{"id":133,"date":"2017-04-03T22:14:50","date_gmt":"2017-04-04T04:14:50","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.gordonsavage.com\/sowhat\/?p=133"},"modified":"2017-04-03T22:14:50","modified_gmt":"2017-04-04T04:14:50","slug":"samantha-payback","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.gordonsavage.com\/sowhat\/uncategorized\/samantha-payback\/","title":{"rendered":"Samantha \u2013 Payback"},"content":{"rendered":"

Originally posted on March 27, 2017<\/u> by Gordon Savage<\/a><\/p>\n

\n

Samantha had done what she considered to be the right thing. She had called home to report that she had gone UA (\u201cUnauthorized Absence\u201d for those of you who are unfamiliar), taking full responsibility for what she had done. It left her father in a quandary of sorts. She had deliberately disobeyed, but she had also reported herself. On top of that he had realized she had been telling the truth, which meant the grounding wasn\u2019t justified. What was he supposed to do?<\/em><\/strong>We drove home in total silence. I looked at Father. His face was grim, and he was staring at the road. I knew better than to say anything. All I could do was sit there imagining what he would do when we got home. It take long for me to find out.<\/p>\n

As soon as Father closed the door, he stopped and froze me with a look I can\u2019t describe. I resisted an urge to drop my head. Instead, I came to attention and stared him in the eye.<\/p>\n

\u201cSammy\u201d\u2014He never called me that except when he was apologetic\u2014 \u201cDammit, you\u2019ve put me in a fix. What you did tonight made me understand that you didn\u2019t lie about the graffiti, and you didn\u2019t deserve to be grounded. I have to apologize for that. On the other hand you disobeyed orders. I don\u2019t know which is more important.\u201d<\/p>\n

He paused. \u201cSo help me, if this had happened last year I would have put you in a military school to teach you some self-control. As it is, a semester \u2013 if we could get you in \u2013 wouldn\u2019t do you or anyone else any good.\u201d<\/p>\n

He looked me up and down. \u201cRight now I should be chewing you out royally, but I recognize my own part in this and your grit for informing me of what you had done. So here\u2019s what\u2019s going to happen. Your grounding is terminated; however, for now your 10 o\u2019clock curfew will continue, and if you screw up again \u2026 well, you figure it out.\u201d<\/p>\n

I stood there speechless. What had just happened? I had disobeyed, a cardinal sin, and I had gotten off with a reprieve. I had to rethink Father\u2019s \u2013 my Dad\u2019s \u2013 actions. I was still mad at him for Brian\u2019s death, but he had been more than fair with me, and Brian wasn\u2019t forced to join the marines. He\u2019d made that decision based on Dad\u2019s urging, but it was Brian decision.<\/p>\n

Dad snapped his fingers in front of my face. \u201cSammy, are you alright?\u201d<\/p>\n

I realized I\u2019d been staring into space. \u201cUh. I\u2019m fine\u2026 and thank you. May I speak candidly?\u201d<\/p>\n

He raised his eyebrows. \u201cCertainly. What\u2019s on your mind?\u201d<\/p>\n

I looked down. Then I gritted my teeth. \u201cI need to apologize. I was so mad at you for making Brian join the marines, but I realize it was his decision. I don\u2019t know if he did it to make you proud of him or what, still it was his choice.\u201d I paused to gather my thoughts.<\/p>\n

\u201cI\u2019m glad to hear that. I hope that I have my Samantha back.\u201d He actually hugged me.<\/p>\n

I teared up. \u201cI love you, Daddy.\u201d<\/p>\n

— # —<\/p>\n

An hour later I continued to be in shock. What had happened? Dad had forgiven me, and I had forgiven him. The feud was over. I could get back to my life. I should have been elated or maybe a little sad. Instead, I was still feeling angry.<\/p>\n

And it wasn\u2019t at Dad. It was at Principal Ashworth. Even before the graffiti incident, he had been after me for some reason, maybe the prank. He had no right to profile me.<\/p>\n

