Perfect (13 page)

All of a sudden, Hanna recalled a memory she hadn’t thought of in a long time: A few days before Ali went missing, the five of them had gone on a field trip to the People’s Light Playhouse to see
Romeo and Juliet
. There weren’t many seventh-graders who’d opted to go—the rest of the field-trippers had been high-schoolers. Practically all of the Rosewood Day senior class had been there—Ali’s older brother, Jason, Spencer’s sister, Melissa, Ian Thomas, Katy Houghton, Ali’s field hockey friend, and Preston Kahn, one of the Kahn brothers. After the play was over, Aria and Emily disappeared to the bathroom, Hanna and Ali sat on the stone wall and started eating their lunches, and Spencer sprinted over to talk to Mrs. Delancey, the English teacher, who was sitting near her students.

“She’s only over there because she wants to be near the older boys,” Ali muttered, glaring at Spencer.

“We could go over too, if you want,” Hanna suggested.

Ali said no. “I’m mad at Spencer,” she declared.

“Why?” Hanna asked.

Ali sighed. “Long, boring story.”

Hanna let it drop—Ali and Spencer often got mad at each other for no reason. She started daydreaming about how the hot actor who played Tybalt had stared right at her all through his death scene. Did Tybalt think Hanna was cute…or fat? Or perhaps he wasn’t staring at her at all—maybe he was just acting dead with his eyes open. When she looked up again, Ali was crying.

“Ali,” Hanna had whispered. She’d never seen Ali cry before. “What’s wrong?”

Tears ran silently down Ali’s cheeks. She didn’t even bother wiping them away. She stared off in the direction of Spencer and Mrs. Delancey. “Forget it.”

“Shit! Look at that!” Mason Byers cried out, breaking Hanna out of her old seventh-grade thoughts. Up in the sky, a biplane cut a line through the clouds. It passed over Rosewood Day, swooped around, and then zoomed by again. Hanna jiggled up and down in her seat and swiveled around. Where the hell was Mona?

“Is that an old Curtiss?” James Freed asked.

“I don’t think so,” Ridley Mayfield answered. “I think it’s a Travel Air D4D.”

“Oh, right,” James said, as if he’d known it all along.

Hanna’s heart fluttered excitedly. The plane made a few long, sweeping strokes through the air, puffing out a trail of clouds that formed a perfect letter
G
. “It’s writing something!” a girl near the door called out.

The plane moved on to the
E
, then the
T
, and then, after a space, the
R
. Hanna was practically bursting. This was the coolest party court gift
ever
.

Mason squinted at the plane, which was dipping and weaving in the sky. “Get…ready…to…” he read.

Just then, Mona slid into the seat next to her, throwing her charcoal gray quilted Louis Vuitton bag over her chair. “Hey, Han,” she said, opening her Fresh Fields bento box and sliding the paper off her wooden chopsticks. “So you’ll never believe who Naomi and Riley got to play at my birthday party. It’s the best gift ever.”

“Forget that,” Hanna squealed. “I got you something cooler.”

Hanna tried to point out the plane in the sky, but Mona was riled up. “They got Lexi,” she rushed on. “
Lexi!
For me! At my party! Can you believe it?”

Hanna let her spoon drop back in the yogurt container. Lexi was a female hip-hop artist from Philadelphia. A major label had signed her and she was going to be a megastar. How had Naomi and Riley managed that? “Whatever,” she said quickly, and steered Mona’s chin toward the clouds. “Look what
I
did for you.”

Mona squinted into the sky. The plane had finished writing the message and was now doing loops over the letters. When Hanna took in the whole message, her eyes widened.

“Get ready to…” Mona’s mouth fell open. “…
fart
with Mona?”

“Get ready to fart with Mona!” Mason cried. Others who saw it were repeating it, too. A freshman boy by the abstract wall mural blew into his hands to make a farting sound.

Mona stared at Hanna. She looked a little green. “What the hell, Hanna?”

“No, that’s wrong!” Hanna squeaked. “It was supposed to say, ‘Get ready to
party
with Mona!’ P-A-R-T-Y! They messed up the letters!”

More people made fart noises. “Gross!” a girl near them screamed. “Why would she
write
that?”

“This is horrible!” Mona cried. She pulled her blazer over her head, just like celebrities did when they were avoiding the paparazzi.

