Photograph: Jay Muhlin

What do you do?
I’m a senior at Graphic Communication Arts High School.

So you’re an artist?
No, I’m studying law enforcement. But I’m graduating on the 25th.

Congratulations! Are you gonna be a police officer?
No, see, I wanted to be a lawyer—because lawyers fight terrorism and racism, and because I know how to argue.

Have you lawyered yourself into a later curfew?
Yeah. Though it’s still early. But anyway, it turns out lawyers are liars. My dad told me. Now I wanna be a stockbroker.

Why?
My godmother is a stockbroker, and she’s worth, like, $1.5 million. She has her own condo in Manhattan, and, like, I don’t want to step out of New York unless I’m modeling or something. I have the long legs for it!

And the pose.
[Laughs] This is the “ugly-pretty” pose—you put your hands on your hips and collapse your shoulders. Anyway, stocks are for me. Like, math? I’m really, really, really, really good with numbers.

You know, to adults, teenagers seem way on top of things—like fashion, music and technology. Do you feel that way?
Um, yeah. My parents are old. [Laughs]I think we’re really advanced, with our iTouch and iPods and MacBook Pros.…

Should we just do away with adults altogether? Oh my God, that would be scary. There are some evil teens out there. Though if all teenagers was like me, then hey, it wouldn’t be a problem.

More thoughts from Jessica

Thank God I’m almost outta high school. The principal just came up with this new dress code: Guys can’t wear do-rags; you can’t wear hats in the building; girls can’t wear short skirts or short shorts.…If I wore these to school now, I’d get suspended.”

You know how guys dress these days—I heard it all came from Rikers Island: The two braids, the sneakers with no shoelaces.…Ew. When I first hooked up with my boyfriend sophomore year, he wore big white tees. I had to change that. Now it’s collared shirts and no butt hanging out.”

“I swear I can't dance. I try-and sometiemes I think I can. But you know the Harlem dances? Like, 'chicken noodle soup, chicken noodle soup, chicken noodle soup with a soda on the side'? And you gotta jump around and do your legs like noodles? I can't do that.”

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