Little Miss Perfect

by Julia Kent

  “No, no. But how about next week?”

  “Deal.” She waves as she leaves, her absence making me ultra-aware of Will.

  He watches her until she gets in her car and drives away. “She's nice.”

  “Of course she is.”

  “I wasn't implying otherwise.”

  “No – I mean, she's nice. Rayelyn is nice. She's always been nice.”

  “I don't know her. That's probably the first time I've talked to her since...” He frowns.

  “Ever?”

  “Maybe?” His honesty comes with raised shoulders in a I dunno? gesture.

  “Well, you're right. She is nice. And she's my friend.”

  “Good to know you're capable of having one nice one.”

  “What's that supposed to mean?”

  “The other two, Purple Stephanie and Freaky Feisty aren't exactly what I'd call nice.” Botching “Persephone” like that is a nice, snarky touch I can't appreciate right now because I have to defend my friends.

  “And you think Ramini, Osgood, and Fletch are?” I am boggled by the idea that he's picking at the social qualities of my friends.

  “They're assholes,” he answers pleasantly.

  The incongruity of his facial expression and his words shuts me down. All I can do is let the wind whisper nonsense in my ear while I try to understand who I am and how I ended up in a parking lot with Will right now. I need a distraction.

  I look at my phone. “Oh my GOD! We're late!”

  “Late for the exam? No way.”

  “No. Late for studying!”

  “You seriously care about this stupid government exam?”

  “If I go to grad school, my high school grades matter.”

  “You were just shocked when I brought up grad school.”

  I smirk.

  He smirks back.

  “Plus, you know...”

  “Valedictorian. You really want it that bad?”

  “Don't you?” Five different people in his inner circle have told me in the last week that I should just give up. That Will is smarter. That he deserves it more than me.

  “Yeah.”

  I shrug at him. We hold each other's gaze. A camaraderie I didn't expect emerges, a shared bond of achievement. I'm not working this hard to beat anyone but me. If I win, I win because I put in the effort.

  If I lose, I lose because Will did more.

  I would be cheating him out of his victory if I softened.

  People who value what we value get it.

  The rest don't, and never will.

  “Got it.” He gestures ahead of him. “Ladies first.”

  I take the hint and, clutching my government textbook, start walking. We pause at his car. As he turns away from me, unlocking it and bending to find his book, the world starts to spin.

  In every good way possible.

  4

  “Hey! My yearbook!” Will backs out of his car, two books in his hands. One is our government textbook, and one is our yearbook.

  2009 is enormous on the cover, in stark relief in gold.

  My heart sinks. I don't have mine here. And this is my very last chance to get it signed by him.

  “Oh. Huh,” is all I can think to say.

  He bends back down in his car, fumbling, giving me an undeniably drool-worthy view of his muscular butt in those faded, snug jeans. When he reappears and makes eye contact, I swear he can read my mind.

  Which is so dirty it might as well be a mud pit to the center of the earth.

  “Do me?” He thrusts the yearbook toward me.

  “What?” The image those words conjures sets my body on fire again. I should have a fire extinguisher in my backpack for times I'm around Will.

  “Sign it? My yearbook?”

  “Oh! Right! Really? Me?”

  “Yes, you. No one else around.”

  “Oh. Uh. Okay.” My hand shakes as he gives me the pen. I will it to stop.

  My will isn't strong enough.

  “Hmmm,” I say, more to fill space than anything else. What can I say here? I have to go for boring and trite, because the alternative is to turn the pen ink into my own blood and bleed my undying love for him all over the page, and that would get messy.

  And potentially fatal.

  Socially, emotionally, utterly fatal.

  I can't die before I take my last final, right? That would seem so ridiculous, like collapsing six inches before the finish line of a marathon.

  But to write about how I really feel when it comes to Will? That would be certain death.

  So I ponder. I blink. I stare out into space until finally, Will clears his throat.

  “You're not inspiring confidence.”

  “Huh?”

