self help reading + music

from What is the What, Dave Eggers:

They were the Royal Nieces of Pinyudo. It was unlikely that these four girls unaware of their nickname, and no one doubted that they found it agreeable. They were aware of the reverence we had for them, but still, they seemed oblivious to me in particular.

As the semester wore on, I began to doubt my strategy. I was the best student in the class, but they paid me no mind. I began to worry that they didn’t care about the academic achievement of me or any boy. It was likely they wanted nothing to do with someone of my status

It took the entire semester, but finally my efforts toward the Royal Girls bore fruit. With one week left before classes let out for a month, as I was leaving school one day, Agum positioned herself in front of me and said something. It was as likely as a zebra appearing before me and whistling. What had Agum said? I had to piece the words together. It was all so sudden, the changing of one life into another. I was so jarred I heard nothing. I had been looking at her eyes, her lashes, her mouth that was so close to mine.
--Achak, my sister has something to ask you, she had said.
Agar, the eldest and tallest, was suddenly next to her.
Her sister stomped on her foot and was punched in return. I didn’t know what was happening, but it seemed good so far.
--Do you want to come to lunch at our house? Agar asked
I realized at that moment that I had been standing on my tiptoes. I righted myself, hoping they had not noticed.
--Today?, I asked.
--Yes, today.
I thought a moment. I thought long enough to think of the wrong thing to say.
--I cannot accept, I said.
I could not believe I said that. Why? Because I had been taught that a gentlemen refuses invitations. The lesson had been explained by my father, one warm night as I was helping him close the shop, but the context was not applicable here, I would later learn. My father had been talking about adultery . . not of an invitation to lunch.

I went about trying to recover. What could I do? I had to take the invitation, now dust, and somehow reconstruct it. I would make fun of myself. Could I act as if I had been kidding?

--I shouldn’t have said no, I said. I wanted to go to lunch.
--Then why did you say no? Agar said.
--Because . . .
As we spoke, I hesitated, Agum joined us. And under that sort of pressure, I had a blessed and fortuitous thought.
--I was concerned what your mother would think of me.
Now Agar and Agum were interested.
--What do you mean?
--I’m from the Kinka Malual Giernyang. I don’t speak your dialect. My customs are different. I wasn’t sure if your mother would accept me.
--Oh! Agar said.
--For a while, Agum said, we thought you were brain-damaged.

Agar took my right hand in hers and spoke. The eyes of Agum and Akon were upon us. They seemed both expectant and familiar with the script we would follow.
--Now we’ll play hide and seek, Agar said. –First you have to find something that I hid here.
Agar pointed to her chest. I took a quick breath.
--You have to look for it. With your hand.
I glanced to the to the other girls for help. They nodded at me. They were all in on this! I felt as able to put my hand under her shirt as I might make fire from earwax. I stood, smiling dumbly. My nervous system has ceased functioning.
--Here! Agar said, quickly taking my hand and putting it under her shirt . . . You have to look!
I forced my hand to make cursory explorations around Agar’s torso. I didn’t know what was what. –Okay, That was a good try, she said. –I think you found it.
--Now we have to find something on you, Agum said.
--I think it’s in there, Agar said, pointing to my shorts.
This was a very different step, and I could not watch . . . In seconds, all three girls had looked for the missing thing in my shorts, and, satisfied they had found it, informed me that something was now lost under their dresses. I obliged . . . I was very bad at looking for things, so I had to look and look! This was my life for many of the days that year in Ethiopia. It was not the worst of my years.

lenny kravitz – breathe chromeo mix