Read Online The Last Best Kiss by Claire LaZebnik - Free Book Online

Art and to sub for Mr. O when he’s sick. I doubt she’d have gotten hired if she hadn’t been a Sterling Woods alum: she graduated from here the year before Molly, which means she’s barely out of college and doesn’t look much older than most of the students. She doesn’t act much older either—she’s a giggler, and she’s blond and very pretty, but from what I’ve heard about the class she teaches, she’s not actually that good at either computer science or art. A lot of the students are way ahead of her in both, and they all say she just sends them over to the computers and sits at the front of the room reading magazines while they use various programs. If someone has a question, she usually asks another kid to help him out.
    She was captain of the volleyball team her senior year here, when Lizzie was on the team. The two of them were friends, so I’ve known her for years. Because I’m her friend’s little sister and she’s now in a position of authority at school, she seems to think it’s her obligation to criticize and advise me.
    I do not enjoy when she does either.
    “Hey, Anna!” Ginny spots me and pounces with delight. She’s wearing tiny volleyball shorts and a shrunken tee and has her blond hair pulled up and back in a neat ponytail. She’s also the assistant volleyball coach for the girls’ team, but it’s not like this outfit is required or anything—she must just like showing off her perfect body. The senior volleyball coach wears a tracksuit and a whistle.
    I’m drawing at a table. I don’t use an easel unless a teacher makes me. When I was a kid, I always drew standing up at our dining room table, and I guess the habit of working that way stuck. Mr. Oresco says I’m going to destroy my back if I don’t switch over to easels and I know he’s right, but I get so lost when I’m drawing and painting that I don’t even notice if my back starts to ache.
    I toss a “hello” back in her direction and kind of hunch over my artwork, but of course that’s not going to stop Ginny, who’s the sort who’ll peer over your shoulder even if you don’t invite her to.
    “Oh, Anna,” she says plaintively as she peers over my shoulder. “Aren’t we ever going to get you to take some chances with your artwork?”
    I stiffen. Everything about this statement annoys me, from the assumption that she’s been mentoring me to the implication that I’m artistically stunted. I say, “This isn’t done yet,” because it’s not, and because I’m hoping that will stop her from analyzing it.
    “Oh, Anna,” she says again—and now just those two words are enough to make me want to drive a sharpened colored pencil through her eye. “It’s not a question of done or not done. Nothing artistic is ever really done , is it? The important thing is whether you’re extending yourself. Are you stretching creatively? This feels so similar to what I’ve seen from you before.”
    I don’t want to defend myself to her. I shouldn’t have to. But it’s hard not to respond when someone’s standing two inches from you criticizing something you’ve made. “This is for my application portfolio.”
    “Art schools are going to want to see your range,” says Ginny, who—just to be clear—never studied at an art school. She went to USC, where she majored in Human Performance. “I’m sure you have plenty of samples of this kind of thing.” She flicks, almost contemptuously, at my drawing. “You need to show them you can do something like a vase of flowers. Or a plate of fish!” Maybe she notices my expression, because she quickly adds, “Or anything that’s colorful and close-up—the point is to let them see there’s more than one side of you.”
    “I really have to finish this.” I bend over my work.
    “You should be using an easel, you know.”
    “I like to work this way.”
    “Your poor back.” She starts rubbing it with the palm of her hand, which just makes me stiffen it more. “Oh, and