Unit 2: Vocabulary from Readings

Was it normal to be so obsessed by a sticky brown hole in the ground in the center of Los Angeles?

Ever since I was three, when I started at the Meglin Kiddie Dance Studio, I was dubbed “The Chinese Shirley Temple”—always the one to be picked at auditions and interviews, always the one to get the speaking lines, always called “the one-shot kid,” because I could do my scenes in one take—even tight close-ups.

The barrage of questions stopped when we finally spotted our car. I didn’t answer her.

A shriek of agony from the trapped victim drew flesh-eating predators, which were then trapped themselves by the very same ooze which provided the bait.

For over ten thousand years the promise of the place drew animals of all sorts, mostly predators and scavengers—dire wolves, panthers, coyotes, vultures—all hungry for their chance.

That really isn’t much for a fourteen-year-old to work with, I thought, as absentmindedly wandered from my history class to the gym.

It seemed a cruel coincidence that I had overheard that conversation.

I stared at him in shock and a small sound of dismay escaped my throat.

It was a very sad and withdrawn girl who dragged into the principal’s office the next day.

Antonio then beat the air with a barrage of body blows and short devastating lefts with an overhand jaw-breaking right.

He walked up some dark streets, deserted except for small pockets of wary-looking kids wearing gang colors.

If Felix had any small doubt about their friendship affecting their fight, it was being neatly dispelled.

His long legs turned to jelly and his arms flailed out desperately.

A cry of alarm surged through Tompkins Square Park.

I pronounced this last word carefully, as if the credibility of my lie depended on its middle syllable.

“Oh! Just stupendous!” Miss Crosman hugged her, then looked up as Eugenie's mother walked in. “Stupendous!” she said again. “Oh! Mrs. Roberts! Your daughter has a gift, a real gift. It’s an honor to teach her.”

The umbrella glowed like a scepter on the blue carpet while Mona, slumping over the keyboard, managed to eke out a fair rendition of a cat fight.

For a moment no one said anything. Even Mona seemed to find the revelation disappointing.

They would stand, one arm around a beautiful woman, and scowl.

He scowled and let his upper lip quiver. His teeth showed along with the ferocity of his soul.

Umm, he thought, maybe it does work. He scowled with greater conviction.

As he trudged to English, he practiced scowling.