Perfect Couple

by Jennifer Echols

  I sloshed toward shore. But as I reached dry sand, I was anything but okay. My left eye stung. My right eye was worse. When I opened it, all I could see was blur. The beach was as bright as another planet with no atmosphere to filter the sun. I could hardly see my way back to the island of umbrellas and towels I’d come from. When I finally made it, I tripped over several boys and landed on the dog, who didn’t budge.

  “Move, dog,” I said rudely. She got up, sticking her sandy butt in my face as I opened my cooler for a thermos of water.

  Kennedy was telling the other guys about the indie film we’d seen at the Tampa Theater downtown last weekend. They were laughing uncontrollably. Kennedy was brilliant and had great comedic delivery. He would be perfect someday as the vastly intelligent, super dry commentator on a political comedy show. His shtick was as much about what he left out as what he said. At the moment, he was strategically omitting that we’d had an argument in his car on the way to the movie and that he still hadn’t been speaking to me by the time he dropped me off at home afterward.

  “Right, Harper?” I heard him ask. He wanted me to verify some funny point in the movie—something he hadn’t discussed with me one on one, because we’d hardly talked since then.

  This was his way of making up. After our fights, he ignored me until he just decided not to anymore. He asked me a question and I responded, and then it was like nothing had happened between us.

  This time, instead of answering, I poured freezing water over my hand and wiped at my eye. Now it felt like I’d gotten sand in my eyeball. I tried to shift the offending particle into the corner where my tears would flush it out. That was a mistake. The stinging was intense.

  I tried to open my eye. I couldn’t. My upper eyelid felt wedged shut by my contact. Was it possible that my contact had drifted that far back? Could it float even farther and get stuck on my optic nerve? Where was my eleventh-grade anatomy knowledge when I needed it?

  “Guys,” I called. Kennedy kept up his blasé movie commentary while I went blind in one eye. Tears streaming down my cheek, I said more loudly, “Guys, do any of you wear contacts? I need help. I think my contact has shifted into the back of my eye socket.”

  “Harper,” Kennedy said, “only you.”

  I took in a deep breath to calm myself, but I was on the verge of panic. These boys were not going to help me. Kennedy would make fun of me while this piece of flexible plastic sliced its way into my brain and gave me a lobotomy. The girls would help me, but they were too far away to hear me yell over the surf, and I couldn’t open one eye, and now I couldn’t see out of the good eye because of the tears. I felt like screaming.

  Strong hands framed my face. One thumb pulled at my lower eyelid. I was surprised Kennedy had relented and come to my rescue. My hero said, “I wear contacts, and I know all about this, unfortunately. Let me help.”

  But it wasn’t Kennedy’s voice. It was Brody.

  6

  “OPEN YOUR EYE,” BRODY SAID.

  “I can’t.” I was almost sobbing.

  “Noah,” Brody said, “kneel here in front of her so the glare from the beach isn’t in her eyes. Will, pour some water on my hand.”

  “It’s not sterile,” Kennedy pointed out from a distance.

  “It’s a beach,” Brody said, sounding irritated. “Nothing is sterile. At least get the sand off.”

  I heard water hiss in the sand and tried to be patient. So much moisture was coming out of my eyes that the contact should have washed out already, but I could feel it still lodged somewhere it should never have gone.

  His hands were on my face again. He pulled at my eye. He was closer to me than he’d ever been, his skin only an inch from mine, but I couldn’t enjoy it with all these guys watching us and my eye falling out. “Harper, relax,” he said.

  Relax? Impossible. I had a boyfriend and a crush on another guy. I’d given myself a mini-makeover to impress my crush, and now he was trying to help me through my mortifying comeuppance, my punishment for trying to attract him. I felt like a spy who had to stay undercover after she’d been shot.

  I sucked in another deep breath, counted to five in my head, and exhaled. I relaxed under Brody’s hands.

  He opened my eye. The huge blur of his finger came at my eyeball, but I managed not to flinch as he manipulated the contact. And suddenly—ahhh. My eye still stung, but I could tell the contact was back in place.

