“It was a joke, Helen—Principal Harris,” he corrected himself too late, his voice cracking slightly. “Heroes’ Week brings out every exaggerated story under the sun. Kids invent things for attention all the time. I didn’t know—how was I supposed to know she actually flew those sorties?”
“You didn’t ask,” Mom’s voice cut through the room as she pushed the door open, stepping inside with Admiral Carter right behind her.
The office suddenly felt impossibly small.
Admiral Carter did not sit. He towered over Mr. Reynolds, his uniform medals catching the afternoon light from the window.
“You didn’t ask because it was easier to mock a child than to risk being wrong,” the admiral said, his voice flat and cold. “Colonel Miller didn’t just fly an F-22, Mr. Reynolds. She led the suppression of enemy air defenses that cleared the corridor for every transport plane evacuating our personnel from that sector. Forty-three families have their parents home today because of her. Your student wasn’t exaggerating. He was understating it.”
