Eric's morning had gone fairly well, and he had been quite thankful that things had calmed down enough that no one was fighting through the course of the morning. Or at least the open fights and arguments that had seemed to dominate the previous day weren't present through the course of the day. That was good from a standpoint of wanting "peace," but he was also well aware that because of the fights that had gone on, that many of the students at Moon Lake High were still digesting everything that had gone on, one way or another. The scientific part of his mind figured that this sort of tension would likely continue until more news came out that might present Moon Lake with the assurance that the wider world wouldn't react negatively toward their existence, similar to how a scientist wouldn't necessarily accept a controversial theory without proof.
But the morning announcement from the principal was something of a positive indicator of things in that the school was paying attention and doing what it could to try and address the problem. It would then give him and Julie the opportunity to explain things to the school's guidance councilor after school on how they would want the proposed chess club and book club to work, and this would likely go beyond more than just the rules on when and where they would meet and for how long. The school would likely expect some measure of a plan on things that would be done to prevent anyone from pushing anyone else's buttons regarding things like the reveal or anything else that was controversial, and Eric knew that he and Julie would have to talk on that. However, the only time they had to talk on that was during the Freshman lunch period.
Eric scanned the lunch room as he entered, looking for the telltale glow of light that would indicate either where Julie was in the line or where she was seated, playing to a weremer's ability to see who their true love was. At the moment, only a few people were seated at the lunch tables and the line was relatively long, and Eric sighed as he did not see any sign of the illuminated glow that Julie Stovall gave of to his eyes whenever he saw her. He gave a frustrated sigh at that, as he knew they would have limited time to discuss things during their lunch period before they went to their "afternoon" classes. He hoped she wasn't too delayed.
"Sorry I was late," came a familiar voice from behind him, "I had to drop a few things off at my locker..."
Eric looked back over his shoulder and noted that while there was a different student immediately behind him, Julie was directly behind that student. Eric felt himself smile and nod as they walked forward through the line. The nod was to acknowledge Julie's comment, but he wouldn't say much more in order to spare people in the line overhearing too much what they'd have planned for after school activities. If others wanted to get involved, that was fine, and Eric had some idea at least one other person who might be willing to join besides Julie, but for the moment while they were working on the proverbial sales pitch to the school they didn't want to get too many people involved in the negotiating the rules that they would promise to operate under.
As such, they went through the line and selected their food for lunch. It wasn't necessarily a bad lunch, but not really Eric or Julie's favorite either, with heavily breaded fish sticks, some macaroni salad, and a pair of kiwi fruit. Eric selected a carton of milk while Julie picked out a bottle of fruit juice and the pair made there way over to one of the tables that was at that time relatively clear. They sat down and got down to the point fairly quickly.
"Well... I think a lot of what you predicted yesterday came true," Eric commented, "that the school was mostly just setting aside time to coordinate how they would manage how to respond to everything related to the reveal and all that."
Julie nodded, "Yes... though, I'd suspect a fair number of people are still going to be tense on the subject. Likely fearing some of the outrage that has gone on outside of Moon Lake over that gun fight in Seattle will be a major issue..."
"And that will only be solved with time and with more information coming out," Eric nodded, "which we don't control."
Julie nodded and took a bite of her fish-stick. The breading gave an audible crack and some of the crumbs fell down onto the tray, but it wasn't too bad and it gave Eric time to move the conversation onto their proposed after school clubs.
"In the meantime, I'd think we'd need to have some preset rules for any chess or book club that the school would be supporting," Eric spoke, "things like the schedule... how long they will meet, what days they will meet... and what the club will and will not tolerate. Things like that. As I'm sure the school will also want to know how we'll deal with some of the issues related to the reveal and all that..."
"That part is easy," Julie commented, "that during either activity... there would be NO discussion of politics or anything controversial and that whoever the school assigns to supervise either club would have the ability to monitor that sort of thing. As I would imagine that chess wouldn't require any discussion on those topics, and nearly all of the books that my friends and I have read from the fantasy genre have avoided many of the issues we see today."
