Free The Total Tragedy of a Girl Named Hamlet by Erin Dionne

stomach brings,/Or as tie heresies that men do leave/Are hated most of those they did deceive,/ So thou, my surfeit and my heresy,/Of all be hated, but the most of me!” Again, same thing. Even though I didn’t know the meaning of some of the words, I was pretty sure I was pronouncing them right. And my voice had fallen into the rhythm of the poetry. Truthfully, it was kind of fun. I knew how the characters were feeling and could sense the emotion Shakespeare built into the words. But, really, why did it have to be Shakespeare-reading that I was good at? Couldn’t it have been something useful, like cooking contemporary recipes? Or exciting and dangerous, like tightrope walking?
    Silly questions aside, how would this impact the Dezzie situation at school? Already my parents were way more involved in my life since she entered HoHo. And that made me think of the Salute to Shakespeare extravaganza. I’d been afraid to ask if Mom had called Mrs. Wimple or Mr. Hoffstedder, choosing instead to live in terror that one of them would show up wearing an Elizabethan collar or Tudor jumper when I least expected it. There was no way I was telling them about this freaky talent.
    It was sure proving to be more of a curse than a gift.

xi
    The following week in art, Saber and Mauri, who were in a different history/English block from me, brought up the dreaded projects after finishing a long, boring conversation about some ski trip Mauri’s dad was going to take them on over winter break.
    “Mrs. Wimple is making us act Midsummer’s Night’s Dream out in class,” said Saber, as if Dezzie didn’t already know that. She splattered green paint on her canvas. We were making Pollock paintings. I didn’t think that Pollock would like her hot pink and lime color choices, but it wasn’t my place to say anything. Evidently, Dezzie didn’t agree.
    “Pollock’s palette was much more muted overall,” she said, mixing a gray/green shade. “He was reflecting post-WWII angst. And it’s mid- summer , not midsummer’s,” she added.
    I kicked her chair, both in an effort to remind her of the “blending in” rules and to stop any Shakespeare-reading talk. Immediately, her face turned pink.
    “So?” asked Mauri.
    “You’re not being true to the abstract expressionist way of thought,” Dezzie explained. “Really, your palette should be more elemental and basic.” I gave up.
    Saber looked uncomfortable. “But these are my favorite colors,” she whined.
    Why did Saber care what Dezzie thought? I was working with deep blues and black, but that was because those were my favorite colors too.
    “It’s, you know, personal choice ,” Mauri piped in. “It’s art .”
    Worried that Dezzie might lecture them on the nature of artistic expression, I tried to change the subject. “How’s the play?” I asked, realizing that I’d brought up the one subject I wanted to avoid. I stabbed my frustration at the canvas.
    “It’s so fun,” said Mauri. “Today I got to read Hippolyta’s lines. She was queen of the Amazons, you know.” I didn’t want to tell her that she’d also been kidnapped and forced to marry Theseus. Better to let Mauri think of her as a regular, royal queen, so she could enjoy acting all princessy—and so it wouldn’t draw attention to our Shakespeare experience. At least she wasn’t questioning me or Dezzie.
    “Hippolyta’s such a good representation of Shakespeare’s feelings of the female as slave,” said Dezzie. She was struggling with her painting and not paying any attention to her rules. “It just doesn’t look right ,” she muttered.
    Mauri and Saber gave her matching blank stares. “Shakespeare’s what?” Saber asked.
    I glared at Dezzie and tried to deflect the conversation. “You know, all the women have to ask for permission to do stuff, instead of making their own choices.”
    “I thought she was cool,” said Mauri. She stuck out her lower lip.
    “I like your painting,” I said, hoping