We needed, she said, to remind everyone what real class looked like.

I nodded and let myself be led through the velvet ropes, and the whispers trailed behind us like obedient ghosts. That’s Wolcott.

The real money.

Look at that aura.

That kid is set for life. Once those whispers had been the drug that got me through my days.

Now they sounded like flies over something dead.

The house lights began their slow descent, and the auditorium sank into an expectant twilight.

A single circle of white light found the center of the stage, and the host strode into it to a crash of applause.