  “If it takes you this long to think of something to say, I'm wondering if that's a reflection on me or you.”

  “HAH! It's me. It's all me.”

  It's you, Will. It's all you. Everything is you.

  Everything.

  Whatever I write has to be perfect. It has to last a lifetime.

  My lifetime. Not his. Because this whole interlude in the parking lot? It means nothing to him. It's a blip. Will is going to take the exam. Go home. Live his wonderful life. Achieve his amazing achievements. He'll fall in love and go out into the world and do great, authoritative things.

  Me?

  I'll hold onto these memories for longer than I should.

  So whatever I write can't be stupid. I'll live with regret and self-loathing forever if I don't get this right.

  Suddenly, it hits me.

  I know what to say.

  My shaking hand, though, needs a few seconds to chill the heck out.

  To Will, who always knows where he’s going. <3 Mallory

  The words write themselves. I close my eyes and let them sink in. It's a done deal, but that doesn't mean I can't reflect for a few seconds.

  I swallow, hard. That's personal enough, but not too personal. It's specific without being intrusive. It says something smart but not overly intellectual.

  And it's a form of praise.

  What I want to write is I love you and you're amazing and I wish we could be together and raise kids and have a long life after we backpack through Europe and maybe Thailand because all I want to do is spend every waking moment with you.

  But that might be a bit too much.

  He reaches for the yearbook.

  “No!” I snap the yearbook shut and toss it on his front seat. “Don't read it!”

  “What did you write?”

  Futile as it is, I try to block him from reaching in, my body angled, the space between us suddenly heated by conflicting interests.

  “Nothing! Read it after finals.”

  “Why wait?”

  “Because we have to study and our final is in an hour and – ”

  “Mallory.” He reaches out and grabs my wrist, a teasing tone in his voice, eyes completely serious.

  I am alive and dead at the same time.

  My wrist is the center of the universe.

  “Mallory,” he says again, my name on his tongue like a prayer.

  I stare at the spot where his fingers touch my skin, as if there's an answer in that tangent. Moving one step closer to me, he looks down. Terrified to look up at him, I stay silent. Still. Immobile.

  If I tip my head to the gods, will my daring be crushed by their wrath? How vain am I to think that Will is looking at me, touching me, breathing on me – because he might want to kiss me?

  Icarus flew too high and melted his wings, plunging to his death for hubris.

  I don't have wings.

  But I have a heart.

  You're not special, he said.

  And despite backpedaling, the words are there, burning with the intensity of the sun.

  Instead of moving away, he moves in, the red cotton of his shirt like a flag, a beacon, a warning, a sign. All the signals are mixed up inside me. Red means stop but it's also the color of rescue.

  Whi
ch is it?

  His hand moves, unfolding against my wrist, sliding up my forearm, every centimeter it touches turning eternity into a new world. There's a catch in his breath, a raggedness to the way he's breathing through his nose, and if I look up, what will I see?

  And if I look up, will he see me? The real me?

  I don't want his attention if he can't.

  Or worse – won't.

  One step closer and his breath pushes some of the straggling curls around my ear. We're touching, the heat of his body radiating through his shirt, my own lightweight T taking it in. A cool breeze pushes the freshly rained-on air and my skirt catches a wet spot on the car, sticking to it, making my calf wet. Every part of me is hyper aware of every part of my existence.

  “You know,” his hushed voice turning the skin around my ears to a roaring campfire, the feeling delicious and warm, heated and smoky. It holds promise, provides beauty, and makes me relax at the same time it has to be contained before spreading danger.

  Danger.

  If I look up, what kind of danger lurks in the sliver of space between us?

  The danger of assumption.

  I must be reading him wrong.

  I must.

  “So!” I say, suddenly chipper, taking a step back as he moves forward, leaving me wondering forever and ever if I'm inventing this. “Good luck!” I extend my hand for a shake.

  A nice, safe, unfuzzy handshake.

