The Vigilante Poets of Selwyn Academy (14 page)

“Today, we’re talking about the general topic of long poems,” said BradLee. He was dressed for casual Friday in jeans and an interrobang T-shirt. Where did one find punctuation-themed clothing? “We’ll start with the work of a literary theorist named Smaro Kamboureli.”

Usually hearing the words “literary theorist” was like pressing Ctrl+Alt+Delete on my body: instant power down. But I thought that if I focused on BradLee, I might forget about Luke.

“She describes the long poem as
mise en abyme
. Anyone here take French?” Luke took French. “Yes, Vivian?”

“Like. Placed in, um—I don’t know that word.”

“Abyss,” said BradLee.

“Placed into an abyss,” said Vivian triumphantly.

“Exactly. Now, all of you. Imagine standing between two mirrors.”

“Like at the mall?” Once Vivian gets the floor, she never wants to relinquish it.

“Sure. You’d see an infinite series of yourself, right?”

“Actually, it depends on the angle.”

“Let’s say the angle’s correct. Got it? Now, how does that apply to a long poem?”

He’d stumped us. Not even Vivian had anything vapid to say.

“Here’s a hint. Kamboureli describes the long poem as ‘a genre without a genre.’ It’s a poem, it’s an epic, it’s a novel. It’s everything.” He turned on the projector. The text swam into focus.

I was lost. I knew what the words meant when they were by themselves, with the possible exception of “demarcated.” But putting them together was a problem. Maybe this Kamboureli dame was bullshitting us all. Making clothes for the emperor.

“What’s she saying here?” said BradLee.

I considered sharing my hypothesis that literary theory is akin to the square root of negative one: we’re just pretending it exists. Nobody spoke. Vivian pulled out a hand mirror to
check her hair. BradLee cast a longing glance at Luke’s empty desk.

I raised my hand.

“Ethan!” He sounded pathetically happy.

“Okay.” My stomach gave a lame little churn, and Maura wasn’t even there. “She’s saying the long poem isn’t one genre. It’s always between genres. It wiggles around on you.”

“My favorite part about Ethan’s answer is the word ‘between,’ ” said BradLee. “Kamboureli writes that the long poem is ‘a textual process of betweenness.’ Tell me why she included the word ‘process.’ ”

I raised my hand again. “Without the ‘process’ part,” I said, “it’s just another genre, a genre that’s a mix of genres. But long poems aren’t stuck. They shift.” I had a stroke of genius, if I do say so myself. “Like the mirrors! The genre moves! It changes!” I could see that infinite series, all those images reflecting the slightest motion, quivering like water under sunlight.

“Yes!” said BradLee.

It was rare that I exacted an exclamation point from a teacher. They used a lot of ellipses when talking to me:
yeah, but …
or
okay
.… Elizabeth gave me an air-five from across the room.

“The long poem is an enactment of betweenness,” said BradLee.

I loved the word “betweenness.” I wrote it down. Several times.

“Generic betweenness, and other types too. One critic called it ‘the tremulous fusion between self-trust and self-doubt.’ ”

If you have ever wondered what it’s like to be me, or a teenager, or a human, that does a pretty nice job of explaining it. The tremulous fusion between self-trust and self-doubt.

The lecture ended. We were supposed to be doing a close-reading worksheet on Pound, but I was reeling with all these ideas.

Reality TV. It was also
mise en abyme
, a genre without a genre. But a long poem flaunted its betweenness, and reality TV tried to hide it. It tried to claim that reality and TV could coexist, no problem. But even its name betrayed the problem. Reality, TV: two antonyms right next to each other. It was as bad as “jumbo shrimp” or “fun run.”

Reality TV couldn’t be both art and life. It could be between, but it couldn’t be both.

I think I was so into
betweenness
that day because it described everything I was feeling. Talk about the tremulous fusion between trust and doubt. I doubted Luke, but I couldn’t stop trusting him. I was angry at him. I was worried for him. I knew the truth and didn’t believe it.

