Kind of Sort of Fine by Spencer Hall

Author:Spencer Hall
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Atheneum Books for Young Readers
Published: 2021-06-22T00:00:00+00:00

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Two days after our documentary about Rohan aired, the sign-up sheet we posted outside the TV studio was full. We added a second sheet, and by the end of the week, it was full too. People started tacking up Post-it notes with their info. On Friday afternoon, Hayley and I collect everything and spread it out between us on a table at Bad Pun Coffee. As we work through the names, I’m surprised to find that only a handful of them are clearly fake. Betty Humpter. Phil MaCrackin. You can guess what kind of things they wrote for their hidden talent.

Looking at all the notes is overwhelming. I don’t know how to sort them, and before I can think of the best way to proceed, Hayley slaps her hands down on the table so hard it jostles the sugar packets. “Okay. So first I say we get rid of the ones that are clearly boring or creepy,” she suggests.

At first I think she might be joking, but then she uncaps a red Sharpie and starts making her way down the first page. “Poker champion? I’m not interested in filming someone sitting at a card table for hours. Sorry, Chuck Billows.” She makes a long red slash across the paper with a flourish. It’s fun to watch her get so excited about this stuff.

She offers the pen to me, and I scan the list until I come to another bad one. “Amateur taxidermist? Definitely not, Sean Rutherford.” I draw a red line, and Hayley laughs a little. Maybe this isn’t such a bad method of sorting after all. When we’re done with the first pass, a quarter of the list is gone.

Next, Hayley rips a piece of paper from a spiral notebook and slides it across the table. “Okay. Now you go through and write down the top ten that seem the most interesting to you. I’ll do the same, and then we’ll compare lists.” I know this maybe isn’t the fairest way to judge our possible subjects, picking them on a whim of whatever strikes our fancy, but I can’t think of a better process, so I take another pass at the list. After fifteen minutes, we both push our lists to the center of the table for comparison.

“Really? The girl who said she’s learning to unicycle is in your top ten?” I say.

“That could be really interesting!”

“Watching someone fall off their unicycle a bunch of times is not interesting. We’re looking for people who already have well-developed talents. Not people who are trying to get them.”

“Fair, but what about you?” Hayley asks. “You put Nick Paulson on your list.”

“Yeah, he says he’s a stand-up comedian. I thought that could be really funny.”

Hayley places her hand on top of mine. “Oh, sweetie, no. Nick is on the boys’ tennis team, and one time he sat next to me on the bus during the drive to a tournament. He’s not funny. There were a lot of fart jokes that I’m pretty sure would’ve even made my little brother roll his eyes.

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