The Fifteenth Minute

F
or Keyanna
, who knows that a sense of humor is everything.

C
ome what come may
,

Time and the hour runs through the roughest day.

—Shakespeare’s Macbeth

I
promised
myself that I wouldn’t spend my second semester of college huddled in my room playing DragonFire. So even though I have just broken into the Dark Portal with fifty golden life credits and a new set of magical nunchucks, I reluctantly freeze my avatar and put my controller down.

Naturally, my screen erupts with messages from other players.
Hey, Vindikator? Where are you going?
And,
Don’t leave now, we’re close to the diamond palace!

My reply is brief but truthful.
Gotta go to class!
Grabbing my trusty baseball cap, I pull it down low over my eyes. Then I put on my coat, lift my bag and run out of my dorm room.

Over the holidays I considered quitting DragonFire cold turkey. But that seems too harsh, because gaming is how I relax. Instead I’ll restrict myself to no more than ninety minutes a day. That leaves me almost an hour tonight to feed my dragons and explore a few of the corridors I found this morning.

It will have to do.

Trotting down the stairs and out into the pretty stone courtyard, I start to wonder if ninety minutes is enough. If my cyber pals send me a bunch of messages, responding will eat into my gaming time…

The semester is only a couple of hours old, and I’m already rationalizing.

Running late now, I dash across College Street and then take a shortcut through the English Literature building. The brick theater department is just in the distance. I love the old architecture of this place—the gargoyles and the gothic archways. But I didn’t choose Harkness College because it looks like a well-styled movie set. I chose it because I wanted to be a real college student. I wanted the whole package—stodgy professors, thick books, parties and hanging out with friends in the dorm.

I hadn’t meant to spend the first semester hiding in my room, but fitting in here is a lot harder than I expected it to be.

Before Christmas, though, things started looking up. I have two good friends now, even if I’m kind of their third wheel. And I’ve made a pact with myself to spend even more time with people rather than screens.

Though screens are pretty awesome. And I like my other identity—Vindikator. On the Internet, nobody knows you’re an actress who made millions wielding a magic wand. I can go all day without hearing a single Princess Vindi joke.

I’ve almost reached my destination when my phone begins ringing like a broken doorbell, each new chime a text from my manager. I pull it out and skim the messages.
Lianne, answer my calls
.
Where are you? Call me back ASAP
.

When I’d decided to go to college at age nineteen like a normal girl, I’d tried to lay down the law with my manager. When school is in session, I want him to at least try to respect my schedule.

He doesn’t.

Now my phone begins to play the “Imperial March” from
Star Wars
. I would happily ignore my own personal Darth Vader, except I’m heading into class, and I don’t want to have to shut my phone down to avoid his impatient updates.

“Bob?” I answer, stopping on the slate pathway. “I’m heading to
class
. What’s the big deal?”

“I sent you a script. You should have it this afternoon.”

No lie, I get a little tingle just hearing those words. Even though the next two years of my life are already spoken for, everyone wants to be wanted. My heart flutters like a butterfly. “What is it?”

“Your next Princess Vindi part.”

Crunch
. The butterfly hits the pavement. “And that’s news?” I ask, my tone becoming less polite. That’s the trajectory of a call with Bob—I start out promising myself I’ll be nice. Thirty seconds later, I’m yelling. “We’re not shooting until
May
. Why do I need to read it in January?” Besides, I’m doing that film whether I like it or not. I’m under contract.

Luckily, this will be the very last Sorceress film. After this summer, I never have to be Princess Vindi again. I never have to wrinkle my nose and turn anyone into a frog or wave my scepter to fight off the devil.

“You need to read it because there’s a clause we need to renegotiate. You need a nudity clause, babe. The Princess is supposed to get it on with Valdor in this film.”

“What?” I yelp. “That’s not in the book.”

“But their relationship is implied. So the screenwriters put it in.”

My stomach turns over. “A sex scene? Seriously?”

“It won’t be too spicy because they need a PG-13 rating. Read the script, and then we’ll negotiate what you’re willing to do. We’ll try to get them to pay you more.”