“I’m calling them right now to complain,” Hanna exclaimed, whipping out her BlackBerry and shakily scrolling for the skywriting company’s number. This wasn’t fair. She’d used the clearest, neatest handwriting possible when she faxed Mona’s party message to the skywriter. “I’m so sorry, Mon. I don’t know how this happened.”

Mona’s face was shadowed under her blazer. “You’re sorry, huh?” she said in a low voice. “I bet you are.” She slid her blazer back around her shoulders, lurched up, and strode away as fast as her raffia Celine wedges would carry her.

“Mona!” Hanna jumped up after her. She touched Mona’s arm and Mona spun around. “It was a mistake! I’d never do that to you!”

Mona took a step closer. Hanna could smell her French lavender laundry soap. “Ditching the Frenniversary is one thing, but I never thought you’d try to ruin my party,” she growled, loud enough for everyone to hear. “But you want to play that way? Fine. Don’t come. You’re officially uninvited.”

Mona stomped through the cafeteria doors, practically pushing two nerdy-looking freshmen aside into the large stone planters. “Mona, wait!” Hanna cried weakly.

“Go to hell,” Mona yelled over her shoulder.

Hanna took a few steps backwards, her whole body trembling. When she looked around the courtyard, everyone was staring at her. “Oh,
snap
,” Hanna heard Desdemona Lee whisper to her softball-playing friends.

“Mrow,”
a group of younger boys hissed from the moss-covered birdbaths. “Loser,” an anonymous voice muttered.

The wafting smell of the cafeteria’s overly sauced, mushy-crusted pizza was beginning to give Hanna that old, familiar feeling of being both hideously nauseated and crazily ravenous at the same time. She returned to her purse and rifled absentmindedly through the side pouch to find her emergency package of white cheddar Cheez-Its. She pushed one into her mouth after another, not even tasting them. When she looked up into the sky, the puffy, letter-shaped clouds announcing Mona’s party had drifted.

The only letter that remained intact was the last one the plane had written: a crisp, angular letter
A
.

16

SOMEONE’S BEEN KISSING IN THE KILN….

That same Wednesday lunch period, Emily strode quickly through the art studio hallway. “Heeeyyy, Emily,” crooned Cody Wallis, Rosewood Day’s star tennis player.

“Hi?” Emily looked over her shoulder. She was the only person around—could Cody really be saying hi to
her
?

“Looking good, Emily Fields,” murmured John Dexter, the unbelievably hot captain of Rosewood Day’s crew team. Emily couldn’t even muster a hello—the last time John had spoken to her was in fifth-grade gym class. They’d been playing dodgeball, and John had beaned Emily’s chest to tag her out. Later, he’d come up to her and said, snickering, “Sorry I hit your boobie.”

She’d never had so many people—especially guys—smile, wave, and say hi to her. This morning, Jared Coffey, a brooding senior who rode a vintage Indian motorcycle to school and was usually too cool to speak to anyone, had insisted on buying her a blueberry muffin out of the vending machine. And as Emily had walked from second to third period this morning, a small convoy of freshman boys followed. One filmed her on his Nokia—it was probably already up on YouTube. She had come to school prepared to be taunted about the photo A had passed around at the meet yesterday, so this was sort of…unexpected.

When a hand shot out of the pottery studio, Emily flinched and let out a small shriek. Maya’s face materialized at the door. “
Psst.
Em!”

Emily stepped out of the stream of traffic. “Maya. Hey.”

Maya batted her eyelashes. “Come with me.”

“I can’t right now.” Emily checked her chunky Nike watch. She was late for her lunch with Becka—Little Miss Tree Tops. “How about after school?”

“Nah, this’ll just take a second!” Maya darted inside the empty studio and around a maze of desks toward the walk-in kiln. To Emily’s surprise, she pushed the kiln’s heavy door open and slid inside. Maya poked her head back out and grinned. “Coming?”

Emily shrugged. Inside the kiln, everything was dark, wooden, and warm—like a sauna. Dozens of students’ pots sat on the shelves. The ceramics teacher hadn’t fired them yet, so they were still brick red and gooey.

“It’s neat in here,” Emily mused softly. She’d always liked the earthy, wet smell of raw clay. On one of the shelves was a coil pot she’d made two periods ago. She’d thought she’d done a good job, but seeing it again, she noticed that one side caved in.

Suddenly, Emily felt Maya’s hands sliding up her back to her shoulders. Maya spun Emily around, and their noses touched. Maya’s breath, as usual, smelled like banana gum. “I think this is the sexiest room in the school, don’t you?”

