Look at me: by Jennifer Egan

Author:Jennifer Egan [Egan, Jennifer]
Language: zho
Format: epub
Tags: Plastic & Cosmetic, Psychological fiction, Teenage girls, Medical, New York (N.Y.), Models (Persons), General, Psychological, Religion, Islam, Traffic accident victims, Surgery, Fiction, Identity (Psychology)
ISBN: 9780385502764
Publisher: N.A. Talese/Doubleday
Published: 2001-09-17T16:00:00+00:00

Chapter Eleven

Michael West stood at the chalkboard in front of the words “Inscribed Angles” and watched Mary Peterson punch out a wad of blue gum between her big serrated teeth. He felt the possibility of anger in himself and glanced at her covertly, hoping it would catch. The Walther was strapped to his calf.

“Henry is correct,” he said. “An inscribed angle is an angle whose vertex is on a curve, and whose sides contain chords of a circle. What does the angle do to the arc? Someone, please.”

They stared at him with their helpless mouths, their freckled cheeks and moist pale eyes. “Intercept,” said Marcie Blum.

“Precisely.”

The lesson continued. The blue gum looked poisonous, disinfectant. Michael raked himself against it, desperate to locate the anger that had lived in him like a hot coal for much of his life. In his eagerness, he’d begun watching news reports from the part of the world he had come from: dust, rage, starved zealous faces, languages he had trained himself not to think in anymore but occasionally still did, when he dreamt. The images jogged memories of his own rage, years ago, hearing English words in the street, or spying the bustling, clandestine trade in videotapes of Hollywood movies: cloudy, illicit, the apparitions barely visible through the murk of amateur recording devices used surreptitiously, heads of moviegoers sometimes blocking the picture. Yet infused with a promise that was like the sting of a scorpion. There was no recovery. Capture desire and the rest will follow. Wars, weapons; they were messy, obsolete. Feed people a morsel of something they’ll crave the rest of their lives, and you won’t have to fight them. They’ll hand themselves over. This was the American conspiracy.

“Are there additional questions?” he asked. Then, disliking his formal diction, he amended, as another hand went up, “Lemme guess. You wanna know if that’s gonna be on the test.”

Titters. A wad of blue gum. Michael lifted his foot, feeling the weight of the Walther at his ankle. He wore it often to school, secreted against different parts of himself, liking the sense of power, the implicit threat. The gun held the place where his anger used to be.

When the bell rang, they shuffled from the room in their winter boots. It was January, and the paroxysm of Christmas, that product America had packaged and exported nearly everywhere (he’d heard the streets of Istanbul were full of Santas) had subsided at last. Snow was predicted for later in the day, and Michael West looked forward to this. He had never seen it at close range.

The room emptied, and Lori Haft stood at his desk. She often required his help after class, and her scores had improved. Michael sought this avidly, to maintain good relations with her mother: the fool who sees everything. He dreaded to confront her in his present, weakened state.

“So,” Lori said. She wore a tight green sweater with little rabbits woven into it. She twirled her hair on a finger. “What’s important?”

“You tell me what you think is important.

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