How could so many emotions exist within one person at one time? I was sitting in a plastic desk-chair contraption in an English classroom in Minnesota, tapping out the meter of lines from Pound’s
Cantos
, wearing a baseball shirt with a small hole in the armpit. But I was also roiling with feelings and thoughts and doubts and conjectures and worries and layers of complication. I looked around the classroom. Elizabeth was playing Hangman with her normal friends. Jackson was approximating square roots in his head. Vivian was fixing her eyeliner. Cynthia was texting under the desk. BradLee was
trying to explain metonymy to Paul Jones, who was trying to make BradLee laugh. But that was only what I could see. If so much happened in my head, didn’t I have to conclude that it was the same way with everyone else? I had to look down again. The world was too big.

Twenty minutes later, I had the following conversation with BradLee.

“Hey, Mr. Lee, can I talk to you for a minute? I’m worried.”

“You’re doing very well in class, Ethan. I loved your comments today.”

“No, I’m worried about the
Contracantos
.”

“Why’s that? By the way—not that I know anything of its provenance—the issue today was excellent. Sophisticated and cutting.”

“That was Luke. Mostly Luke. He’s what I’m worried about.”

“Why’s that?”

“People are saying that he—no, forget it. It sounds dumb when you say it out loud. See you tomorrow.”

“Say it.”

“I’m sure it’s not true. It
couldn’t
be true. People are saying—”

BradLee took over. “That he’s behind the
Contracantos
. That somebody told Coluber, and Coluber told kTV.” He was speaking flatly. “That they’ve offered him a contract for the remaining six episodes, and that he’s very gratified and has accepted with pleasure.”

I was gaping. “You heard too?”

“Ethan,” he said. He glanced at the closed door. “It’s all true.”

“All of it? I don’t believe you.”

“You should believe me.”

“But how would you know? No offense.”

“Trust me. I know. And Ethan, think of the greater good.
For Art’s Sake
is doing excellent things for Selwyn.”

“Luke’s our
friend
!”

“It’s just not that big of a deal—”

But I was gone.

“At last,” said Elizabeth crankily as I climbed into the Appelvan.

Jackson turned the key. The car didn’t start, and I didn’t respond to Elizabeth.

“An apology would be nice. We’ve been sitting here fifteen minutes.”

Another turn of the key. The van shuddered and fell still.

“Ethan? Hello?”

I’d been staring out the window. “It’s all true,” I said.

There was a nasty sound like gears grinding together, but even that didn’t last.

“BradLee told me it was all true. He said they offered a contract, and Luke accepted.”

“How would BradLee know?” said Jackson, turning toward me.

“You get your car started,” said Elizabeth. “I will interrogate Ethan. But yeah, how
would
he know?”

“There he is,” said Jackson, staring at the rearview mirror. I swiveled. BradLee was walking across the parking lot, deep in conversation with—

Weird.

My view was obstructed by flying leggings of the traffic-cone-orange variety. Elizabeth dove over the front seat, and then past me into the back. She knelt on the rear seat and stared.

“Shit,” she said. “Shitacular. Shitaculacious.”

BradLee was walking with someone. That someone was Coluber.

The Appelvan rumbled to life. “Victory!” cried Jackson.

“Don’t move,” said Elizabeth.

“They’re going to see you!” I said, worried.

“Tinted windows, dumbass,” she said, without looking back. “And they are
into
this conversation.”

I couldn’t see clearly. I was tempted to dive over the seat, but I was likely to kick her in the head if I tried, and if I kicked her in the head she’d probably shiv me.

“The Appelvan won’t idle for long,” said Jackson.

“Take a slow loop around the lot,” Elizabeth commanded.

After Jackson backed out, I could see better. Coluber was gesturing expansively. He was smiling. As we passed them—“
Slow
, Jackson!”—I could see that BradLee was smiling too.

“Tell me everything BradLee said,” said Jackson.

“He said it wasn’t a big deal. He told me to think of the greater good.”

“Did he say that in a soothing way? Or in a self-justifying way?”

“I don’t know. Both?”

“They’re getting into a car. Go! Go!” That was Elizabeth.

BradLee got into the driver’s seat of a prehistoric two-door Volkswagen. Coluber slid into the other side.

“BradLee!” I couldn’t believe it. “He drives Coluber around? That shithead!”

“Follow them, Jackson,” said Elizabeth as the Volkswagen backed out.

“I refuse. We know everything we need to know.”

The Volkswagen had no front license plate and lots of bird poop on the hood. “You’d think BradLee could have afforded a nicer car with all that banking money,” I said.

“Follow him.”

“No.”