The more I thought about it the angrier I got. The idea was slow forming, but I was going to make him pay. He didn\u2019t like my pranks? He\u2019d learn about pranks. I began thinking of ways I could play practical jokes on him \u2013 without getting caught.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Originally posted on March 27, 2017 by Gordon Savage Samantha had done what she considered to be the right thing. She had called home to report that she had gone UA (\u201cUnauthorized Absence\u201d for those of you who are unfamiliar), taking full responsibility for what she had done. It left her father in a quandary […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"om_disable_all_campaigns":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_feature_clip_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2},"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-133","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"yoast_head":"\nSamantha \u2013 Payback - The Oath Still Stands<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/www.gordonsavage.com\/sowhat\/uncategorized\/samantha-payback\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Samantha \u2013 Payback - The Oath Still Stands\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"Originally posted on March 27, 2017 by Gordon Savage Samantha had done what she considered to be the right thing. 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She protested that she didn\u2019t do it, but to no avail. I never did find out who actually put the graffiti on the school wall,\u2026","rel":"","context":"Similar post","block_context":{"text":"Similar post","link":""},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":56,"url":"https:\/\/www.gordonsavage.com\/sowhat\/uncategorized\/samantha-a-death-in-the-family\/","url_meta":{"origin":133,"position":1},"title":"Samantha – A Death in the Family","author":"gordonsavage@msn.com","date":"February 19, 2017","format":false,"excerpt":"Originally posted on January 2, 2017 by Gordon Savage When I started working on Antimatter, the follow-on to Teleportal, I realized that since Samantha was going to be the principle character, I needed to know more about her. As I explored her past, I came to realize she was much\u2026","rel":"","context":"Similar post","block_context":{"text":"Similar post","link":""},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":91,"url":"https:\/\/www.gordonsavage.com\/sowhat\/uncategorized\/samantha-grounded\/","url_meta":{"origin":133,"position":2},"title":"Samantha – Grounded","author":"gordonsavage@msn.com","date":"March 7, 2017","format":false,"excerpt":"Posted on\u00a0January 30, 2017\u00a0by\u00a0Gordon Savage Samantha was ready to face her punishment. She figured that the tougher it was the more motivated she\u2019d be to make sure she hurt her father. As expected, she was grounded, but it was a first time offense. She knew she had more work to\u2026","rel":"","context":"Similar post","block_context":{"text":"Similar post","link":""},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":78,"url":"https:\/\/www.gordonsavage.com\/sowhat\/uncategorized\/samantha-mall-walking-part-1\/","url_meta":{"origin":133,"position":3},"title":"Samantha – Mall Walking – Part 1","author":"gordonsavage@msn.com","date":"February 21, 2017","format":false,"excerpt":"Originally posted on January 16, 2017 by Gordon Savage Fast forward to Friday on the first week of school. Samantha had been in a funk since her brother's death. The only time she wasn't sulking was when she was running, and she did a lot of that. Now school had\u2026","rel":"","context":"Similar post","block_context":{"text":"Similar post","link":""},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":127,"url":"https:\/\/www.gordonsavage.com\/sowhat\/uncategorized\/samantha-over-the-wall\/","url_meta":{"origin":133,"position":4},"title":"Samantha \u2013 Over the Wall","author":"gordonsavage@msn.com","date":"March 30, 2017","format":false,"excerpt":"Originally posted on March 20, 2017 by Gordon Savage When she was told she couldn't go to the dance, something broke in Samantha. She was so angry with her father she ignored her own responsibility for being grounded and decided on outright defiance. 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She's still grieving.\"\u2026","rel":"","context":"Similar post","block_context":{"text":"Similar post","link":""},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]}],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.gordonsavage.com\/sowhat\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/133","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.gordonsavage.com\/sowhat\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.gordonsavage.com\/sowhat\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.gordonsavage.com\/sowhat\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.gordonsavage.com\/sowhat\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=133"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/www.gordonsavage.com\/sowhat\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/133\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":136,"href":"https:\/\/www.gordonsavage.com\/sowhat\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/133\/revisions\/136"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.gordonsavage.com\/sowhat\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=133"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.gordonsavage.com\/sowhat\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=133"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.gordonsavage.com\/sowhat\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=133"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}