Shit!
I can hear in Bob’s voice how much he likes this idea. The man would sell me into slavery if it meant more cash for him.

“I have to take a call with Sony now,” he says. “Look for my FedEx.”

“Wait!” I yelp. “What about the Scottish play? Have you heard from the director?”

“We’ll talk later.”

“Bob!” I shout. “I know it’s against policy for you to listen when I talk. But that part is
everything
to me. You said you’d—”

“Gotta jump,” he says, and the line goes dead.

Damn. It. All!

Not only am I now unsettled, but I’m late for my class. Shoving my phone into my bag, I jog up the steps and into the building, then down the hallway toward the room where my seminar on twentieth-century theater will be held.

I prefer to get to my classes early and sit in the front row. It’s not because I’m a nerd. It’s just that I don’t like making an entrance. But today I’ll have no choice. When I finally arrive, it’s exactly one minute past eleven. And the door to room 201 squeaks.

Of course it does.

At least a dozen heads turn in my direction as I slip into the room. The professor—he would be the skinny man holding a sheaf of hand-outs and speaking to the group—pauses mid-sentence to witness my arrival.

That’s when I hear the first snicker and see the first pair of eyebrows arch in amusement. From somewhere in the room comes a hissed whisper. “Princess Vindi!” It’s followed by a chuckle.

I don’t look around for the source of the laughter, because it’s better not to know which asshole is already poking fun at me. And anyway, I’m scanning for a seat.

It’s just my luck that this room features a giant conference table instead of rows of chairs. Feeling panicky, I realize there aren’t any more empty seats at the table. The rest of the heavy wooden armchairs are pushed back against the wall. I grab one and wrestle it toward the table. The quicker I can sit down, the quicker those eyes will go back to the professor. But the chair squeals in protest on the wood floor, and if I’m going to sit at the table, two students are going to have to scoot apart to accommodate me.

There is a terrible pause while I wait for someone to catch on and make a space.

Kill me already.

The professor sighs and pulls his own chair aside. The student next to him clues in and makes a bit more space. So now I’m dragging a beast of a chair past three other students to finally fit myself into the only available slot.

Eight years later I’m finally seated, and the table nearly reaches my chin. Did I mention that I’m quite vertically challenged? Tease me and die.

“Where were we?” the professor says. “Ah, yes. On your syllabus, please make a note of the due dates listed on page two. There is no web page for this course. I like to do things old-school.”

The reading list is lengthy, but I don’t mind. This is why I came to Harkness—to swim in the deep end of academia. To get out of Hollywood and to be a normal college student. I picked Harkness for its rigor, not for the benefit of my social life.

Good thing, because I don’t have a social life.

It’s not that I expected to find fangirls at a place like Harkness. Students here are too busy taking over the world to care about me. But I didn’t count on being
mocked
for my strange little career. On the first day I asked an upperclassman where to find the bookstore. His answer: “You just ride your broom over there, right?”

The howl of laughter he got for that little joke echoed through me for days.

It’s not something I’d say out loud, but it’s
weird
to find myself in a place where I’m utterly uncool. Take me a few miles from here, walk me down the hallways of the local middle school—it would be a mob scene. I’d be asked to sign so many autographs that the Sharpies I carry in my bag would run dry.

Here? I’m a pariah. I’m the girl who got into Harkness by being famous, instead of by slaving away on the math team or the debate squad in high school. I get it, I really do. I’m a poster child for privilege. Before he died, my father was Hollywood royalty. And my mother is a known diva and playgirl. The first time I rode a yacht to the Cannes film festival I was four.

Though I’ve been earning my
own
wad of cash on the big screen since I was seven, nobody cares. At Harkness, it’s all held against me—something I hadn’t anticipated. I hadn’t known that, by choosing such an elite college, I’d found the one place on earth where I was least likely to be respected. The epicenter of my own uncoolness.

Live and learn.

Good thing I didn’t come here to be popular. I came here to earn a degree so when I finally reach the limits of my patience with Hollywood’s bullshit, I won’t be too old to go to college.

“Now let’s begin by introducing ourselves,” the professor says. “Just give us your name, your year, and which of the plays you’re most excited to read this semester.”