“Then I will.” Elizabeth plunged feet first into the middle seat and headfirst into the front. She grabbed the wheel while still horizontal. The Appelvan made a crazy swerve.

“What the hell, Elizabeth—”

“Move over.”

“No!” Another swerve. The right mirror came within inches of the Students Xing sign.

“Brake, goddammit.”

We accelerated and went over a speed bump diagonally. I grabbed my tailbone in agony.

“That was not the brake!”

“Yeah, because you’re shoving me and my feet were displaced from their typical—”

“Then move over.”

Jackson hit the brakes, heaved a great sigh of resignation, and squirmed under Elizabeth to the passenger seat.

“Let’s hope your lollygagging didn’t lose us our only chance,” she muttered. “Where are they?”

They had bypassed the lot’s exit. “Heading toward the front circle,” I said.

“Crap,” said Elizabeth. “Much easier to tail someone on the open road.” She reached down to slide the seat forward. It zoomed up so far that her nose almost hit the windshield.

“Only two settings,” Jackson told her, sounding satisfied. “It’s broken. You’re either way back or way forward.”

“This car is two percent metal, ninety-eight percent shit. My nose is three inches from the glass. I feel like an old lady. Nonetheless, are you familiar with the acronym ‘FIDO’?”

“I don’t think so,” said Jackson cautiously.

“ ‘Eff It, Drive On.’ That’s my motto.” She hit the gas, and the Appelvan lurched forward like a bumper car. I’d never appreciated the finesse Jackson brings to our daily carpool. She drove to the front circle.

“There is no rhyme or reason to this mission,” said Jackson. “So a teacher and a vice principal are driving around their school. Big freaking whoop-di—
oh
.”

Trisha Meier was standing on the school steps. When BradLee’s car pulled up, she hung up her phone with a flounce. Coluber lounged inside and BradLee hopped out of the car. He hugged her. He actually hugged her.

“Foul,” muttered Elizabeth.

“This mission is impulsive and rash,” said Jackson. “They’re going to guess what we’re doing. Pretend you have to go get something from your locker, Ethan.”

“I’m not missing this. You go get something.”

“You.”

“You.”

He lobbed an aggressive sigh. “Fine. I’ll pretend to check the tires.”

“Wait wait wait,” said Elizabeth. “He’s pulling back the seat for her! She’s climbing into the back. Trisha, honey, your skirt is way too short to—ugh! My eyes! They burn!”

“Missed it,” said Jackson, squinting out the windshield with interest.

“So BradLee is dating Trisha Meier,” said Elizabeth.

“That’s not true,” I said automatically.

“It’s likely,” said Elizabeth. “Did you
see
that hug? She totally did a boob-thrust.”

“Confirmed,” said Jackson.

Elizabeth swiveled around to give me a triple eyebrow-raise and a leer. It wasn’t the most attractive facial expression, which I was about to point out, but Jackson interrupted.

“They’re leaving.”

“Ooh, almost distracted myself.” She followed the Volkswagen to the exit, where a line of cars was waiting to turn out onto the busy street. BradLee’s left-turn signal went on.

“Not good,” said Jackson. “A left turn here can be dicey. There’s not often space for two cars to pull out at once.”

“Our bumpers shall be as one,” pronounced Elizabeth. She crept toward BradLee’s car.

“That will do,” said Jackson. We were so close that I could read the papers strewn on his rear window ledge.

“Hey, that’s my
Mansfield Park
essay,” I said. “I forgot that even existed.”

“Watch his brake lights,” Jackson ordered me. “I’ll take the traffic. You go when we say, Elizabeth.”

She was perched over the wheel like a bird of prey.

“Gap in traffic imminent,” said Jackson. “Three seconds.”

“Brake lights off,” I said.

“GO!” we yelled. BradLee neatly inserted the Volkswagen into the gap. With a screech and a roar, the Appelvan was on its tail.

Jackson turned and high-fove me.

“I’m the one who deserves congratulation,” said Elizabeth.

“Every time you talk, you look back,” Jackson said. “That worries me.”

“Every time you talk, your breath fogs up the windshield,” I added. “Which worries
me
.”

We followed them down the street. “You know what?” said Jackson. “We’re tailing the wrong people.”

“How is it even possible that we have this wrong?” I said. “We have a teacher, an administrator,
and
a Trisha Meier.”