  “Thank you so much,” I said, cupping one hand over my eye. I kept the other shut too, because that felt better. I couldn’t see Brody in front of me, but I felt his warmth there. I said, “It was burrowing into my sinuses and wanted to come out my nose. Is it supposed to do that?”

  “No,” he said. “You must have rubbed it really hard. Maybe you should take it out.”

  “I wouldn’t have anywhere to put it.”

  “You’re supposed to carry a small bottle of contact solution with you everywhere,” he said, “and a contact case, and a spare pair of glasses.”

  “Do you carry all that stuff?” I asked.

  “No, I’m a guy. Are your contacts expensive? Maybe you should just throw it away.”

  “They’re expensive,” I said, “and I can’t see without them, and I have to drive home.”

  “I could drive you home,” he offered.

  “Did you get it?” Kennedy called from behind Brody—still several towels away. He hadn’t bothered to come any closer to help.

  Maybe he wasn’t even asking about my contact. The film conversation had continued despite my medical emergency. He could have been asking Quinn if he’d gotten a ticket to next week’s indie. At any rate, Brody ignored Kennedy. He asked me quietly, “Did you bring sunglasses?”

  “I don’t have any,” I said sheepishly. “I couldn’t wear them before because I’ve always worn glasses.”

  “Contacts make the glare worse, so sunglasses are more important. You can have mine.” He pulled up my free hand and gave me what I assumed were his sunglasses.

  “No, you need them.”

  “I’ve got another pair in my truck.” I heard him rattling the ice in the chest again. “Lie down.”

  His voice had a bossy edge. I kind of liked it. I did what he said and lay down on the towel.

  He handed me a cold, wet bundle. “Press this to your eye, but not hard. Take a time-out. You’ll feel better in a minute. Your eye will re-lubricate or whatever.”

  “Thank you.”

  I lay on my tummy in the hot shade, breathing deeply and evenly, willing my eye to feel better. The boys were talking about TV shows now and had obviously forgotten I was there, because they were repeating the kind of jokes boys didn’t usually tell when they knew girls were listening. I didn’t hear Brody’s voice, but I assumed he’d moved back into the group with the rest of them.

  Then a warm, comforting hand settled on my back. My mind spun with who would be so kind to me. Definitely not Kennedy. Possibly Quinn or Noah. They could get away with it because Kennedy would have no reason to be jealous. Probably Brody, and then Kennedy would be jealous. Or should be. Maybe Kennedy couldn’t see his hand on me.

  I tried to enjoy the camaraderie, but I couldn’t stand the suspense any longer. I lifted my head and squinted across my body with my good eye.

  It was the dog, lying right beside me with her chin on my back. Now that I knew it was her face and not a boy’s hand, I recognized the feel of her hair and the trickle of her slobber.

  I put my own head back down.

  After a few minutes, the guys’ voices moved away one by one. I heard them shouting out in the water. Only Kennedy and Quinn were left, making fun of Mr. Oakley, which I kind of resented because I liked Mr. Oakley. When I’d told him I wanted a press pass to photograph the football games, he’d set out to give me a football lesson rather than rolling his eyes like Kennedy had. I felt so distanced from the fun I’d come here to have, wrapped up in my own resentment and pain, that I almost jumped when Kennedy spoke just above me. “Harper, ar
e you okay?”

  “I’m better,” I said without moving. I am shocked that you give a shit, I thought.

  “We’re going to the snack bar,” he said. “Want anything?”

  “No, thanks,” I said.

  Alone under the umbrella, I spent a few more minutes trying to chill. I let the cool cloth soothe my eye. Finally I took it off and blinked. My eye worked, and my contact stayed in place, thanks to Brody. I unbundled the cloth and looked at it. It was a huge T-shirt emblazoned with PELICANS FOOTBALL. Brody’s last name was written in marker on the hem.

  I placed his sunglasses on my nose and slowly sat up, tumbling the dog off me in the process. I was ready, however reluctantly, to rejoin my safe and small and constantly disappointing world.

  Brody sat back on his elbows one towel over, watching me.

  “Feel better?” he asked.

