The (Almost) Perfect Guide To Imperfect Boys

by Barbara Dee

  Maya’s cheeks splotched pink. “You think I’m that shallow—that I’d like somebody just because he complimented me?”

  “No, no.” I could feel my face getting hot. “But the way you’re inviting him to everything—”

  “Finley, I’m only doing that because you like him.”

  “What?” I said.

  “You like him,” she repeated. “I mean, don’t you? You keep staring at him.”

  “That’s because I don’t trust him,” I sputtered. “I’ve been trying to tell you that, Maya. That’s my whole point.”

  She took my arm. “Look, Finley, don’t be upset with me for saying this, but do you ever think you’re possibly a little bit too hard on people? And maybe that’s the reason you’re having trouble with boys?”

  “Excuse me?”

  “I don’t mean trouble; I take that back. I’m just saying, you know, all that Frog business, naming boys to categories based on whether their voices changed—”

  “Are you serious?” I was gaping at her now. “The Life Cycle wasn’t just about their dumb voices! It was about their total behavior. And, Maya, you did it too!”

  “I know, it was both of us; you’re right. But I’m thinking . . . maybe it’s time to throw out the chart, okay? Because boys grow up; they all do. Eventually. Look at Zachary: Did you think he’d ever change? And he has. I mean, obviously.”

  She squinted. Then her face lit up, and she did her desert-island wave to someone behind my head.

  Of course it was Zachary.

  • • •

  As soon as Zachary came loping over, I mumbled some excuse and fled the lockers. I just couldn’t deal with him right then; my brain was in snow-globe mode. Partly it was because Maya had accused me of crushing on Zachary, but mostly it was this: Even though I’d gone to school that morning worried about my best friend, and feeling guilty (although all I’d done was try to rescue her from both Chloe and Señor Hansen), we’d gotten into a fight. And she’d called me boy-illiterate again. And made me feel like a baby for the whole Life Cycle thing, which she’d half invented.

  Although, now that I focused on it, I couldn’t think of the last time she’d updated the chart. Okay, but she still talked about doing upgrades, didn’t she?

  Except no matter how hard I tried, I couldn’t remember the last time she’d decided a boy was Froggy, or had qualified for Croaker status. And I remembered something else—two days ago when I’d mentioned Wyeth Brockman’s croak/blush/invitation, she’d acted like it didn’t matter.

  Really, the more I thought about it, the more it seemed that the Life Cycle had become my job lately.

  All right, I told myself. So maybe it was my job.

  But even if that was true, even if I’d become the official chart keeper, did that mean I was being “too hard on people”? Or that I “was having trouble with boys”?

  I mentally scrolled through various boys on the Life Cycle chart. Just yesterday I’d upgraded Wyeth Brockman, so it wasn’t as if I couldn’t change my mind about people. When they deserved it.

  And I could appreciate the niceness of complete Croakers—Drew Looper, to name one. For example, just last week we’d been laughing together in social studies about this Web comic we both liked called Splat. Also, a few days ago he’d let me copy his math homework, and to say thanks I gave him half of my chocolate chip brownie.

  See? Niceness. From both of us.

  Oh, and also Ben Santino. After I’d decided he was too Croaker to crush on at Chloe’s party, we had a really fun conversation about zombies. Which we both agreed were way cooler than vampires. Or werewolves.

  So the fact that I’d listed Ben Santino as a Croaker didn’t mean I couldn’t see him as a person.

  It just meant I couldn’t imagine him as date-worthy.

  Which was totally not the same as “having trouble with boys.” Or “being too hard on people” in general.

  As for staring at Zachary: All right, maybe I had been. But staring did not equal liking. I was a chart keeper, a photographer, a student of character. Une stud-ent of charact-aire. Staring was necessary, a part of the job. How could you notice things about people if you weren’t focused? You couldn’t.

  At least, that’s what I told myself in homeroom.

  CHAPTER 11

  Every June at Fulton Middle they had Student Recognition Day, but really, it should have been called Maya Lopez Day. For the past three years she’d won practically everything—prizes in math, Spanish, science, physical fitness, and character. Last year, she even won Perfect Attendance, which we always treated like a joke—ha ha, a prize for just showing up, how impressive.

  What I’m saying is, I never thought very much about the fact that Maya was always around at school. She just was. Until that Wednesday (and Thursday), when she was banished to the computer lab, learning to respect Señor Hansen’s authority. Maybe stop calling him “Mister,” for starters.