“Maya,” Emily warned. They had to stop…only, Maya’s hands felt so good.

“No one will see,” Maya protested. She raked her hands through Emily’s dry, chlorine-damaged hair. “And besides, everyone knows about us anyway.”

“Aren’t you bothered by what happened yesterday?” Emily asked, pulling away. “Don’t you feel…violated?”

Maya thought for a moment. “Not particularly. And no one really seems to care.”

“That’s the weird thing,” Emily agreed. “I thought everyone was going to be mean today—like, teasing me or whatever. But instead…I’m suddenly crazily popular. People didn’t even pay this much attention to me after Ali disappeared.”

Maya grinned and touched Emily’s chin. “See? I told you it wouldn’t be so bad. Wasn’t it a good idea?”

Emily stepped back. In the kiln’s pale light, Maya’s face shone a ghoulish green. Yesterday, she’d noticed Maya in the natatorium stands…but when she’d looked after discovering the photo, she couldn’t find Maya anywhere. Maya had wanted their relationship to be more open. A sick feeling washed over her. “What do you mean,
good idea
?”

Maya shrugged. “I just mean, whoever did this made things much easier for us.”

“B-but it’s
not
easier,” Emily stammered, remembering where she was supposed to be right now. “My parents are livid about that photo. I have to go into a counseling program to prove to them I’m not gay. And if I don’t, they’re going to send me to Iowa to live with my aunt Helene and uncle Allen. For
good
.”

Maya frowned. “Why didn’t you tell your parents the truth? That this is who you are, and it’s not something you can, like, change. Even in Iowa.” She shrugged. “I told my family I was bi last year. They didn’t take it
that
well at first, but they got better.”

Emily moved her feet back and forth against the kiln’s smooth cement floor. “Your parents are different.”

“Maybe.” Maya stood back. “But listen. Since last year, when I was finally honest with myself and with everybody else? Ever since then, I’ve felt so great.”

Emily’s eyes instinctively fell to the snakelike scar on the inside of Maya’s forearm. Maya used to cut herself—she said it was the only thing that made her feel okay. Had being honest about who she was changed that?

Emily closed her eyes and thought of her mother’s angry face. And getting on a plane to live in Iowa. Never sleeping in her own bed again. Her parents hating her forever. A lump formed in her throat.

“I have to do what they say.” Emily focused on a petrified piece of gum someone had stuck on a kiln shelf. “I should go.” She opened the kiln door and stepped back into the classroom.

Maya followed her. “Wait!” She caught Emily’s arm, and as Emily spun around, Maya’s eyes searched her face. “What are you saying? Are you breaking up with me?”

Emily stared across the room. There was a sticker above the pottery teacher’s desk that said,
I LOVE POTS
!

Only, someone had crossed out the
s
and drawn a marijuana leaf over the exclamation point. “Rosewood’s my home, Maya. I want to stay here. I’m sorry.”

She snaked around the vats of glaze and potter’s wheels. “Em!” Maya called behind her. But Emily didn’t turn around.

She took the exit door that led straight out of the pottery studio to the quad, feeling like she’d just made a huge mistake. The area was empty—everyone was at lunch—but for a second, Emily could have sworn she saw a figure standing on Rosewood Day’s bell tower roof. The figure had long blond hair and held binoculars to her face. It almost looked like Ali.

After Emily blinked, all she saw was the tower’s weathered bronze bell. Her eyes must have been playing tricks on her. She’d probably just seen a gnarled, twisted tree.

Or…had she?

Emily shuffled down the little footpath that led to Lorence chapel, which looked less like a chapel and more like the gingerbread house Emily had made for the King James Mall Christmas competition in fourth grade. The building’s scalloped siding was cinnamon brown, and the elaborate trim, balusters, and gables were a creamy white. Gumdrop-colored flowers lined the window boxes. Inside, a girl was sitting in one of the front pews, facing forward in the otherwise empty chapel.

“Sorry I’m late,” Emily huffed, sliding onto the bench. There was a Nativity scene placed on the altar at the front of the room, waiting to be set up. Emily shook her head. It wasn’t even November yet.

“It’s cool.” The girl put out her hand. “Rebecca Johnson. I go by Becka.”

“Emily.”

Becka wore a long lacy tunic, skinny jeans, and demure pink flats. Delicate, flower-shaped earrings dangled from her ears, and her hair was held back with a lace-trimmed headband. Emily wondered if she’d end up looking as girly as Becka if she completed the Tree Tops program.