Work for Hire by Margo Karasek Page B

Wednesday.”
    I bit back a groan and momentarily shut my eyes. Not him too.
    It seemed today was going to be filled with firsts, because although Xander had homework virtually every night, he never had to actually write more than a word for any particular assignment. All his homework questions were fill-ins, multiple choice or matching. I remembered Lisa had mentioned he needed extra “editing” with his writing. That warning couldn’t portend good things to come.
    “Really?” I said, pretending enthusiasm. Then I reached for a kitchen stool near the door. Xander must have brought it up just for me when he came in from school.
    I placed the stool near Xander’s chair and waited for him to take his seat. Then I sat—no, plopped—on mine. The stool barely measured above six inches. It was more of a footrest, really. Sitting, my knees reached my chin and my head hovered in the vicinity of Xander’s shoulder. I looked like Alice, trapped in the rabbit’s hole, both too large and too small. Xander chuckled at my predicament, his grin as wide as the Cheshire cat’s, but remained in his chair. He, unlike Gemma, never volunteered his seat for my benefit. I smiled back at the joke. Xander, clearly, liked being a prankster.
    “What’s it about?” I asked.
    “Originality in the creative world.”
    Xander leaned back in his chair and positioned his sock-clad feet, ankles crossed, on the desk right in front of my face.
    “Dude.” I parroted Xander’s favorite word, scrunched my nose and waved a hand to ward off the stink. Fun and games notwithstanding, I drew the line at smelly socks under my nose. “Get your stinky feet out of my face. And what about originality in the creative world?”
    “Sorry,” Xander grinned, clearly not at all sorry. He dropped his feet to the floor, pushed his chair away from the desk and rolled back towards the guitar. He reached for the instrument, placed it in his lap and began fiddling with the strings again. “Mr. Dandridge wants us to write about whether we think anything in, like, the arts or literature is original anymore. It has to be at least five hundred words. He made us start the essay in class today. I think the sheet is somewhere on the desk, if you want to look.”
    If I wanted to look? Of course I wanted to look. If Xander had actually written something already, we might have a good start. The essay was due next Wednesday, and it was only Thursday. We had five whole days to write and edit five hundred words. How hard could that be? I scanned the desk for any loose sheets of paper but found none.
    “I don’t see it, Xander.” I shoved through some more pages. Xander wasn’t the world’s most organized student. Torn sheets of his science and math notes littered the desk’s surface, but none resembled the start of an essay. “It’s definitely not on your desk.”
    Xander stared at me and continued playing. I mentally counted to ten.
    “Xander, can you please leave the guitar alone, and come help me look for the essay.”
    Xander bent his head over the Gibson and plunked its strings harder. The resulting discord had even him wincing. He paused his fingers, returned the guitar to the bed and rolled the chair back to the desk.
    “Maybe it’s still in my book bag.” He pulled out his massive JanSport from underneath the desk and rummaged through its clutter of text- and notebooks. “Here it is,” he triumphantly crowed, pulling out a crumpled sheet from between two books.
    I took the sheet and focused on the barely legible scribble. Xander’s handwriting was atrocious. I could just make out the essay. In his forty-five minutes of class time, Xander had managed to write:
    I’m writing about how nothing new anymore, because everyone just copy what everyone else already says, ergo what point, like my mother, she take picture for magazine, but picture going to be like everyone picture, but magazine published, mother calls by important people important, they say she is