Easy enough. I skim the syllabus to pick out my answer. There are a lot of plays by dead white men here, but I guess that’s to be expected.

The student beside the professor is Bill, a junior. And he tells us how excited he is to read
Mother Courage and Her Children
, by Bertolt Brecht.

Ugh
. Well I guess Bill and I will never be friends. I hate Brecht.

Weirdly, five out of the next eight students also pick that play. And then the skinny dude in the beret sitting next to me practically orgasms while telling us how much he loves Brecht. “His treatment of corruption is seminal,” Mr. Beret says. “The twentieth century would not have been the same without his character Arturo Ui. That play is transcendent.”

Really, dude?

Now it’s my turn, and I remember I promised myself I’d speak up more often this semester. “I’ll play devil’s advocate,” I offer when everyone’s eyes fall to me. “Brecht is clever, but he isn’t subtle. Sometimes I’d rather lose myself in a story and let the play make its points in a way that isn’t so brutal. So I’m looking forward to reading Wendy Wasserstein with all of you.”

There is a deep and terrible silence, which makes me feel panicky. Was that too pushy? Really?

Mr. Beret snorts audibly. “Brecht’s genius is not always accessible.”

The second after he says it, my neck begins to burn. I’m not used to having my intelligence insulted to my face. It takes a great deal of effort not to argue with him. I mean, I first saw Pacino perform Arturo Ui when I was six years old! I’ve probably seen more onstage genius than anyone in this room. Times ten!

Instead of defending myself, I just sit there grinding my teeth.

“You didn’t tell us your name or your class,” the nerdy professor says quietly.

And that’s when I want to sink into the floor and die, because he’s right. I was so busy speaking up I forgot to follow the instructions. Even worse, it’s
such
a Hollywood asshole thing to do—to assume everyone already knows your name. “Sorry,” I say quickly. “I’m Lianne and I’m a freshman.”

The death silence lingers a moment longer before the girl on my right speaks up. “I’m Hosanna, a sophomore, and I like that the syllabus has a mix of serious and less serious plays. I’m looking forward to reading the Neil Simon.”

Beret boy groans, and I’m grateful to my neighbor for thumbing her nose at what is clearly a room full of hardcore intellectual snobs.

The professor starts speaking again, inviting us to dive right into the first play on our list, which is
Private Lives
by Noël Coward. Nobody is staring at me anymore, but I still have that sweaty, uncomfortable feeling of having put myself too far out there. I just want to go back to my dorm room and play another round of DragonFire. Is that so wrong?

I write my name on the top of my syllabus, and then read the second page. There’s one big paper due in place of a midterm, and then a final exam. Fine. But class participation counts as thirty percent of our grade. Oh, joy.

But it’s what I read at the bottom of the page that really horrifies me. The Professor’s bio.
Dr. Harlon Overstein has most recently published in
American Arts and Letters
and is the foremost American expert on the plays of Bertolt Brecht
.

Well, slap my ass and call me Sally. I’ve just insulted our professor’s taste in twentieth-century theater and his entire career.

Kill me already.

S
omehow I make
it through the ninety-minute class without embarrassing myself again. When I finally emerge, blinking in the January sunlight, it’s past noon. Last semester I would have bought a take-out salad to eat alone in my room. But since I’ve promised to turn over more new leaves than a hurricane in the rain forest, I head over to the Beaumont dining hall instead.

This bit of bravery is rewarded when I spot my neighbor (and one of my only friends) Bella at a table just inside the door. She’s sitting with Bridger, one of her ridiculously attractive hockey player pals. “Hey munchkin,” Bella says. “How’s the first day back?”

I let the short joke slide, because Bella has never once asked me where I keep my magic wand, or asked me to cast a spell to clean up the bathroom we share. “Pretty painful. Can I sit?”

“Of course.”

I drop my bag over the back of the chair. And after I grab a cup of soup and a salad, I collapse into the seat. “I’ve had a stupid morning. You?”

“Fricking scary. Back-to-back science classes are going to kick my ass.” She tips her head to the side to acknowledge the redheaded guy sitting beside her. “But these are the classes that Bridger takes for fun.”