Free The Vigilante Poets of Selwyn Academy by Kate Hattemer

words?”
    “I guess it could be archaism.”
    “Is there something better?” She looked right into my eyes. I forgot to respond. I thought about a chunk of the
Cantos
we’d talked about in English:
    sky’s clear
    night’s sea
    green of the mountain pool
    That’s what I thought when Maura Heldsman looked into my eyes.
    “You don’t have to tell me.”
    “Oh.” I looked down at the paper. “Yeah. The repetition of the ‘hast.’ ”
    “Oh gosh, what’s that called?”
    “Anaphora.”
    “Thanks.” She wrote it down. “Done with English. I have like no time now that
Giselle
’s heating up.”
    “Do you spend a lot of time filming too?” I said. Bad transition, but I had to get to
For Art’s Sake
somehow.
    “The weekly challenges are a bore. But other than that, it’s not bad. They follow me around. It’s nothing compared to college auditions and all that crap.”
    I couldn’t believe I was having a conversation with Maura Heldsman. I kept accidentally looking into her eyes, and then I’d have to refocus on the space between them so that I could form words. Otherwise my brain was just overcome by the green green greenity. Which is how articulate I was feeling.
Sky’s clear / night’s sea
.
    “How’s that going? College and all.”
    I hoped she didn’t think it was weird, this random guy grilling her about her life. I mean, it
was
weird. But she didn’t seem to have noticed. Maybe she was just used to people wanting to talk to her. Like whenever I go to Starbucks with Luke, the female baristas remember his name from the last time. He assumes that they remember everyone’s name, which is not the case. Even if you spend your entire summer there.
    “College.” She flopped her head onto her calves. She could fold in half like a piece of paper. “I got into Juilliard.”
    “Seriously? Wow.” For Selwyn kids, if an arts career is the Holy Grail, Juilliard is a seat at the Round Table.
    “And Boston Conservatory and CalArts, but I want to go to Juilliard. Who wouldn’t?”
    “Are you going?”
    “TBD. My parents hate the idea of a dance career. Mostly because they’ve seen what it’s done to my feet. I have theugliest feet in the world. Bunions, hammertoes, corns, bone spurs, fungal toenails. Sorry, is this grossing you out?”
    Maura, you could pick your nose with those fungal toes, and I’d think it was cute. “I’m okay.”
    “And just in, breaking news, heel bursitis. Feels like being stabbed with a hot poker.” She blinked rapidly three or four times. “My parents think I won’t be able to walk by the time I’m forty, and not gonna lie, they’re probably right. But I don’t care if it means I can dance until then.”
    “So go to Juilliard.”
    She sat up and rubbed her thumbs against her fingers. “Money money money. They’d let me go if it was cheaper. They’d grumble, but they’d let me. But it’s like fifty thousand a year. Not to mention the pointe shoes, another three hundred a month. And I can go to the U for free almost. Where I could minor in dance and have a, I quote, sensible major like communications.”
    “That’s terrible.”
    “Basically, I have to win.”
    “Win?”
    She looked at me in surprise, as if she’d just remembered she was talking to someone outside her world. “Win
FAS
. Win
For Art’s Sake
. If I win that scholarship, I can go.”
    I felt like an idiot. I’d forgotten my mission.
    “I’ve been freaked out all season they’ll cancel the show. That’d be the worst.”
    “That would suck.”
    “No kidding.”
    “Um.” I didn’t know how to broach the topic, but I didn’t want to face Luke if I hadn’t tried. “Aren’t you kind of mad at them?”
    She laughed. “You mean how I’m resident slut?” She was wiggling her feet, pointing and flexing, pointing and flexing.
    I wasn’t going to be that blunt. I didn’t know what to say. “I wasn’t going to be that blunt.”
    “Whatever.” She bent in half and then straightened.