Almost Perfect Read online

  At that moment, a new student walked in.

  Let me say that again. A new student walked in.

  When I started kindergarten twelve years ago, there were fifteen kids in my class. Looking around the lab, I saw six of them there with me. For more than a decade, I’d been in class with the same few dozen kids. Occasionally, students would transfer in and out (mostly avoiding the Department of Social Services), but for the most part, people didn’t willingly move to Boyer. On the rare occasions we did get new students, it was always uncomfortable. They’d come in cowering as the lifers smacked their chops and sealed vile arrangements with cartons of cigarettes.

  Not this chick. She stormed into the lab as if she’d been coming there every morning. She had masses of curly rust-colored hair. Thousands of freckles dotted her cheeks and forehead. When she smiled, her green eyes scrunched and her wire-covered teeth were fully exposed.

  She was almost amazingly tall. I was used to looking down at most women, but this girl had to be nearly six feet.

  Her outfit was kind of strange, too. Her dress was completely black on one side and white on the other. Her earrings were such enormous hoops I thought they might be piston rings. She also wore pointy black boots and a matching beret.

  Now, Mr. Elmer, despite his short hair and neat mustache, was kind of a hippie. He didn’t stand on formality; when the new girl barged in, he just sort of gestured to the stack of unclaimed textbooks, then to the empty table at the back of the room.

  I knew I shouldn’t stare, but I couldn’t look away. Girls this strange didn’t exist in Boyer. They lived in Columbia or Kansas City or places like that.

  Just before the intruder reached the back table, Mr. Elmer looked up from the frogs.

  “Actually, we’re starting a lab today. Why don’t you team up with a couple of other people?”

  She didn’t break stride. Just grabbed a chair from the empty table and, without asking, sat down next to me. I quickly scooted to give her room.

  The new girl sneezed three times, then abruptly shoved my books and things to the middle of the table. She neatly arranged her books and binder. Removing her hat, she turned to me. She wasn’t a striking beauty. Too many freckles, braces, frizzy hair. She looked like someone who’d model for that photography studio next to Ron’s Grill. Like the owner’s niece, maybe—presentable enough and would work for free.

  But at the same time, there was something very pleasant about her. Maybe it was the way she obviously worked so hard to give the impression she didn’t care how she dressed. Or the tiny lines radiating from her green eyes, lines that a teenager would get only from constantly smiling. And what a smile! When she grinned at us, I got the strangest feeling, like she was smirking at something foolish I’d just done but it was okay because she thought it was cute.

  She turned to me. “Hi,” she said. “I’m Sage Hendricks.”

  Sage had a deep but sexy, feminine voice, the kind you hear on ads for 900 numbers. I waited for her to say something else.

  “Dude,” whispered Tim, jabbing me with a chocolaty finger. “Your line.”

  “Huh? Oh, um, I’m Logan Witherspoon. This is Tim.”

  Sage smiled at us again. Or maybe just at me. Her lips were covered in bright red lipstick and her grin was mischievous, like my zipper was down but she wasn’t going to tell me.

  Tim offered his half-empty bag of candy, and she shook her head. Her curly hair fell into her face, and she brushed it aside.

  At that moment, the arrival of a chemical-soaked frog corpse interrupted my appraisal of Sage. I stopped contemplating my tablemate and listened halfheartedly to Mr. Elmer’s butchering instructions. Elmer was one of those teachers who cracked jokes knowing full well we were laughing at him, not with him. Sage, however, must have thought he was funny. She had a loud laugh and accidentally elbowed me in the ribs more than once.

  I wanted to ask Sage about herself, like where she came from. But soon it was time for the first cut. Tim indicated the jaw-to-chest incision that would open our toad like some hideous birthday present.

  “So, who wants to go first?” I asked.

  Sage scooted her chair back. “This is a man’s job.”

  Tim shrugged. “You heard the girl, Logan.”

  Suddenly on the spot, I picked up the scissors and did my best to imitate one of those suave surgeons from the TV dramas. My surgery skills were more like something you’d see in a slasher flick.

