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Playing Carnegie

By Valerie Banfield

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EXCERPT - Carla sat in front of the old spinet and pounced on the keys. The heavy chords of the Rachmaninoff concerto rained down with such fervor that even the composer might have pardoned the inaccuracies of her execution. Just as she leaned into a troubling key transposition, an unwelcome presence glided across the classroom and wriggled up her neck. She stumbled over the next two chords and pulled her fingers away from the ivories as she glanced over her shoulder.
Mildred Hendricks, fiend, tormentor, and the high school’s head paper shaker, stood in the doorway. In the ensuing silence, she raised her hands, obscuring the large R stitched to the front of her cheerleading uniform, and clapped. The slapping of one palm against the other was slow, methodical, and nothing short of demeaning, just as the queen intended.
“Lovely, Carnegie.”
Carnegie? A new one. Mildred and her pompom entourage weren’t typically clever. They were, however, monotonous in their ridicule of Carla’s threadbare wardrobe and her social standing. Even her high IQ earned disdain, as her test scores often altered the grading curve. Popular, she was not. Being her mother’s daughter didn’t help.

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