How To Be A Perfect Girl (20 page)

“Thanks,” Val replied, uncertain if he was
telling the truth or simply trying to make her feel better.

Porter drove even crazier than usual, and
made it into the Palm Lake lot with the rest of the upperclassmen
returning from lunch. Derrick spotted Porter’s car and left the
group he was with to meet up with them.

“Hey, where’d you guys go?” he asked as Val
stepped out of the car.

Porter shrugged, “We didn’t feel like
Fazoli’s today. Went to McDonald’s instead.”

Derrick laughed; he raised an eyebrow at
Val, “So you won’t eat pizza, but you’re fine with McDonald’s?”

“Oh, no, I didn’t have anything,” Val
replied.

Derrick squinted, “Hang on, you
look—different.”

“I do?”

“Yeah, like—oh yeah, no more raccoon eyes.
Why’d you take all your makeup off?” The three of them headed for
the school entrance.

“It got smeared.” Val didn’t explain
further; she hoped that would prevent Derrick from pressing
further.

A grin lit up the older boy’s face; he
grabbed Porter’s shoulders, “Damn, I can see why you wanted to talk
now!”

“What?” Val asked, confused.

“Nothing happened,” Porter looked almost
angry.

Derrick laughed, “Yeah, right.” They stopped
just outside Palm Lake’s doors while he waited for either Val or
Porter to elaborate. “Fine then,” he finally said, “Don’t tell me
anything. But I know something happened. How’d your makeup get
smeared, Val, if nothing happened?”

“It’s none of your business,” Val said
defensively.

“Derrick, nothing happened,” Porter repeated
in a flat tone. The passing period bell rang.

“Well, I’ll see you guys later,” Derrick
left, but not before shooting Porter another grin and giving him a
thumbs up.

Val looked back at Porter, “What does he
think happened?” she asked.

Porter sighed; he pushed a hand through his
hair, “Come on, Val. What do you think he thinks happened?”

“I don’t know. He seemed like—like he
thought we, you know—“

“Yeah, that’s it,” Porter confirmed. “Fuck!”
he yelled, causing a passing teacher to throw them both a very
hostile glare, “If things weren’t screwed up before, they will be
now.”

“Why? Derrick won’t tell anyone, will he?
And besides, nothing actually happened, so it doesn’t matter.”

“It does matter. Derrick wasn’t the only one
who noticed us coming back. Even if he keeps quiet, stuff like this
gets around.” Porter stared at the ground, “I was trying to fix
things, and now they’re worse than before.”

“I’m sorry,” Val placed an arm on Porter’s
shoulder that he promptly shrugged off.

“It’s not your fault. But—maybe we should
keep our distance for a while.”

“But you don’t even know that there are
gonna be rumors yet.”

“Oh, I do. The only question is how much
Avery’ll flip when she hears them; it’s bound to be bad, that much
I’m sure of. Look Val, I like hanging out with you, but you’re
really young and—“ he trailed off.

“I like hanging out with you, though, and
you like hanging out with me—I think. And we don’t even know for
sure if anyone will say anything.”

Porter assumed a blank expression, “Val, you
asked me not that long ago if I liked you as a friend or
as—something more. The truth is, I only like you as a friend and my
relationship with Avery is more important than my relationship with
you.”

The words came like knifepoints, and Val
took a step back. Until that moment, she hadn’t realized how much
she had wanted Porter to like her. “Oh,” she said, a lump forming
in her throat, “Oh, well—“ Val swallowed, “Then I guess that’s
that.” She took a deep breath and entered the building, forcing
herself not to look back at Porter.

“Val,” Porter said quietly, but she didn’t
turn to hear what he had to say.

English went by like a blur; Val
halfheartedly tried to pay attention as the teacher, Miss Donnely,
emphatically read through passages of Romeo and Juliet. The class
was over quickly, and Val found she couldn’t remember anything
about the scenes they’d discussed.

Seeing Keenan in Chemistry just reminded Val
of the whole incident; he looked similar enough to his brother that
she had a hard time keeping her anger at Porter from seeping out
with him.

“So,” Keenan said after class, “We still on
for today?” They walked into the hall before continuing the
conversation.

Val shrugged, “Yeah, I guess so. I’ll be
home by five, if you wanna just go there and wait for me—you can go
in by the garage. The code’s my birthday, month and day.”

