“Good,” a few people say throughout the room. It’s unnecessarily hot in here. I look over at Abigail, who’s fanning her face as she takes notes on her iPad.

“She hasn’t even said anything yet,” I whisper, and pull my long frizzy hair over my face like a curtain with secrets behind it.

Abigail tucks her short hair behind her ear and rolls her eyes at me. “Doesn’t mean I don’t have notes.”

“Thank you for turning your essays and book projects in,” Evelyn says, avoiding eye contact with me. Shit.

“I’m hoping to have them graded by next week. If you haven’t turned yours in, please do ASAP so I don’t have to spend the weekend grading. I do have an outside life, you know.” She smiles at us. “In the meantime, we’re going to focus on philosophy. Let’s get into some dialogue and try this again with more energy: How is everyone doing?”

I cough. It’s sad when such low enthusiasm is so evenly distributed throughout a room. I look down at my fingernails and wish they felt more. Evelyn paces in front of her desk. Then her eyes light up as she points to the back of the room. “Yes, Brendan?”

Heads turn. Brendan’s tie has a gravy stain on it, proof that the cafeteria wasn’t lying about its online menu: It was, in fact, Thanksgiving Thursday. Again. On Friday. “I feel a little blasé about life,” Brendan says with his cheek smooshed into his hand. He drags out blasé so it’s like blaahhhh-zay.

“What does that mean?” Doug asks, then looks over at me with an eyebrow raised. I shrug in a cool way because it’s very important that Doug likes me, understands how extraordinary I am, tells Gene I deserve a prom ask-cute, etc.

“Blasé means ‘over it,’” Josie calls out before Abigail can get her hand up. Abigail frowns at the split ends in her hair, which she always does when she’s annoyed. There haven’t been any updates on valedictorian.

“Blasé is ‘uninterested because of frequent exposure,’” Abigail clarifies.

Evelyn nods. “Right, girls. And I’m so glad you said that, Brendan.” She turns around to scribble on the chalkboard: blasé. “Is anyone else feeling some existential despair? Perhaps grappling with the meaning of life in the face of death?”

“Uh, what?” Jared asks, squinting at Evelyn through his clear-framed glasses.

“That wasn’t exactly what I meant,” Brendan mumbles nearly inaudibly.

From the side of the room by the windows, the heater makes a noise like a mouth breather choking on its own air, and Evelyn pulls a finger puppet out of her pocket. Abigail and I look at each other with wide eyes. The puppet has dark hair and a creepily stitched face with lopsided eyes and an actual Cheerio for a mouth.

“Don’t worry, this is why I brought Albert Camus,” Evelyn says, holding her pointer up, then turning the puppet to look at her. (She waves to it.) When she turns the puppet to us and waves, I’m the only one who waves back. And then I want to sand my fingers down with a nail file. “Does anyone know who he was?” Evelyn asks.