  “Uh, what?” Head tilted down, he looks up, meeting my eyes, the angle not much different from moments ago yet another emotional continent away.

  “Good luck! With the, uh, exam. You know. May the best man win. Or best woman. Or best.... student. You know. The government exam. Gotta cram the judicial section so I can go in there and regurgitate and then forget it and spend a night praying and wondering if I'm valedictorian!”

  His hand takes mine.

  Is he pulling me toward him?

  “Mallory.” Confusion infuses his thick tone, the sound of my name coming from his throat like every wish being granted by a genie who is emerging from a bottle, not quite out but ready to perform magic.

  Rogue magic.

  The kind that hurts when it misfires.

  I pump his hand once, like a debate handshake. I pull away.

  “So, Will, thanks. You helped me with my vibrator.”

  Two guys walk by at that exact moment, both lighting cigarettes. Jim Janeski and David Galtino. Stoners. More Feisty's type than mine. Jim has long bangs that curl up, like Johnny Depp.

  “She didn't just say vibrator, did she?” he says to David, who gives me a once over.

  “What? Her? She's a brain. No way she even knows what one is.”

  Will glares at them but their backs are turned to us before either of them can see. Their laughter feels like having a box of roofing nails poured over my head.

  “Bye!” I practically run to the double doors where more students are coming out, moving through the oncoming crowd like I'm fighting the current while whitewater rafting. Through tears, I locate the nearest bathroom, a gold and blue series of painted, big cinderblocks with metal stalls attached.

  I find an empty one. It reeks of cigarettes.

  I don't care.

  A whiff of real, live nicotine smoke tells me someone's in here. I halt the shriek inside me and instead, roll my eyes to the ceiling, fighting tears. A whimper escapes.

  Shoes shuffle on the scuffed linoleum. “Hey? Is someone crying?”

  Persephone.

  I let the whimper go low, coming out in a long cry that becomes the word, “No.”

  “Mallory?” I look up to find Persephone's forehead, eyes, and nose hovering above me like a demented, nicotine-addicted poltergeist. A thin tendril of smoke curls up from the half-consumed ciggy in her left hand.

  “You're smoking? Again?” I sniff.

  “You look like you could use one yourself,” she says in a low, sympathetic voice. Jumping down from whatever she's standing on to be that high, the thump of her shoes rattles my bones.

  Her words let me drop my guard, whatever self-respect I have left mustering itself for duty at the same time I get to crawl into a friend fort and just breathe in the muted light.

  “Persephone?” There's Fiona. Her Doc Martens appear. “Who are you tormenting?”

  I emerge from the stall, my government textbook the closest thing I'll ever come to holding a toxic item in my fingers. “Me.”

  “What did you say to her?” Fiona grills Persephone. “You know she's fragile right now.”

  “I am?”

  “You're about to kick ass and be valedictorian! One more exam!” Frowning, Fiona examines my face. “You're crying! Did Will Lotham do this? What did he say to you? He was intimidating you, wasn't he? Got all his asshole friends to gang up on you again?”

  “No.”

  “Then what did he do?”

  “He touched me.” I look at my wrist. Then my hip.

  Outrage is in every muscle as her shoulders go back and she halts. “He – what?”

  Persephone stubs out her cigarette on the shelf over the sinks. “Shhhh! Someone's outside!” Reaching in her pocket, she pulls out a bottle of Paris Hilton perfume and sprays the air like she's crop dusting.

  A little gets in my eyes, stinging them. I welcome the pain. It takes my mind off the ache inside me.

  Fiona goes outside. “What are you doing here?” she calls out. I hear a man's voice, then footsteps.

  “You said Will touched you?” Persephone hisses, keeping her voice down. We assume there's a teacher in the hallway, talking to Fi. I don't care right now. What's he going to do? Give us detention?

  An electric current shoots through me. Could he strip me of valedictorian if I win?

  Wiping my eyes furiously on the hem of my shirt, I breathe through my mouth and glare at Persephone. “The perfume never, ever covers up the scent of the cigarette. Who are you trying to fool?”

