household materials and a stapler. While my Barbie was wearing a shirtwaist
housedress with piping and roomy pockets, hers would be tightly bound into a Japanese kimono made from an old satin negligee
and belted with a strip of flocked wallpaper. She once made both of our Barbies reversible rain capes from a plastic tablecloth.
The rain side had a latticework theme, with sprigs of cherries; the other side was the white flannel backing, which we thought
looked like a fur stole.
Anyway, I have favorite clothes that I like to repeat.
“If I am forced to respond, Mr. Prentiss, you will receive the first of
next
year’s detentions,” the monitor says without looking up. She now has something angora blooming in her lap, a rainbow-colored
scarf with frilled edges. Very pretty, although people don’t actually wear things like that.
He’s waving his arm around.
If
x
equals zero, then
n
and
p
equal zero too. It’s a trick question. You hardly ever see a trick question in a textbook, although it does happen. I check
my work, but it appears to be correct.
“Mr. Prentiss, what can I do for you?” she says wearily.
“Thank you! This has to do with homework, which Mr. Bingham—gym—kept us too late last period for me to get to my locker, which
I had planned on doing to get homework for in here. We were climbing the ropes and nobody could do it, we were all just hanging
there, so Bingham took off his whistle and started showing us!” He pauses to look around. “The Buffalo climbed the rope.”
This causes a stir among the male detainees. When the monitor starts to set her needles aside, Mr. Prentiss hurries on.
“Anyway, can I borrow an algebra book from this person so I can copy down today’s problems? Otherwise I’ll just be sitting
here for an hour, wasting time and probably who knows what.”
She squints at him, considering all the angles. “And who has the book?”
“That girl at the last table, with brown hair. I don’t even know her name.”
She looks back at me. “Do you have what he’s talking about?”
I nod.
He starts to get up.
“Oh no, you don’t.” She points at me. “You. I don’t want him walking around.”
I collect my math book and walk up the aisle. He doesn’t look at me and I don’t look at him. I return to my seat and a minute
later his hand waves and she nods at me. I go up the aisle, take the book, and return again.
Inside the front cover is a sheet of notebook paper, folded twice. I open it under the table, where Felicia can see. It’s
his drawing of the beagle-nosed lion. Below it, floating, is one word in tiny cursive:
Hi.
The next couple of days are a whirlwind of speculation and advice, impromptu conventions around my locker, home of the dwindling
plate of fudge. The la carte lady had been gone the day I brought it, and by the time she returned, I wasn’t too sure about
taking food to someone who spends all day up to her neck in it. Instead, we ironed our sewing projects and gave them to her,
a ruffled pillow sham and a smocked apron, both orange and white gingham.
“Well,” she said. “I don’t know what to say.”
We didn’t either.
Mr. Prentiss says hi to me twice more on my way to the back of the room, each time widening his narrow eyes as though he is
about to say something else. I can’t stay for it, whatever it is, because I’ve begun to feel weightless and slightly faint.
Now that I’m over here on this side of the canyon, everything seems so intensified—his long, expressive feet in their ripped
sneakers, hooked abstractly around the rungs of his chair, the way he bounces a pencil, so lightly, against his temple while
he reads, the way he raises his head when someone walks past but doesn’t raise his jaw, so his mouth drops open a little bit.
Not in a way that makes him seem impaired, but in a way that makes the looking up seem uncalculated. He’s just looking up,
is all, because he wants to see who is
housedress with piping and roomy pockets, hers would be tightly bound into a Japanese kimono made from an old satin negligee
and belted with a strip of flocked wallpaper. She once made both of our Barbies reversible rain capes from a plastic tablecloth.
The rain side had a latticework theme, with sprigs of cherries; the other side was the white flannel backing, which we thought
looked like a fur stole.
Anyway, I have favorite clothes that I like to repeat.
“If I am forced to respond, Mr. Prentiss, you will receive the first of
next
year’s detentions,” the monitor says without looking up. She now has something angora blooming in her lap, a rainbow-colored
scarf with frilled edges. Very pretty, although people don’t actually wear things like that.
He’s waving his arm around.
If
x
equals zero, then
n
and
p
equal zero too. It’s a trick question. You hardly ever see a trick question in a textbook, although it does happen. I check
my work, but it appears to be correct.
“Mr. Prentiss, what can I do for you?” she says wearily.
“Thank you! This has to do with homework, which Mr. Bingham—gym—kept us too late last period for me to get to my locker, which
I had planned on doing to get homework for in here. We were climbing the ropes and nobody could do it, we were all just hanging
there, so Bingham took off his whistle and started showing us!” He pauses to look around. “The Buffalo climbed the rope.”
This causes a stir among the male detainees. When the monitor starts to set her needles aside, Mr. Prentiss hurries on.
“Anyway, can I borrow an algebra book from this person so I can copy down today’s problems? Otherwise I’ll just be sitting
here for an hour, wasting time and probably who knows what.”
She squints at him, considering all the angles. “And who has the book?”
“That girl at the last table, with brown hair. I don’t even know her name.”
She looks back at me. “Do you have what he’s talking about?”
I nod.
He starts to get up.
“Oh no, you don’t.” She points at me. “You. I don’t want him walking around.”
I collect my math book and walk up the aisle. He doesn’t look at me and I don’t look at him. I return to my seat and a minute
later his hand waves and she nods at me. I go up the aisle, take the book, and return again.
Inside the front cover is a sheet of notebook paper, folded twice. I open it under the table, where Felicia can see. It’s
his drawing of the beagle-nosed lion. Below it, floating, is one word in tiny cursive:
Hi.
The next couple of days are a whirlwind of speculation and advice, impromptu conventions around my locker, home of the dwindling
plate of fudge. The la carte lady had been gone the day I brought it, and by the time she returned, I wasn’t too sure about
taking food to someone who spends all day up to her neck in it. Instead, we ironed our sewing projects and gave them to her,
a ruffled pillow sham and a smocked apron, both orange and white gingham.
“Well,” she said. “I don’t know what to say.”
We didn’t either.
Mr. Prentiss says hi to me twice more on my way to the back of the room, each time widening his narrow eyes as though he is
about to say something else. I can’t stay for it, whatever it is, because I’ve begun to feel weightless and slightly faint.
Now that I’m over here on this side of the canyon, everything seems so intensified—his long, expressive feet in their ripped
sneakers, hooked abstractly around the rungs of his chair, the way he bounces a pencil, so lightly, against his temple while
he reads, the way he raises his head when someone walks past but doesn’t raise his jaw, so his mouth drops open a little bit.
Not in a way that makes him seem impaired, but in a way that makes the looking up seem uncalculated. He’s just looking up,
is all, because he wants to see who is
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