“Oh, cool. Listen, is something wrong?”

Val sighed, “No, I’m fine.”

“Alex swears that ‘fine’ is girl code for
‘something’s wrong and if you weren’t so stupid you’d know what it
is’.” Keenan laughed in a weak attempt to relieve the tension.

Val looked him in the eyes, “Okay,
something’s wrong. But let’s talk about it later. I need to get to
Eco Club. The first meeting’s today.”

Keenan nodded, “Rain check then. But I wanna
hear all about it tonight.”

“Oh trust me, you will.” Val hugged Keenan
before going to the room that was supposed to be Eco Club’s meeting
place. It was one half of a double room, separated from its twin by
some thin accordion doors.

As it turned out, Eco Club was the smallest
club that Val had ever seen. In five minutes, the club’s sponsor
had shown up, along with five other students, all of whom were
older than Val. She didn’t know any of them.

“Oh, nice!” a toad-faced girl with extremely
large glasses exclaimed, “We have a new member!”

“Um, yeah,” Val felt awkward standing there,
with all six people staring at her.

“Perfect! We need some new blood!” the girl
gestured to herself and three of the other members, “We’re all
seniors. So it’ll be up to you and Noah to keep things going.” With
a jolt, Val recognized the nerdy freshman, who refused to meet her
eyes.

“Noah’s my brother,” the girl continued,
“And I just realized—I haven’t introduced myself yet. I’m Mia.”

“Oh, uh, nice to meet
you,”
How can I get out of here?
Thought Val. “I’m Valentina; I prefer to be
called Val, though.”

“A pleasure!” Mia squealed, “Well Valentina,
I’m excited to have you in this club! I just know we’ll have a
wonderful year!”

Wow, she’s
really—energetic.
“So, what do you guys
do?”

It was the wrong question to ask; for the
next hour Mia talked about all the ‘projects’ the Eco Club was
planning on working on, which included everything from a
school-wide recycling project to getting solar panels installed on
the roof. “Although,” Mia admitted, “So far we’ve only implemented
the recycling program on the basis that we sort through and
retrieve all the cans and papers ourselves.”

Val grimaced, “So you—sort through
trash?”

“Kinda. Not really. I mean, it’s not trash,
it’s recycling. But yeah, we go through it all by ourselves.” Mia
beamed, as if this were a source of pride.

Val checked the time on her phone, hoping
soccer practice would give her an excuse to leave; it still read
only three pm.

“She’s not interested,” Noah commented from
his spot several feet away from the group, “You can save the pitch,
Mia.”

“No, I really am,” Val said, if for no other
reason than to spare the Eco Club kids’ feelings, “I think
it’s—great, how you want to save the environment and
everything.”

Noah laughed, “You are such a liar Val.
Yeah, you think this club’s great, just like you wanted to learn
how to play Mini Monsters.”

Val gulped, “Well, I—“

“Just try being honest for once. It won’t
kill you.”

“Noah! Be nice to Valentina!” Mia
reprimanded, “After all, she’s gonna be your only ally in the fight
to save our environment once we graduate. Isn’t that right?” she
directed the question at Val.

“Uh, yeah—“ Val checked her phone again:
3:06pm. “Look, I have to get to practice a little early today. Is
it okay if I leave now?”

Mia nodded, “We’ll see you next Friday.
We’re voting for officers.” To Valentina, she whispered, “Don’t
worry, there are enough positions for everybody. If you want, you
could even be the official recorder! That’s a high-ranking position
for a freshman,” she smiled.

“Oh, cool,” Val hoisted her bag and left
before Mia could start into another speech. Behind her, she heard
Noah say, “Three to one odds she doesn’t show. Any takers?”

There was almost no one else in the girl’s
locker room when Val started to change. She was just putting on her
athletic shorts when Scarlett cleared her throat, “What are you
doing in here?”

“Changing,” Val answered, “I had to get out
of this one club, so I know I’m a bit early, but I figure maybe
I’ll get in a little extra practice before, you know, before the
official practice starts.”

Scarlett laughed; at first Val didn’t see
what was funny, but then the junior explained, “We don’t have
practice on Fridays. I thought you gathered that from what Coach
said yesterday.”

“Oh,” Val frowned, “But then, why are you
here?”

