, Professor.”

Beau finds the page he’s looking for. “Well,” he begins, voice tight, “Fleming almost certainly overstates the Kirk of Scotland’s authority over clan chiefs, especially in the early years of the Reformation. His suppositions are mostly made from church records and Kirk Session minutes, so his paper leans toward the positive impacts of the Reformation on Scotland and is biased in his historicity, claiming that the Kirk did more than can reasonably be supported when viewed with a wider lens.”

Professor Drummond nods. “Go on.”

“According to scholars such as Dawson and MacGregor, loyalties persisted well into the seventeenth century, especially in the Highlands,” Beau continues. “The Kirk introduced new structures across the country, but those didn’t immediately replace existing power networks, and were usually only successful if a clan chief gave his permission.”

“And what does that suggest about the relationship between religious reform and political authority?”

Beau glances down at his notes again, picking a page up with trembling fingers before slapping it back down on his desk. “That the Kirk’s distribution of power was uneven at best, coming on slower in the Highlands and only gaining more control as the clan structure began to weaken for other reasons that had nothing to do with the Reformation.”

Drummond seems to consider this. “Interesting.”

Releasing the edges of my chair that I’d gripped in secondhand embarrassment, I clear my throat; Beau’s head snaps up, his bright blue eyes ablaze with something I’ve never seen on his sculpted visage before: anger.

I lose my train of thought, but Beau wades into the silence. “Go ahead, Torin. Tell me what was wrong with that statement. It’s always something. Let’s get it over with.” There’s a tremor in his voice, his face is turning red, and Maeve’s arm flexes as she grips his leg.

“I… No, I was just going to say—”

“You were just going to say I don’t know what I’m talking about? Like you do every day, in every class?”

“Mr. Fontenot,” Professor Drummond says calmly.

Beau doesn’t seem to hear him. “If you could go one day without nitpicking every word that comes out of my mouth, could it be today?”

I’m trying to figure out how to defuse things, say something soothing or apologetic, but for some reason I diagnose the situation out loud. “Is this because of your grade?”

“Mr. Ramsay!” the professor says, less calm now, as my classmates gasp.

The color drains from Beau’s face, and Maeve puts her arm around his back. She’s shooting daggers at me, and everyone else just looks plain shocked. My stomach drops at an alarming rate, my mouth going dry.

“Shite, that’s not what I meant—I mean, I didn’t mean to—” My thoughts are racing at breakneck speed, and my mouth has no clue which ones to use.

The color comes back to his face quickly. “What? You didn’t mean to tell everyone I almost failed the midterm?” Fuck, he’s shouting now.