  “Yes, thanks.” I squinted at him, feeling my face slowly flush. I wondered what was keeping him here. Not me.

  “I went to my truck to get my other sunglasses,” he said, peering at me over the top of them. “When I got back, everybody was gone. Kennedy left you by yourself?”

  “Just to go to the snack bar.”

  Brody glared in the general direction of the snack bar far down the beach as if he disapproved. I would have thought his concern was silly, except that my eye did still burn every time I blinked.

  “Do you know where the other girls have been gone so long?” he asked.

  “Mmmm,” I said, which meant Yes and If I tell you, I will seem like the scheming bitch I am becoming.

  He gave me a knowing look over his shades. “Did Grace go try to get beer from those college guys?” When I didn’t answer, his shoulders dropped in frustration.

  “Why don’t you stop her?” I asked. “Or . . . help her?” Stopping her was what I would have tried to do if I’d been her friend, but helping her was probably more up Brody’s alley. He wasn’t the class party animal. That would be Sawyer—at least, before Sawyer changed his ways last week, according to Tia. But the gatherings at Brody’s house when his mom was out for the night weren’t dry.

  He smiled at me. “The first rule of breaking rules is that you take some basic precautions not to get caught, right?”

  I didn’t answer, because I wouldn’t know. It did sound a lot like Tia’s opinion on the subject.

  “It’s Labor Day,” he said, “it’s daylight, it’s a public beach, and the cops are all over the place. Grace is being stupid. Besides, I think she’s getting more than beer from one of those guys.”

  “Oh.” I puzzled through what this meant. He didn’t sound upset that she might be cheating on him. But inside, he must burn with jealousy. That’s why he’d been paying so much attention to me. Grace hadn’t been around to see, but he’d hoped it would get back to her.

  This didn’t explain why he was still here, alone with me.

  “Let’s see that eye,” he said.

  Again, I got a little excited at his bossy command. In the last half hour I’d come to think of him as the best candidate to get me to the emergency room if my eyeball popped out. I sat up on my knees. Just as before, our bodies almost touched. He took off his shades, slid the ones I’d borrowed from my face, and placed his pointer finger gently on my lower eyelid. “It’s still a little red, but not nearly as bad as it was.” He nodded down the beach. “Why don’t we go to the pavilion and take the picture for the yearbook? That will get you out of the glare.”

  “Okay. Let me get my camera out of my car.”

  “I’ll go with you.”

  I held out my hand. “Sunglasses, please. Definitely. Thank you.”

  We headed for the parking lot, leaving the dog behind. She made no move to follow us. I supposed she would be okay by herself. Our town didn’t have a leash law because the hippie city government thought animals should run free like the wind. Someone needed to relay this to the dog, who rolled over on her back, watching upside down for Will to return.

  As Brody and I walked together across the melted asphalt lot, I said, “Sorry, my car’s all the way back here.”

  “We could have gotten in my truck and driven to your car.”

  “And then driven around the parking lot for the rest of the day after someone stole your space.” I laughed.

  “That doesn’t sound too bad,” he said.

  Was he implying he’d enjoy driving in circles with me? He kept saying things like this, or I kept interpreting them that way. I had to remind myself the only concrete evidence I had that he liked me was a cold compress he’d constructed from his T-shirt. Lately my brain had turned into a multiple-choice “Does he dig me?” quiz from Seventeen.

  He snapped me out of it by exclaiming, “A 1990 Dodge Charger! This is you?”

  “Yeah,” I admitted as we stopped behind the trunk. “Granddad bought it when he was in his midforties. Grandmom had just left him and moved across town with my mom to live with her mom. The car was his consolation prize, I guess.”

  Brody put his hand out to stroke the red metallic paint. He snatched his hand back when the hot surface burned his fingers. “You’re driving your granddad’s midlife crisis?”

  “He lets me borrow his midlife crisis.” I unlocked the stylish (not) louvered hatchback and pulled out my camera case.

  Brody reached up and closed the hatchback for me. “I hear these things are pretty fast. What have you gotten it up to?”

  “Thirty.”

  He gaped at me, horrified. “You’ve never taken it out on the interstate to see what it can do?”

