None of the other students were listening. The teacher was scraping chalk and saying something important about Paraguay and "the milk economy of the downtrodden." Paraguay, William knew, was next to Uruguay, but what did "guay" mean? William raised his hand, ready to learn.

William began his question, but the teacher interrupted him.

"How come you think nobody is listening, William?" the teacher asked.

The teacher explained that the majority of public school students died in horrible car accidents anyway, and if they escaped because of the jaws of life, they went on to have immoral sex, leaving them ravaged with disease, and if modern medicine improved, it spared them only long enough for their idealism to be crushed by teh weathering of age because the media controls everything and only people born with trust-funds have a chance to escape life on the streets where every night is an adventure and you're lucky to eat half-used cat-food from a can.

William wanted to ask again what "guay" meant, but the bell rang and the teacher was sweating like crazy and yelling and drawing tombstones with the names of students on the chalkboard.

William wrote the words “milk economy,” underlined.