The (Almost) Perfect Guide To Imperfect Boys (6 page)

“Mmmf.”

“Okay, I
know
there's a little weirdness between those two,” Olivia admitted. “But we're all friends, aren't we? And Hanna also.”

We were? I thought how extremely nice but also how strange it was that Olivia had this fantasy that nothing had changed since the Green Girl days, that we were still four best friends—but that off to the side, in a parallel universe, was Chloe. Or rather, Olivia and Chloe, plus Chloe's other assorted lapdogs.

“Then you guys will come to the party?” Olivia was asking.

“Not sure yet,” I admitted. “Maybe.”

“You have to! And by the way, I'm inviting Freakazoid.”

“What?”

“Joking! Omigosh, Finley, could you imagine Chloe's
face
?”

Then she hung up.

Great, great, great.
And now what was I supposed to do with this information? Go to Maya and be all like,
Hey, good news! Chloe says you're invited after all!

Because, knowing Maya, she'd want the invitation straight from Chloe, not passed along from Chloe to Olivia to me, like we were first graders playing telephone. Plus she'd want an actual
invitation
—I don't mean all printed out like the Terrible Twos' birth announcements; I mean with Chloe looking her in
the eye and saying,
Hey, Maya, I forgive you for the laundry-room incident with Dylan, and also for making Hansen give us a test tomorrow. Please come to my party.

Really, the more I thought about it, the more I wasn't sure I should even tell Maya about this call.

But then I thought:
If I don't tell her, she'll want to crash the party. And maybe pick a fight with Chloe for
not
inviting her.

Which Chloe did.

And also didn't.

“POW!” Max shouted so loud it sounded like a firecracker in my head. I spun around to see my little brother pointing a red rubber dolphin at me. “BOOM!”

“You should be watching Elmo,” I snapped. “And stop pointing dolphins at people!”

“He's always pointing things and making sound effects,” Mom announced, as she came into the kitchen with her empty mug. She put on the teakettle. “I think it's a gender thing, really, because Addie's more into people and language; you can talk to her; she's this little
person.
But boys.” She smiled. “They're just so strange sometimes, don't you think?”

“Whatever,” I said. “I have utterly no opinion about boys.”

“You don't? Did something happen?” She lifted Max, kissing his messy curls.

Mom was clearly hoping for a heart-to-heart girl chat, but the last thing I felt like doing was telling her all about my supposed boy illiteracy. For one thing, it was kind of an excruciating topic; for another, if I told her, she'd probably ask a million follow-up questions. She might even end up calling Maya's mom. Besides, right at that second I was still processing the conversation with Olivia.

“Um, thanks,” I said quickly, “but I actually do have a ton of homework.”

“Yes, you said. But if you want to talk—”

“I NEED DOWN,” Max protested, squirming out of Mom's arms and bolting down the hall.

The teakettle screamed. And somewhere in the house the phone started ringing.

Mom shot me a pleading look as she turned off the stove. “Finny, could you possibly answer that? I feel like my head is about to explode.”

“No problem. Should I say you're here?”

“Oh, absolutely not! Tell whoever it is I've flown to Maui.”

“Seriously?”

“All right, just say I'm working. No, wait—I'm in the shower.”

What was weird at that moment was how young Mom looked, like a kid who hadn't done her homework. But at the same time she looked sort of old, her face all wrinkly, her hazel eyes crazy with tiredness.

“Okay,” I said, searching the kitchen counter. “Where's the phone?”

“TV room, I think. Please hurry!”

I raced back into the TV room, almost tripping over a container of No Worries Organic Play-Clay.
Sesame Street
was still on, but Addie was sitting in the corner, calmly scribbling on the wall with a fat orange Crayola.

“Addie, what are you doing!” I scolded. “Naughty.”

She burst into tears, so I scooped her up with one arm. Before I could stop her, she wiped goopy snot all over my shoulder. Lovely.

With my free hand I grabbed the phone from the sofa seat. It felt sticky, and I didn't want to know why.

“Hello?” I shouted over Addie's wailing.