"But some books may talk tangentially on those sorts of issues," Eric pointed out.
"But they aren't explicit," Julie countered, "thus a general comment on what is in the book can be workable and wouldn't be political in nature... or at least wouldn't be explicitly political and thus wouldn't be directly tied into politics or controversial subjects, like the present reveal."
"Makes sense..." Eric said slowly, "and if we go with something like that... that'd at least give the school that we've been thinking on stuff like this... even if it isn't that hard."
"And what would think on scheduling?" Julie asked, "the days could alternate. The chess club meets on one day and the book club the next. That way we're not competing for time and so on... but would it be set to rotate or would it be fixed like a Monday, Wednesday, Friday for one group and Tuesday, Thursday for the other?"
"I've been thinking on this through the day," Eric said slowly, "and a part of me has thought that simply alternating would work the easiest..."
"But," Julie said slowly as Eric managed to finish dissecting his kiwi with the utensils provided to them and noticing that Eric's tone of voice fell off a bit as he did so.
"But that could get complicated when understanding weekends and holidays," Eric said slowly, "how would we keep track of things over the course of things like Thanksgiving break or Christmas break, which could be even longer. Now... they may do something special with regard to the Thanksgiving football game, but that's one group and wouldn't have the alternation that we'd be putting in to make room for two different clubs... and assuming that many of the same people would be in both."
"Makes sense... as you and I would be in both," Julie said slowly, "and we can't be in the meetings for both if they were schedule to meet at the same time."
Eric nodded as the took a bit of his kiwi and glanced at one of the wall clocks that were present. At the same time, Arthur Curtis came to join them. The other male weremer blocked out Eric's view of one the clocks as he came in and sat down beside Eric.
"Both being in what?" Arthur asked as he sat down, "Would this be in one of those after school clubs that was hinted at in the morning announcements."
"That's part of it... one would be with chess, something I've been into," Eric answered.
"The other would be a book club... looking to fantasy and maybe some science fiction," Julie added, "which fits something of a hybrid of things both Eric and I are into. Something that would help Eric ultimately make more friends in Moon Lake."
"Well..." Arthur commented as he patted Eric on the back, "I can't say much on fantasy books, but I'm great at checkers and pretty good at chess. So, I'd join the chess club."
Eric nodded and gave something of a low smile. There might still be times when he'd worry that Arthur might have interests in Julie that mirrored his own, particularly after his first meeting with Arthur, but a lot of that had been smoothed out. Apparently the other male weremer had failed to notice Julie's pearl necklace. Once it was noticed, that element of flirtation went away as Arthur recognized a weremer's engagement "ring" as important, but that didn't mean he wanted to give up on a platonic friendship with Julie and wasn't opposed to a platonic friendship with Eric, either. And friendship was something Eric did like. His best friend would always be Julie, given their relationship, but the friends he'd made with Arthur and some of the others he'd met in Moon Lake had helped.
"Well... that'd help with potential members," Eric said him, "have you got any ideas on how we should schedule the meetings?"
"I'd think to do something like the way they do things at the college," Arthur offered, "they have some classes on Mondays, Wednesdays, and Fridays and then others on Tuesdays and Thursdays... And do chess on the former and the books on the latter."
"Any reason why?" Julie asked.
"Mostly because the book club would mean doing some reading outside of homework," Arthur commented, "doing so would mean that the members would need to put aside time to read in order to talk about the book. Thus by meeting on Tuesdays and Thursdays... while reading might be limited between the two days, you would have much more time between Thursday and Tuesday."
"That'd make sense," Eric commented, "that might help with the scheduling for the week..."
"And each day could go for about an hour like the football practices for the Thanksgiving day game," Julie nodded.
"And hopefully they get to play," Arthur added, "never played... and before I learned it was flag football this year, I didn't want to play, but my folks have enjoyed watching the game."
"My brother's looking forward to it," Eric nodded, "hopefully they get to play..."