“I’m going to go down to the weight room,”
Scarlett replied, “I wanna be a starter this year, and that’ll only
happen if I build up my leg strength.”

“Oh, nice.” Val thought a moment, and then
asked, “Can I come with you?”

“Sure. You can spot me, and if you want I’ll
show you my special exercises to focus on the muscles soccer
players really need.”

“Cool! Well just let me finish changing and
then we can go.”

Scarlett laughed again, “I need to change
too.” She opened one of the bottom lockers on a nearby wall.
“You’ll probably get done before me.”

“Probably,” Val was almost finished as it
was; she tied up her shoes, returning her soccer cleats to her
locker.

“By the way,” Scarlett said as she replaced
her blue shirt with a white Under Armor one, “I heard about you and
Porter. Very nice.”

“What did you hear?” It was astonishing that
the news would travel so quickly, especially to Scarlett, who was a
junior.

“I was there when Addison told Avery,”
Scarlett grinned, “You should have seen her face. I’ve never seen
Avery livid before, but that’s how I would describe it. I think
it’s safe to say you won this round.”

“Won what round? What do you mean?” Val
looked at the junior with an alarmed expression.

“The bout between you and Avery. That’s what
you two were fighting about a couple of days ago, right? I
overheard a little of it; the whole ‘I don’t hate you thing’. Well,
I think it’s safe to say Avery hates you now, and you’ve definitely
moved up to a somebody on her radar.”

“Or hitlist,” Val muttered.

Scarlett shrugged, “You know what they say.
Better to be talked about than not noticed at all. Anyway, I’m
done. You wanna go lift some weights?”

“Let’s go,” as they walked, Val asked, “So
what did Addison say happened between me and Porter.”

“Just that you two were alone for a whole
hour and when you came back you didn’t have any makeup on.”

“So?”

Scarlett eyed Val, “So the obvious
conclusion is that—“ she made a bobbing motion with her head; when
Val still looked at her with raised eyebrows she said, “You’re
gonna make me say it, aren’t you?”

“I don’t get what you’re trying to say,” Val
admitted, “So yeah, it would help if you just came right out and
explained.”

Scarlett grimaced, stopping in the stairwell
that led down into the weight room. “What I’m trying to say is that
the most logical sequence of events is you two went somewhere to
have a little fun, and Porter had a little too much fun on your
face, and you had to clean it up. Get it now?”

Bile filled Val’s mouth as comprehension
dawned on her, “Oh my gosh—I can see why Avery would hate me, if
she thinks that. But it’s not what happened!”

“Doesn’t matter,” Scarlett replied,
“Everyone thinks it did, so as far as Palm Lake is concerned you
and Porter hooked up. It’s not entirely a bad thing; there are a
lot of people, especially seniors, who wanted to see Avery brought
down a peg, and you did it. A freshman stealing her boyfriend! And
during school, too!” A small smile crept across the redhead’s face,
“It makes for a good story, at the very least.”

Val nodded, lost in her own thoughts. She
followed Scarlett down into the weight room, where several muscled
boys were busily moving about.

“This is the football team,” Scarlett
explained, anticipating Val’s question, “They lift during the same
time we normally have practice, but they don’t get Fridays off like
we do.”

“Scarlett!” Josh from Val’s Flag Football
class walked up. He set the dumbbell he was holding on the floor
and hugged Val’s friend.

“Hey Josh,” Scarlett said, “I brought a
friend today.”

“I can see that.” Josh looked at Val,
“You’re the girl in my p.e. class, right? Porter’s friend?”

Val nodded, “Is he here?”

“Yeah, he’s down there,” Josh pointed to a
row of shoulder press machines.

“Oh, well—you know what Scarlett, maybe I
should just go?” Val looked at Scarlett, hoping the older girl
would let her avoid the potentially awkward situation without much
fuss.

“Nonsense,” Scarlett leaned in and whispered
so Josh wouldn’t overhear, “It’s no use avoiding him now. Best
thing to do is pretend that nothing happened. The more you react to
gossip like this, the more you feed it.”

“Yeah,” Val replied, “I guess you have a
point. What do you want to do first, then?”

“Squats,” Scarlett pointed to a few bars
that were raised to approximately shoulder level by a metal shelf.
Each one had a belt attached to it that fell slowly as the boys at
the occupied bars lowered themselves down, and raised back as they
stood back up.