Four Of A Kind-Chapter 157: [3.59] The American Dream is a Test

The AP English test sat on my desk like a dead body I was being asked to identify.

Ms. Vance walked between the rows distributing packets with the kind of reverence usually reserved for handing out indictments. Her heels clicked against the floor in perfect rhythm. Click. Click. Click. The sound of my impending doom arriving in three-inch intervals.

"You have ninety minutes," she announced, her voice carrying that specific teacher quality that made even breathing feel like a crime. "Begin when I say."

I looked down at the essay prompt.

Analyze the use of symbolism in F. Scott Fitzgerald’s The Great Gatsby, with particular focus on how physical objects represent abstract concepts. Use specific textual evidence to support your thesis.

Perfect. A question I could answer in my sleep two weeks ago.

Except right now, my brain felt like someone had replaced it with cotton balls and regret.

"Begin."

Pens started scratching across paper immediately. The overachievers in the front row were already writing thesis statements. I could practically see the five-paragraph essay structure materializing from their heads like some kind of academic Stand ability.

I picked up my pen.

Put it down.

Picked it up again.

What the hell was wrong with me?

The green light represents Gatsby’s hopes and dreams and unattainable desire for...

For what? I’d written this exact sentence three hundred times. I knew this material backward and forward.

So why couldn’t I remember the next word?

My phone buzzed in my pocket. Silent, but I felt it. Probably Cassidy panicking about her own test. Or Vivienne sending me seventeen reminders about the launch party. Or Harlow asking if I remembered to eat breakfast.

Or my mother.

No. I blocked her. She couldn’t text me anymore.

But what if she got a different number?

"Mr. Angelo."

I looked up.

Ms. Vance stood at the end of my row with her arms crossed. "Is there a problem?"

"No ma’am."

"Then I suggest you start writing. Time’s ticking."

She walked away, and I could feel Felix two seats over giving me that concerned friend look that I absolutely did not need right now.

Daisy. That was the word. Gatsby wanted Daisy.

I started writing.

The green light symbolizes Gatsby’s desire for Daisy Buchanan, but more than that, it represents his idealized vision of the past and his belief that he can recreate what was lost. The light sits across the bay from Gatsby’s mansion, close enough to see but impossible to touch, which mirrors his relationship with Daisy herself.

Good. That worked. Next paragraph.

What about the eyes of Doctor T.J. Eckleburg?

They represented... something. God watching? The loss of religious values in the Jazz Age? The commercialization of American spirituality?

All three? None of those?

I’d definitely written about this in my essay for Sabrina. The one she helped me with while sleeping on my shoulder in the library nook.

When was that? Last week? Two weeks ago?

Time had become a thick, viscous thing since I started working for the Valentines, blurring days into an endless loop of tutoring, driving, schedule management, and trying not to think about which one of them had kissed me.

My pen stopped moving.

I forced it to continue.

The billboard with the eyes of Doctor T.J. Eckleburg overlooks the Valley of Ashes, creating a sense of surveillance and judgment over the characters’ moral failings. The eyes see everything but do nothing, suggesting...

Suggesting what? That God was dead? That morality was performative? That I should really have studied last night instead of playing UNO with two sisters who teamed up just to destroy me?

Twenty minutes had passed.

I had maybe four paragraphs. This essay needed at least six to hit the rubric requirements.

My phone buzzed again.

I ignored it.

Focus, Angelo. You’ve written about Gatsby twelve times. You know this book better than you know your own bank account balance.

Actually, that wasn’t saying much. My bank account balance was depressingly easy to memorize.

The cars. Write about the cars.

Gatsby’s yellow Rolls-Royce represents his new wealth and his desire to display his success to Daisy and the old money elite who look down on him. However, the ostentatious nature of the vehicle also reveals his insecurity and his need for external validation. Unlike Tom Buchanan, who doesn’t need to prove his wealth through flashy displays, Gatsby...

Gatsby what?

Performs. That was the word. Gatsby performs wealth because he wasn’t born into it.

Kind of like how I was currently performing competence while my brain was busy having a full meltdown about my mother’s texts and which Valentine kissed me and whether Cassidy was going to pass her test today.

