Harrison sat with that. Outside his office window, winter sunlight made the courtyard glitter with a hard brightness. "Agreed," he said finally.
The proposal took a month. It was not glamorous. It involved budgets, eligibility criteria, discreet application processes that did not require students to narrate their hardship for applause. When the board approved a pilot version in March, Harrison felt something like the relief of having paid a debt that had been accruing interest in silence.
He did not tell Jack.
Jack learned anyway, because children in institutions learn the weather of adult decisions through rumor and sudden improvements. One afternoon a practice room reservation system updated to include "equity priority windows." A quiet notice about transit assistance appeared on the scholarship portal. Pierce, in the hallway, muttered that the school was becoming soft. Jack said nothing. He used the priority window. He got home before dark more often. Eleanor noticed the difference in his shoulders before he mentioned the policy.
"Someone upstairs remembered that talent needs buses," she said.
Jack thought of Principal Harrison in the charcoal suit and deep green tie, standing in the lobby doorway like a sentinel. "Maybe," he said.
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Spring arrived as a rumor before it arrived as weather.