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Shmoop alert! Unidentified question headed this way...

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Which words could fill in the blanks so that the sentence below makes sense?

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To Jessica, who felt anxious about playing the lead role in the musical and wanted

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a(n) blank to skip it, getting the flu just before the big performance felt like a(n) blank.

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Here are the potential answers.

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So what's going on in this sentence? We know that Jessica wasn't feeling too hot about

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playing the lead, so we can assume she wanted a reason to skip her big debut.

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Let's see if any of these first blank options help us get that across.

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"Compensation" means to receive some kind of a payment for a loss, so it's just not

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right for this role. "Accolade" in an expression of approval

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or praise. Jessica is too chicken to try for this, therefore (B) is off the list.

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(C), "reward," isn't getting any accolades from us, because it doesn't make sense at

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all in this context.

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"Excuse" totally works. Jessica is definitely looking for any excuse to not do the part.

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We'll make sure (E) doesn't have any hidden talents before we post this cast list, though.

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Nope, "privilege" is total nonsense. (E) is out of consideration.

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It looks like (D) gets the part. We already gave the first blank the go-ahead, and the

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second blank looks good, too.

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"Godsend" refers to something super lucky, like, say a gift that "God sent."

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For Jessica, getting the flu was the best thing ever. For her understudy, it was probably

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a good thing as well.

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Although it might not have been a godsend for the audience.

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