  “Jesus, Logan, you’re going to hack into the table at this rate,” said Tim, spewing half-chewed Mr. Goodbar. He yanked the scissors from me and made a rather neat incision. I was a little annoyed. He didn’t have to talk to me that way in front of Sage.

  Sage stared in rapt attention as Tim pried apart the rib cage. I had a hard time keeping my eyes on our work. Without realizing it, I found my gaze drifting back to our new lab partner.

  “So, what kind of name is Sage?” I asked, then regretted it. It sounded like I was making fun of her.

  She just laughed. “An original name,” she replied.

  I pretended to be interested in Tim’s hacking and slashing, but in reality, I was thinking about Sage. Why? She wasn’t any prettier than Tanya, who apparently had a thing for me. Tanya would go out with me. So why could I not stop looking at this new girl?

  Okay, she wasn’t bad-looking. She was obviously in great shape; she probably worked out. She was really tall, but tall isn’t necessarily bad. And she had a nice face. And seemed friendly. I was glad she was at our table.

  When the lab was over, Tim and I stood at the sink, scrubbing up. I stared at Sage, hopefully not as obviously as I’d stared at Brenda. She was applying some more lipstick, using what appeared to be a car’s side-view mirror to check her reflection. The chick had character, you could say that much.

  I thought maybe I should offer to show her around Boyer. Or something that would take more than five minutes.

  The bell rang, and I went over to ask her if she had plans after school. I hesitated a bit too long, though. She was packed and out the door before I could say anything.

  That day at lunch, Tim inhaled his second meal without using niceties such as napkins or utensils. Jack sat on my other side drumming out some personal rhythm with his fork. This was my life, and there was nothing I could do about it.

  I picked at my meat loaf.

  “Hey, Tim,” I asked. “What did you think of the new girl?” I hadn’t been able to stop thinking about her, wondering where she had come from and what she was like. So little ever changed in Boyer; a new student was always a source of interest.

  Tim looked up from his tray. He had corn in his hair.

  “Sage? She’s okay.”

  Jack stopped drumming, which caused his legs to start jiggling. If Jack was ever put in a straitjacket (and sometimes it didn’t seem unlikely), I think his brain would explode.

  “Sage?” he asked. “Her sister was in my keyboarding class. Name’s Tammi. Freshman.”

  Two new Boyer students in one day?

  “What was she like?”

  “Loud,” he answered decisively. “I think they’re from Joplin or somewhere south. Dad works in Columbia.”

  “Is Tammi a seven-footer, too?” asked Tim. His tray was empty, but he continued to mop up gravy with his bare fingers.

  “Nah,” replied Jack. “She’s a dwarf. I don’t think she’s five feet. Cute, though.”

  Tim shrugged. “Maybe one’s adopted.”

  I didn’t reply. I was experiencing my daily 12:13 kick to the nuts.

  Figuratively. It was at 12:13 every day that Brenda would walk by my table. Every day, at 12:13, she would walk past our table, pause, and smile at me. Not the great grin that she used to give me. Just a small, friendly smile, like you’d give an old acquaintance you didn’t really want to talk to.

  And then she’d move on. She was good at moving on.

  “Witherspoon!” Jack barked at me, stabbing me in the kidney with his fork. Caught in the act
of staring, I turned away. Jack and Tim were looking at me with pity.

  “Dude, this is getting sad,” said Jack. “She’s not coming back.”

  No, she wasn’t. For the first few weeks of our breakup, I didn’t give up hope. Every time she walked by, every time the phone rang, I held my breath.

  Logan, I made a terrible mistake. …

  Now, I knew it was over. Even if she asked to get back together, I wouldn’t want to. But I wished she’d talk to me. I wished she’d apologize. Do something to show me that the past three years had meant something to her.

  Jack threatened me with his fork again. “Snap out of it, Logan. Did you ask Tanya out yet?”

  Tim shook his head at Jack with a look of fatherly disappointment. Tim, so far as I knew, had never had a date. Jack would occasionally land a girl with his Adam Sandler I’m so crazy I’m cute routine, but it never lasted. Since Brenda and I had started dating, the boys kind of looked up to me. And if they both assumed that Brenda and I had gone a lot further than we had, I wasn’t about to correct them.

