Page 137 - What Is Not Yours Is Not Yours

There were even little ladders for more convenient perusal. Day had never seen

anything like it.)
Flor, Day, Willa, Marie, and Theo unloaded their rucksacks and filled them
again with books from the Bettencourt shelves. Not having read any of the books
she was taking, Day made her exchanges based on thoughts the titles or authors’
names set in motion. She exchanged two Edith Wharton novels for two Henry
James novels, Lucia Berlin’s short stories for John Cheever’s, Elaine Dundy’s
The Dud Avocado for Dany Laferrière’s I Am a Japanese Writer, Dubravka

Ugrešić’s Lend Me Your Character for Gogol’s How the Two Ivans Quarreled
and Other Stories, Maggie Nelson’s Jane: A Murder for Capote’s In Cold Blood,
Lisa Tuttle’s The Pillow Friend for The Collected Ghost Stories of M. R. James.
She stopped keeping track: If she kept track she’d be there all night. But she left
with what looked like a quality haul, and so did the others. The Wenches had

their noses in books that were new to them for weeks. They waited for some
challenge to be issued from Bettencourt headquarters, but none came forth. The
boys didn’t seem to have noticed that their library had been compromised.
Maybe a drink swap would have been more effective.
—

FLOR AND BARNEY of the Bettencourters really seemed to be becoming ever more

of an item; it was gross, but the Wenches acted as if they didn’t mind so as not to
encourage a Romeo and Juliet complex. Besides, Theo summed up what all the
Wenches were feeling about the Bettencourt book haul when she looked up from
the pages of Kim Young-ha’s Your Republic Is Calling You and said resentfully:
“They have good taste, though.”

—

HERCULES DEMETRIOU didn’t show his face at the Female Trouble screening. That
didn’t matter; there was popcorn and Pepper and so much divine and diabolical
mayhem onscreen, plus Cookie Mueller telling it exactly like it is: Just ’cause
we’re pretty everybody’s jealous!
“Were you expecting to see someone?” Pepper asked her, as they walked out
of the cinema. “You kept looking round.”

She lied that she’d been watching the audience. It was a plausible lie because
she was the kind of person who watched audiences.
—