“Finley?” a male voice asked.

“Yes?”

“Hi.” There was a pause. “It's Zachary.”

I swallowed a huge gulp of air. Which might have been helium, because when I spoke, my voice kind of squeaked. “Zachary?”

“You sound shocked.”

“Not at all! It's just that I couldn't hear very well.” I lowered Addie, who bolted toward the kitchen, still bawling. “Um. Hi.”

“Um hi back,” he said.

It was funny how his voice sounded Froggier than it had at school. Although come to think of it, I didn't have scads of Frog experience on the phone. So possibly this was what they all sounded like.

Proof of my boy illiteracy? Gah, maybe.

Plus, now there was this awkward silence.

“Sooo,” I said. “Was there any particular reason? Why you called?”

“Do people need particular reasons to call you?”

“No. Actually I get pointless phone calls all the time.” Immediately I realized how wrong that sounded. But too late. “I just meant we haven't had a conversation in forever.”

“We talked today at lunch. After I'm pretty sure you took my picture.”

“I didn't take your picture!”

“Yeah? You were pointing your camera at me.”

“Okay, maybe I was,” I admitted. “But not to take your picture!”

“Then what for?” He was laughing. “Were you, like, spying on me, or something?”

I could feel my cheeks burn and my brain freeze up. Because what was I supposed to say here:
Fine, I confess: I was spying on your cuteness. But that was before I realized you were
you.

“Look, I'm sorry,” I muttered. “It's just a new camera, and everyone keeps forcing me to take their photos. And I needed focus practice, and you were walking in the snow—”

“So you focused on me.”

“Right. It could have been anyone, okay?”

“Oh, of course. No, no, I totally get it.” He paused. When he spoke again, his voice sounded different. More serious. “And actually, Finley, I should apologize for teasing. Sometimes I overdo it.”

“Well, exactly,” I sputtered.

“Also, I think photography is a very cool hobby. I'm interested in learning more about it.”

He was?

Oh.

“So am I,” I said.

Awkward silence number two. And . . . still going.

“Anyway,” he finally said in the nonteasing voice, “I guess I'll be seeing you tomorrow. Fisher-Greenglass said I could come back.”

“Why would anyone stop you? You said you weren't expelled.” As soon as this was out of my mouth, I wished I'd left out “you said.” Because “you said” sounded as if I didn't believe him.

But if he thought I was accusing him of lying, he let it go. “Well, actually, I didn't leave school on the best terms with some people.”

“Yes, I know,” I said.

“So, yeah. And now I'm not . . . really sure what to
expect.” His voice caught a bit on the word “expect.” Almost a croak, but not quite. Then he added loudly and cheerily: “Anyhow, I believe in second chances, and I hope everyone else does too.”

“Oh, they do, definitely,” I lied.

“Awesome. Hey, Finley, I'm really glad I saw you today. Or rather that
you
were spying on
me
.”

“Me too. Although I wasn't spying.”

“Whatever,” he said, and I could hear a smile inside the word. “Oh, and Finley? Don't forget your camera tomorrow. I'll let you focus-practice, if you want.”

He hung up.

Well, that was strange,
I thought. Not just the fact that Zachary had called me out of the blue, based on nothing but the camera incident, but also because of the odd, jumpy way he'd sounded. I couldn't put my finger on it, exactly, but it reminded me of Dad with the remote control, switching from channel to channel so fast it made me dizzy every time I watched TV with him.

Although to be fair to Zachary, he was probably feeling ubernervous about tomorrow. And how could he not be, I told myself, even if he hadn't been expelled?

But the call decided me. I now had two major
things to tell Maya: Zachary Mattison had called, and so had Olivia. The calls weren't related in any logical way, except that they both fell under the heading Reasons Finley Was Too Distracted to Do Her Math Homework.

And Reasons Why She Spent the Evening on the Internet.

And Ended Up Reading This Post on Her Mom's Blog:

Yesterday Max loved eating Smiley-O's, but today he only wanted to toss them all over my kitchen. Why? I think the simple answer is that he just enjoys watching things smash. To him this is funny—and even funnier when he adds sound effects, like BOOM.