  “C’mon, man,” Jack began again. “Show the girls around here what runners are made of.” With his spoon and two fingers, Jack graphically demonstrated just how I should show them.

  Tim sighed, belched, and sighed again. “I think what Jack is trying to say is that you’re a really nice guy, and if Brenda couldn’t see that, then to hell with her. But you do need to get on with your life.”

  Jack crinkled his brow. “That’s not what I was trying to say.”

  I gathered my trash. “Thank you both. And screw you both. I’m fine.”

  I dropped off my tray just as the bell rang. Across the cafeteria, Brenda was carefully gathering her things. My idiot friends thought I was still hung up on her, only they weren’t idiots because they were right.

  Maybe I should just ask someone out. Find a girl, and if things didn’t work out, at least I’d tried. What was the worst that could happen?

  I would find that out very shortly.

  chapter four

  WHEN I GOT UP for school the next day, I found my mother in our tiny closet of a kitchen cooking bacon and eggs. Though she probably hadn’t gotten off work until one the night before, she was up before seven fixing breakfast.

  “Mom, you don’t have to do this every morning. I can eat at school.” I knew I qualified for the free meals program.

  Mom slid two fried eggs onto my plate. She looked tired. Lately, I’d noticed the wrinkles around her eyes and the gray starting to streak her hair. Fourteen years of being a single parent were taking their toll. She got too little sleep. I couldn’t remember the last time she’d gone out with her friends.

  “Sit down with me and eat,” she said, patting the cheap table my grandfather had given us. “I don’t get to see you that often anymore.”

  Obediently, I joined her. It was always kind of awkward, these meals alone with my mother. More and more I felt like we didn’t have anything to talk about. Things had been easier when Laura was around. She had enough personality for all three of us.

  “So you haven’t filled out your application for college yet,” she said, pointing to the form still magneted to the fridge. “It’s due by January.”

  I didn’t meet her eyes. “I have plenty of time.”

  “I don’t see why you’re putting it off; it’ll only take half an hour. I could help you, or you could ask your counselor.”

  “I’ll get to it,” I snapped. I was sick of talking about this. For years, college and Brenda had gone together. Now that she was gone, I wasn’t sure that was the route I wanted to take. What would I do there? Get drunk and party? I could do that in Boyer. And what would I study? I could get a business degree and end up managing a tire place or a motel somewhere. Or get my teaching certificate and wind up coaching and teaching social studies. Neither prospect thrilled me.

  “I stopped by the library and picked up some information about student loans,” continued Mom. “I have Wednesday off. Maybe we could sit down and …”

  I threw down my fork. “Mom! Drop it, okay? What’s the big deal if I don’t go to college? I mean, maybe I could just work for a year, save up some money, and then go.”

  For a second, I thought Mom was going to cry. The apologies clogged my throat in an effort to get out.

  “Aw, Mom, I didn’t mean that. It’s just …”

  Mom quickly regained her composure. “Logan, listen to me. I can’t afford to send you to school. There’s been a lot I haven’t been able to give you and Laura …”

  “Mom!” She’d worked her whole life just to support us. The last thing I wanted was to make her feel like that wasn’t enough.

  “Let me finish. Logan, it’d be so easy for you just to stay here. You could keep mowing grass. You could probably have your own landscaping business in ten years. And I wouldn’t have to miss you like I do Laura. But, honey, that’s the same thing I thought twenty years ago. I figured it was okay just to get married right out of high school. I thought I’d still be able to do all those things I wanted to. And now … my kids are leaving home, and I realize I’m exactly where I was at eighteen. And I don’t want that to happen to you. I don’t want you to look back and see a lot of missed opportunities.”

  I touched Mom’s hand. “I know you’re right. I promise I’ll fill out those forms this week.”

  She smiled at me. “Thanks, Logan.”

  I grabbed my bag and stood to leave. There was something else I had to say.

  “And Mom? I, um … I …”

  “I love you too, honey.”

  That morning, I didn’t sit around waiting for Brenda. Maybe I was trying to get over her, or maybe I just didn’t want Tim to catch me stalking again. As I walked toward bio, I found myself thinking about Sage.

