still Ch 2

In English Yvette sits next to me and moans, “I think I have something, but it’s not going to be as good as yours.”
“Mine sucks. Trust me, you’re good.”
She smiles and looks pleased.
“Hey, Yvette…you’re going to UCLA so you can do acting, right?”
“Oh yes! They’ve got the BEST acting department, and it’s a perfect opportunity to make connections. But it’s also a pretty good school…not as good as Stanford, maybe, but very good nonetheless.”
“Nonetheless…um, have you heard of this guy?” I hand her the agent’s business card.
“Aeski Heming…you know. I haven’t. Talent agent,” she looks perplexed as she hands it back. “Why? Are you thinking of going to UCLA instead? I thought you’d already sent back your acceptance letter to Stanford.”
“No…I did. It’s just that, well, I think I might defer college for a while and, I don’t know, dabble in acting.”
She gasps and asks, with a twinge of envy, “That’s your agent? Wait. You’ve never even been in a school play. And you have an agent now? How is that possible?”
“Yvette! Would you mind keeping your voice down?” Mr. Henson is looking at her with disapproval. He’s grading our final essays while we watch an inspirational movie about a group of inner city scribes.
“Sorry,” she mouths, still looking at me with a mixture of admiration and disbelief.
“No,” I whisper, leaning closer to her. “He’s not my agent, he just gave me his card.”
“Oh,” she looks slightly placated. “But you are going to pursue acting, you think? I could help you, you know, we could go over some dialogues, if you’d like.”
Over Mercy’s dead body, I think. “You think I’d have a chance…at acting, I mean?”
She smiles, “With my help, why not? It’s a craft, like anything else.”
“Thanks,” I whisper.