Hot as Heller (Aster Valley 3)

I took the seat opposite him at the table and began asking him questions about ghosts and ghost movies. He looked a little confused at first but quickly began talking about horror movies I’d barely heard of. I held up a hand. “Slow down, I don’t watch horror movies.”

“So then what were you expecting me to talk about? Scooby-Doo?”

“Do you know who that is?” I had no idea they still showed that to kids.

Solo rolled his eyes. “Yes. Jeez. Everyone knows Scooby-Doo.”

“Good. So then you know about the ghosts there and how they were usually fake. The villain used them to move Shaggy and the gang where he or she wanted them, right? Sometimes the ghosts even tried to get the gang in trouble.”

Solo nodded.

I continued. “That’s how Shakespeare used the ghost in Hamlet. To get Hamlet where he wanted him to be. Only, not physically. The ghost egged him on toward vengeance.”

I began explaining more about the ghost’s role in convincing Hamlet to seek revenge. When Solo’s eyes glossed over, I stood up and pulled him away from the table. “Here, let’s act some of it out. It might make more sense that way.”

He looked around as if there were a dozen high school friends waiting in the bushes with their phone cameras pointed his way. “I’m not very good at acting…” he said.

I shot him a glance. “How many times have you acted in something?”

He rubbed his face with his hands before offering me a sheepish grin. “Point taken. Fine. But I don’t see how this is going to help.”

“Though this be madness, yet there is method in ’t,” I quoted, flipping through Solo’s copy of Hamlet until I came to the part I wanted. We took turns reading through some of the sections. Solo stopped here and there to ask questions, and I answered them as well as I could without getting too deep. But then he surprised me.

“So, it’s kind of like the ghost is in purgatory until he gets his stuff handled, and Hamlet is also kind of like… in a purgatory, too, since he’s—”

“Yes!” I yelped, unable to withhold my excitement at the lightbulb that had gone off in his head. “Exactly.”

His grin grew wider. “So in a way… the ghost is a reflection of Hamlet’s own mind.”

I sighed and held the paperback to my chest. “My work here is done. But not really, because I’m sure Hamlet’s ghost isn’t the only topic your teacher is covering, right?”

Solo’s smile faded. “Nah. Next week we have a test on the themes of action and inaction. And I’m not great with themes.”

“Not great yet,” I corrected, handing him the book back. “Believe it or not, it ties into the concept you already discovered. Purgatory is like indecision, right?”

His eyes opened wide with surprise again, and I wanted to throw my head back and laugh with satisfaction. I loved this stuff so much.

“You’re smarter than you look,” Solo said before realizing how his words had sounded. “Shit. I’m sorry, I didn’t mean it like that.”

Rather than give him an easy out, I challenged him. “How did you mean it?”

His eyes flicked away in embarrassment. “It’s just… I don’t know. That show you were in… you play this eager kid. Like a puppy. And then when your character gets a little older, he’s moody and shit. I guess I thought you were like that. Not into brainy stuff like Shakespeare and studying things in school.”

“I get that a lot. But I’d encourage you to remember that actors are not their characters. Natalie Portman went to Harvard. Wentworth Miller went to Princeton. Hell, Emma Watson went to Brown. And people still think of her as a sassy little witch.”

I’d caught a spark of interest in Solo’s expression when I’d mentioned the gay actor from Prison Break. It reminded me I’d promised to tell him my coming out story.

“Do you want to talk about anything else today or save it for tomorrow?” I asked so as not to push him if he wasn’t in the mood.

He glanced at the time on his phone. “Nah, I gotta go help my dads at the diner for lunch. Rain check?”

“You got it.”

“Hey, Finn?” Solo asked, suddenly looking less sure. His toe scraped through a patch of dirt, and his thumb tapped out a beat against his hip.

“Yeah?”

“This was good. Today. The Shakespeare stuff. Thank you. Also… I was wondering if maybe a couple of my classmates could join us tomorrow?” He hurried to add, “I mean, if I made them swear not to tell anyone about you? It’s just that they’re struggling, too, and this really helps.”

I hesitated. If I started teaching a group of kids Shakespeare in the park, there was no way it would go unnoticed. My agent would love that kind of media attention, but I’d always kept my Shakespeare stuff close to the vest.