  “Nope.”

  He grinned and raised his eyebrows. “Do you want me to try it?”

  “I heard you were one point away from getting your license revoked because of all your speeding tickets.”

  “True. See? That’s why I need you, Harper.”

  I looped the strap of my camera bag over my bare shoulder. As we turned for the pavilion, I said casually, “I’ve been reading about you in the newspaper.”

  “Yeah.” He smiled wryly. “That’s taken some getting used to. You have to keep it in perspective. In a town this small, high school football is entertainment. The only alternatives are the beach and a theater showing two movies. Unless, of course, you drive to Tampa with Kennedy to see the latest indie.”

  A little sarcasm? His tone wasn’t sarcastic, but his message must be. Maybe he liked me after all. But I wouldn’t let him change the subject, because I wanted him to explain something to me. “I was curious about this morning’s newspaper article. I couldn’t believe they were so down on you—and after you won the game!”

  His smile faded. Though we were walking leisurely across a parking lot, his whole body took on a guarded look like he was about to get tackled.

  “I just wondered whether they were making that up to sell newspapers,” I said, “or if there was really something wrong with you at the game.”

  He watched me silently. Not a muscle moved in his face.

  I asked him, “Are you having problems with somebody because Noah came out?”

  “No,” he said firmly. “Are you?”

  I shrugged. “Kennedy was mad about what Sawyer said at the end of class.”

  Brody nodded. “I felt bad about leaving you alone in Ms. Patel’s room after that. I couldn’t tell whether you were upset. You never look like anything bothers you.”

  “I don’t?” I asked, genuinely surprised.

  He shook his head but watched me through his shades. As a result, I began to feel very hot and bothered. Heat crept up my neck and along my jawline.

  “Now you do seem upset,” he said. “Kennedy has no right to be mad at you because of something Sawyer said. If he was man enough, he’d take it up with Sawyer.”

  The idea of this made me uncomfortable. Kennedy was much bigger. Sawyer was more cunning and perhaps a little evil.

  We reached the edge of the parking lot and the wooden stairs down to the pavilion. I called over my shoulder, “If it’s no
t Noah, what was bothering you at the game? Or was there anything at all? You won, so the newspaper critiquing how you won seems kind of harsh.”

  He laughed shortly. “I wish the newspaper would hire you.”

  That was a good one. It was all I could do to keep track of which direction the ball was going on the field. I asked, “Is there something wrong?”

  The pavilion was a large octagon with a vaulted wooden ceiling and thick stucco walls built to withstand tropical storms. Windows cut in all sides gave us a view of the beach. The sound of the ocean echoed inside. Beachgoers tended to use the pavilion as a lunchtime picnic area, or a shelter from the midday sun. In the late afternoon, it was empty.

  The shelter was so dark in contrast to the bright day that I had to take off Brody’s sunglasses to see. I hung the earpiece on the side string of my bikini bottoms, which I meant to be provocative but probably carried all the sexual overtone of a pair of pliers in a tool belt.

  Brody removed his shades too. The shadows overhead descended across his face. The circles under his eyes seemed darker. He blinked and took a long breath. Something was wrong.

  He set one shoulder against the wall. “Don’t tell anybody,” he said. “Only Coach knows.”

  I backed to the stucco beside him. “I’m good at keeping secrets,” I promised.

  He watched me for a moment and slowly raked his hair out of his eyes. “I got hurt,” he said. “That part’s not a secret.”

  “When?” I asked sharply. “It may not be a secret, but I didn’t hear about it.” If I had, I wouldn’t have been able to think about anything else. “Are you okay?”

  “Don’t I look okay?”

  “Brody!” I wailed, fed up with his teasing. I didn’t want to joke about this.

  “Yes, yes, I’m okay,” he assured me, waving my concern away. “It happened before school started, in practice. I got dinged.”

  “Dinged,” I repeated. “What’s that mean?”

  “I got my bell rung.”

  “Your bell,” I puzzled. Was that a euphemism for an injury to the jockstrap area? Even Brody would have turned way redder in the face if he was admitting that.