Troublesome. All of it.

"Thirty minutes remaining."

My hand cramped.

I had maybe two and a half pages. The rubric wanted four minimum.

Alright. Time to pull out the emergency protocol.

When you don’t know the answer, make the question work for you instead.

I flipped back to the prompt and reread it.

Use specific textual evidence.

Fine. I could quote. I was excellent at quoting when my brain refused to analyze.

I started writing faster, pulling passages from memory and explaining them in the most basic way possible. The green light appears at the end of Daisy’s dock. Gatsby reaches for it. It represents hope but also delusion. Quote, explain, move on. The eyes watch the valley. The valley is full of ash. Ash represents decay. Quote, explain, move on.

It was mechanical. Robotic even. Ms. Vance would probably write something passive-aggressive in the margins about "surface-level analysis" and "unexplored potential."

But it would pass.

And passing was all I needed right now.

"Ten minutes."

I wrote my conclusion in approximately four minutes. Restated my thesis. Made a broad statement about the American Dream being corrupted by materialism. Mentioned how all the symbols work together to critique 1920s excess.

Done.

I set my pen down at the exact moment Ms. Vance called time.

"Pens down. Pass your papers forward."

Felix turned around and mouthed, "How’d you do?"

I gave him a noncommittal shrug.

He made a face that suggested he’d bombed completely.

Papers made their way to the front in a chain reaction. Ms. Vance collected them with the expression of someone preparing to grade sixty essays about the same book she’d been teaching for fifteen years.

"Dismissed. Enjoy your lunch."

The scraping of chairs and the thunder of footsteps filled the air as the classroom emptied in thirty seconds flat.

Felix caught up to me in the hallway. "Dude. That was brutal."

"It wasn’t that bad."

"I forgot what the Valley of Ashes even represented. I just wrote that it symbolized pollution and called it a day."

"Environmental consciousness. Could work."

"Or I could fail spectacularly and have to explain to my dad why his investment in my Hartwell education was a complete waste." Felix ran a hand through his hair. "Whatever. I need tacos."

"What?"

"Tacos. The universal cure for academic disasters. Seniors can leave for lunch, and there’s this place in Chelsea that does al pastor that’ll make you forget your own name." He grabbed my shoulder. "Come on. You look like death. When’s the last time you ate a real meal?"

I thought about it.

The egg breakfast this morning. Before that, the rice ball Mrs. Tanaka gave me yesterday. Before that...

"Point made," Felix said. "We’re going."

"I have Calculus next period."

"After Calculus then. One o’clock. Meet me at my Range Rover."

"I have—"

"Don’t even start with the ’I have to work’ thing. You’ve been looking like you haven’t slept in three days. The dark circles under your eyes have their own dark circles. Even I’m worried, and I don’t worry about anything except where my next meal comes from."

He wasn’t wrong.

"Fine. One o’clock."

His entire face lit up. "Yes! This is gonna be great! I’ll text you the address!"

He disappeared down the hallway before I could change my mind, probably already planning what to order.

I headed toward the math wing.

Calculus.

The test I actually should have been worried about, except my brain had decided that obsessing over purple eyes and wine-red hair was more important than reviewing derivative rules.

Great priorities, Angelo. Really stellar.

The classroom was already half full when I arrived. I found my usual seat in the back corner and pulled out my pencil, my calculator, and the pit of dread that had taken up permanent residence in my stomach.

Mr. Chen walked in at 8:57 with a stack of test packets and that smile teachers get when they know they’re about to ruin everyone’s day.

"Good morning, class. I hope you studied."

The collective groan could probably be heard in New Jersey.

"Today’s test covers derivatives, chain rule, and product rule. You have seventy minutes. Show all your work. No phones. No talking. No crying."

Someone in the front row actually whimpered.

Chen started distributing packets. When he reached my desk, he paused. "Angelo. You feeling alright? You look pale."

"Fine, sir. Just tired."

"Mm." He set the packet down. "Well, wake up. This test isn’t forgiving."

Fantastic.