Page 25 (1/2)

"Just so happens my dance card is none too full at the moment"

"Is that a yes?"

He nods

"Good I do have one condition It’s more of a favor Two favors, actually"

He frowns for a h, it disappears into the halo of hair

"I don’t want to read Twelfth Night out loud You can do all the parts, if you want, and I’ll listen, and then I’ll read one of the other plays Or we can rent aI just don’t want to have to say it Not a word of it"

"How you gonna get aith that in class?"

"I’ll figure it out"

"What you got against Twelfth Night?"

"That’s the other thing I don’t want to talk about it"

He sighs as if considering "Are you a flake or a diva? Diva I can ith, but I got no time for flakes"

"I don’t think I’m either" Dee looks skeptical "It’s just that one play, I swear I’m sure there’s a DVD for it"

He looks atto X-ray nizes he has no other options, because he rolls his eyes and sighs loudly "There are several versions of Twelfth Night, actually" Suddenly, his voice and diction have coone professorial "There’s a filnificent But if we’re going to cheat like this, we should rent the stage version"

I stare at him a moment, baffled He stares back, then his rins And I realize what I said before was right: No one is who they pretend to be

Twenty-one

FEBRUARY

College

For the first feeeks of class, Dee and I tried ot dirty looks, especially when Dee broke out into his voices And he has lots of voices: a soleue--his take on a Welsh accent, I guess--as Fluellen, exaggerated French accents when doing the French characters I don’t bother with accents It’s enough forshushed in the library one too many times, itched to the Student Union, but Dee couldn’t hear me over the din He projected so well, you’d think he was a theaterBut I think he’s history or political science Not that he’s told limpsed his textbooks, and they’re all toovern the second play, The Winter’s Tale, I suggest that we enerally quiet in the afternoons Dee giveslook and then says okay I tell him to come over at four

That afternoon, I lay out a plate of the cookies that Grand me, and I make tea I have no idea what Dee expects, but this is the first tih I’ or if Dee is coives s it in the closet, even though mine is tossed over a chair He kicks off his boots Then he looks around my room

"Do you have a clock?" he asks "My phone’s dead"

I get up and show him the box of alarm clocks, which I have since put back in the closet "Take your pick"

He takes a long tiany deco number I show him hoind it He asks how to set the alar he has to be at his job at the dining hall at six The reading usually doesn’t take more than a half hour, so I’ About that Or about his job, even though I’m curious about it

He sits down on my desk chair I sit on my bed He picks up a tube of fruit flies frohtly amused expression "They’re Drosophila," I explain "I’ them for a class"

He shakes his head "If you run out, you can coet more in my mama’s kitchen"

I want to ask hiuarded Orfriends is a specific skill, and I missed the lesson "Okay, tis I don’t correct his pronunciation

We read a really good scene at the beginning of The Winter’s Tale, when Leontes freaks out and thinks that Heret to the end point, Dee packs up his Shakespeare textbook, and I think he’s going to leave, but instead he pulls out a book by soives me the quickest of looks

"I’ll ether in silence It’s nice At five fifty, the alaro to work

"Wednesday?" he says

"Sure"

Two days later, we go through the same routine, cookies, tea, hello to the "dropsillas," Shakespeare out loud, and silent study We don’t talk We just work On Friday, Kali comes into the room It’s the first time she’s seen Dee, seen anyone, in the roo moment I introduce them