  “Habit?” she admits.

  “You told us you only smoked a few!”

  “I lied.”

  “Obviously.”

  Fiona comes back into the bathroom, eyes wide, astonishment making her look younger and more innocent.

  “Who was that?”

  She looks at me. “Will.”

  “Will Lotham?”

  “No, Will Farrell. Of course it was Will Lotham!”

  “What was he doing?”

  “Standing out there, looking around. I told him he was being a pervert hanging out in front of the girl's room and he shook his head, then left.”

  “You did not say that to him!” I gasp.

  “Hello, Mallory? Have you met Fiona Gaskin? Here's your best friend – ”

  “Shut up!” Emotion makes me punch her harder than I mean to, her elbow banging into her rib.

  “Ow!”

  “What was Will doing out there? Is he stalking you, Mal?” Fiona's eyes go from innocent to deadly. “Because I will kick his sorry little quarterback ass.”

  “I don't want to talk about it.”

  “It must be bad!” Persephone gasps.

  “Just because I don't want to talk about it doesn't mean it's negative.”

  “It must be negative if you're hiding in the secret smokers' bathroom crying on the toilet.”

  “He – he touched me. I've been dreaming about Will Lotham touching me for the last four years.”

  “We know,” they say in unison. I don't like their weary tone, but whatever.

  “And then I swear, it was like he was going to – ” Pure embarrassment makes me shut down.

  “What? Hit you?” Enraged Fiona actually bares her teeth.

  “No! Not hit. Kiss!” I blurt out. The word feels like a mouth full of broken rocks.

  “Kiss?” I can tell by the bewildered way they both say it that it's foreign to them, too.

  “I AM SO STUPID! Of course he wasn't trying to kiss me ha ha. Fooled you!”

  I am fooling no one. Especially not m
yself.

  “Mal,” Fiona says, suddenly gentle, eyes boring into me the way you study an animal you're not sure is safe. “Are you okay? How many hours of sleep did you get last night?”

  “I'm fine. Just rattled.”

  “Because he was bullying you?” she asks.

  “Or kissing you?” Eyebrows sky high, It's clear Persephone has questions. Questions I can't answer right now, because I'm half out of my mind with a bazillion of my own questions, all begging for an answer from a guy who just walked away. A guy who is out of my league. A guy who just talked to me in a way that touched some deep core I have cradled inside for so long, protective and defensive.

  But he touched it when he touched me.

  When he dipped his head and said my name and –

  Fiona's phone rings in her pocket. Flipping it open, she answers with a curt “Hello?” Her eyes cut immediately to Persephone.

  “We're late,” she informs her.

  “For what?” Persephone shouts, fluffing her hair in the mirror, finger-combing it.

  “For that thing.” Tight-mouthed, she gives Persephone one of those eye transmitting looks that has a thousand unspoken words in it.

  “Thing?”

  “Thing,” Fiona snaps.

  I know what they're doing. My mom and dad are holding a surprise party for me tonight. Even if I'm salutatorian and not valedictorian, they want to celebrate. Mom left a note on the counter that made me put two and two together.

  I should be touched.

  Right now, though, all I can feel is a knot in my chest and a lump in my throat.

  “We can't leave her like this!” Persephone protests.

  “It's fine. Go,” I say, giving them a fake smile. “I have to study for my government final anyhow.”

  “What Will said – did – out there. Are you okay?” Fiona's not convinced.

  “I'll be fine.”

  “But you're not fine now. That asshole!” Persephone says it, but I can tell Fi feels it.

  “He's not an asshole. He - ”

  “He stalked you to the bathroom! The guy spends four years ignoring you – or worse, belittling you – and now he – ”

  “He belittled me once. In ninth grade. That was it, Fiona.”

  “Now you're defending him!”

  “I can't do this. Not now. I know you care.”

  She relaxes. “I just don't want him hurting you.”