  I couldn’t remember ever meeting a chick that strange. Even after an hour of class, I knew that weird girl wasn’t like anyone in Boyer. Too colorful, too outspoken, too wild.

  Brenda never would have dressed in crazy clothes like that. She always dressed in long skirts and plain sweaters. And she wouldn’t have joked around with people she’d just met, either. Brenda was so reserved that she still had a hard time talking to my friends.

  Sage, on the other hand, seemed to warm up to anyone nearby. By the time I got to class, she was already sitting at the lab table laughing with Tim. Annoyed, I plopped down next to her.

  “And that’s when they told Jack he was no longer welcome at Chuck E. Cheese’s,” finished Tim.

  Sage’s laughter boomed across the lab. Then she turned to me.

  “You’ve got something on your shirt, Logan.”

  I looked down and she bopped me on the nose. Kind of hard.

  As I pretended to blow my nose to make sure it wasn’t bleeding, I looked at Sage. She had forced her spirals of hair into two pigtails. She wore ragged jeans and a short-sleeved sweater. Her arms were almost solidly freckled.

  Brenda wouldn’t be caught dead in an outfit like that. And she wouldn’t have bopped a strange guy in the nose. And she always seemed annoyed around Tim and Jack. I used to think her stuffiness was kind of sweet. Now it just seemed irritating.

  The bell rang before I could be charming. Luckily, Tim volunteered to go get the frog, so I had a couple of seconds.

  “So, Sage, where are you from?” I asked. It totally sounded like a pickup line. I might as well have been wearing an open-collared disco shirt.

  “Near Joplin. Hey, I forgot my pencil. Give me yours.”

  I handed her my only pencil. “Joplin’s, like, three hours away. Why did you move here?”

  Sage ignored the question. “Tim was telling me about you.”

  I smiled as my brain went into full panic. Tim had known me long enough that he had some real dirt on me.

  “What did he say?” I asked with the nonchalance of an FBI interrogator.

  Sage was picking through the various plastic bags of candy on Tim’s side of the table. “He said you run track. I believe i
t; you’re in great shape.”

  Sage turned back to me and unashamedly scoped me from top to bottom. I felt like I should be hanging in a butcher’s window, the way she was checking me out. It was a great feeling. I tried to flex without making it too obvious.

  Apparently, she wasn’t content with just looking. “Here, make a muscle.”

  I obediently showed her my bicep, the result of years of shoving around a lawn mower. Sage clutched my forearm, squeezing me with her painted nails. Her hands were soft.

  “Wow!” she said, not letting go. “I’m surprised you don’t play football.”

  When a girl you hardly know starts touching you, it’s hard to think about anything else. It didn’t seem to be the right moment to explain that I’d tried out for the team but never made it. I didn’t have the bulk or the coordination.

  Luckily, Tim showed up at that moment with the dead frog, causing Sage to release me. As Tim feng shuied the frog, the dissection tools, and his food, I tried to get my brain back on track. Brenda was the last girl who had ever touched me for that long (except my sister, but she had had me in a headlock). I’d forgotten how nice it could feel.

  “So, do you play any sports?” I asked, trying to keep the conversation going.

  “Nope,” she said with a shrug.

  I tried to be complimentary. “Maybe you should. I think you’d be good at bas …”

  Sage’s smile collapsed into a scowl. Tim, who’d been flipping frog organs around like a master Japanese chef, grimaced.

  Nice, Logan. Tell the really tall girl she should play basketball.

  I tried to recover. “… baaass fishing?”

  Sage frowned, then suddenly burst out laughing. She shoved me in the chest with her open palm but didn’t remove her hand from my chest.

  “Sage, Logan, get to work, please,” came the warning voice of Mr. Elmer.

  Sage sat up in her chair and began pointedly reading the lab instructions. After a few seconds, her eyes crept over the top of the paper. I’d never had anyone smile at me like that before. And I couldn’t even see her mouth.

  Five minutes before the bell, I stowed the frog in the lab fridge. Tim was packing up his hourly buffet when I returned to the table. Sage was at the front of the room. Despite never touching the frog, she was intently scrubbing her hands.