As for Addie, her sense of humor—her sense of everything—is more sophisticated. Here's what I'm wondering—is it just my twins, or are toddler girls more complicated than toddler boys? Do they stay that way over time? (Thirteen-year-old Awesome Daughter is certainly a complicated person!) Am I making too much of the gender thing? Let me hear from you, friends. Comments below!

Xox,

Jen

•  •  •

I had to wait until the next day to talk to Maya, because Maya's mom was super strict about what she called “after-school socializing.” According to Mrs. Lopez, afternoons were for homework and gymnastics practice, not for newsworthy phone calls from your best friend. Not for e-mails or texts, either. All of which, if you asked me, was a big reason why Maya obsessed so much about parties, and about weekends in general.

My plan was to get to school early on Tuesday, to meet Maya before homeroom. But that morning Dad insisted on making pancakes. He worked so hard running his car-parts company—“crazy busy” was how he described it—that it meant he missed most family dinners during the week. So when he decided to cook breakfast, you couldn't say,
No thanks, Dad, I'll just grab a bagel.
Besides, it was incredibly sweet of him to let Mom sleep late.

“Morning, Finster,” he greeted me from the stove. “What's your opinion of blueberries this fine morning?”

“My opinion is, they're purple, not blue.” This made me think of Zachary's eyes, which I didn't want to do. So I switched over to the comedy routine Dad had taught me when I was little:
“Why is there no blue
food? I can't find blue food. I mean, green is lime; yellow is lemon—”

“Orange is orange,”
Dad said, nodding.

“Red is cherry,”
I said, grinning.
“What's blue? Oh, they say, ‘Blueberries!' ”

“Uh-uh,”
Dad recited.
“Blue on the vine, purple on the plate.”

Together we chanted,
“There's no blue food! Where is the blue food! We want the blue food!”

Dad grinned as he handed me a plate of blueberry pancakes. “I can't believe you remember that entire George Carlin bit, Finster.”

“Sure.” I swirled some syrup on my plate and took a huge-ormous forkful of pancake. “Why wouldn't I?”

“Oh, I don't know. Because the human brain works in mysterious ways.” He speared a pancake off my plate and chewed it thoughtfully. “Speaking of which, Mom mentioned you were having a bit of trouble memorizing Spanish?”

“Just irregular verbs. Because they're so random.”

“So if they're tricky, why not let Mom help you? She's amazing at those memory things.”

I rolled my eyes. “Yes, I know. She's the queen of mnemonics.”

“And that's a good thing, right?” He took another bite.

“It's awesome. I'd just rather figure stuff out on my own.”

“But why? If it's hard and she's willing to help you—”

“Dad, she's
willing,
but she doesn't have time. You should see her in the afternoons; she's practically mental when I get home. And anyhow, I can manage.”

“I'm sure you can,” Dad said, nodding seriously. “Nobody's doubting your ability.”

Really? Then why did you and Mom threaten to take away my camera?
I wondered.

He messed my hair. “Hey, Finster, wanna switch? You go to my office today and I'll go to eighth grade.”

“Let me think about it,” I said, kissing Dad's stubbly cheek with sticky lips. “See you tonight, okay? And thanks for the blue food.”

•  •  •

As soon as I got to school, I raced to Maya's locker. About six weeks ago, before winter break, I'd decorated it for her as a birthday present, wrapping it in orange and hot pink paper, tacking rainbow-colored ribbons around the edges, taping up a collage of her favorite things—New York City, puppies, ice cream
cones, the Olympic rings, fireworks. When girls decorated their best friend's lockers at our school, usually it stayed like that for a week or so. But Maya had kept my decorations, even though by now they were smashed and scraggly.

“Two news items,” I informed her. “
Numero uno
, we're invited to Chloe's party.”

She folded her arms across her chest. “We
are
? How do you know that?”

“Olivia called yesterday.”

“Really? And she
said
we're both invited?”