Her teacher entered and went to a lectern. He wore a light blue sweater and jeans and had a dark brown goatee, but he was mostly bald with two even strips of hair just above his temples. From where we were sitting, they looked painted on his head. He was giving a lecture on Mark Twain's Huckleberry Finn.
"Did you read it?" I asked Ava.
"The first ten pages," she said. "Boring."
"Boring?"
I had read it in eleventh grade and thought it was one of the most fun and interesting novels taught that year. How could she call it boring? Despite her attitude, she looked as if she was listening attentively but took no notes. Others were either writing in notebooks or typing on little portable computers. The point of the lecture was what exactly the importance was of Huck saying, "All right, I'll go to hell."
