We signed two days later.
The announcement was scheduled for the first business week after New Year’s. Until then, we were under strict instructions not to discuss the details publicly.
Scott sent one text the day after Christmas.
Hope you had a nice day. Sophie loves the sweater you got her. We’ll bring your gifts by sometime this week.
I stared at it longer than it deserved.
Then I wrote back, I’m glad she likes it. No rush.
I did not mention the acquisition.
There is a difference between hiding something to punish someone and declining to hand intimate parts of your life to people who have shown no interest in them.
For almost two years, Scott had not asked what I was working on.
I was done volunteering myself for dismissal.
The press release went live on a Tuesday at six in the morning Pacific time.
By seven, my inbox had become nearly unusable.
Former colleagues wrote in all capital letters. A superintendent in Idaho sent a photograph of his staff gathered around a computer. One of my former students, now a nurse in Seattle, wrote, Mrs. Bennett, of course you did this. You were the first teacher who figured out I needed to draw everything before I understood it.
That message meant more to me than most of the business coverage.
By nine-thirty, a Portland television station had requested an interview. By noon, an education publication had posted a photograph of Nina and me standing awkwardly beside a Clear Path banner.
The acquisition price was reported as nine figures.
My phone rang at 12:14.
Scott.
I let it ring twice before answering.
“Hi.”
“Mom.”
His voice sounded breathless.
“Are you okay?”
“Yes.”
“I just saw—” He stopped. “Is this real?”
“Yes.”
“Clear Path Learning is your company?”
“I’m one of the founders.”
“And they bought it for—”
“The reported figure is accurate.”
He went quiet.
Finally he said, “You never told me.”
I looked out my kitchen window at a squirrel trying to reach the bird feeder.