  And I suppose if we’d been able to walk to class together, and pass notes in social studies, like always, we could have talked it out, or I could have made a silly joke. Or something. Except now she was in computer lab jail. So how could I (a) explain that she’d hurt my feelings (again) but at the same time (b) get things back to normal between us? I couldn’t imagine how to make these two opposite things happen, but all morning I couldn’t think about anything else.

  It didn’t help matters that while Maya was imprisoned in the computer lab, I had to deal with the Official Gossip. Somehow overnight a rumor had gotten started that Fisher-Greenglass had suspended Maya for a full week, summoned her parents to school, and announced that Maya was forbidden to return to Señor Hansen’s class until she had written a letter of apology in perfect Spanish.

  In homeroom Sabrina asked me if it was true that Fisher-Greenglass was also making Maya write a letter of apology to Chloe, although in English. So I said that Maya didn’t have to write any letters, not in pig latin or Esperanto or any other language, and furthermore, if Maya owed Chloe an apology, Chloe owed her one right back.

  Then Sabrina said, “All right, well, I know Maya’s your friend and everything, and you think she’s so great, but.”

  “But what?” I said.

  Sabrina pressed her lips into a straight line. “I don’t know, Finley. Maybe you could think for yourself sometime?”

  I couldn’t believe that. I mean, this was being uttered by Chloe’s lapdog.

  Other people asked me if Maya was okay. They always tilted their heads to the side when they asked this, like one ear suddenly weighed ten pounds: “Is she okayyy?” Sophie Yang and Dahlia Ringgold even asked me in homeroom if I personally was okayyy.

  “Why wouldn’t I be?” I asked.

  “Oh, because you guys had a fight,” they explained sympathetically.

  I almost asked which fight they meant—what Maya had said to me in Hansen’s class yesterday, or what she’d said today at the lockers. But I realized it didn’t matter. The Official Gossip version of our friendship was that we’d been arguing in public.

  And for once, it was right.

  • • •

  With all of this going on, the last person I wanted to deal with was Zachary. I avoided him all morning, until fourth-period art.

  For most of that class our teacher, Ms. Cronin, was describing the new project. She was a very sweet teacher, but she was a big explainer, always willing to re-explain things for the kids who weren’t listening, then take questions from the kids who hadn’t been listening to her re-explanation. Usually by the time we got to pick up our drawing pencils and actually do the project, the period was over.

  I think most kids didn’t care. But I cared, even though I’d always been a terrible artist. It was like I could see what I wanted to draw, but when I picked up the pencil, all I ever got was a stick figure, or a stick landscape, or a stick portrait. Everything looked boring and flat and generic. Even though I saw it as complicated and 3-D.

  Anyhow.

  That d
ay Ms. Cronin was re-explaining about this sunflower painting by van Gogh. She said the thing about it was that it was specific. “Every one of these flowers has its own special, unique character,” she declared, sweeping her hand over a big reproduction she’d glued to some poster board. “Doesn’t it almost seem as if each flower in that vase should have its own name?”

  “Yeah,” Jarret called out. “I think the top one is called Kyle.”

  Kyle punched his arm.

  “Ms. Cronin,” Chloe said in her fake-sweet voice. “Didn’t van Gogh do his painting in France?”

  “Well, yes,” Ms. Cronin said. “In Arles, which is in the south of France.”

  “I thought so. So shouldn’t those sunflowers be named Jacques? Or Marie?”

  Sabrina giggled. So did Olivia.

  Ms. Cronin nodded patiently. “That’s fine, Chloe. But let’s forget about the names. All I meant was—”

  She re-explained her point about how each flower, each petal, had its own special specialness. Finally she gave us our next assignment: Draw an object, any object, so that it seemed to have a “specific, unique character.”

  “Does it need to be a flower?” Cody Bannister asked.

  “Not at all,” Ms. Cronin said. “It could be a cat or a pencil or a quart of milk. The important thing is to really see it—”

  Irk. More re-explanations.

  If Maya had been there, we’d have been passing notes about Cody’s new haircut (too much mousse, or something; the front stuck out like a hood ornament). But she wasn’t. And because by then I was crazed with boredom, I peeked over at Zachary.

  He was talking to Dahlia Ringgold. Or rather, she was talking to him, saying something brilliant and enthusiastic like “Oh, I mean that’s like so incredibly, omigosh, I don’t believe it.” When she finally stopped exclaiming things, Drew Looper reached over and shoved Zachary off his stool. It wasn’t a mean shove; it was more a way to go with the ladies shove. Except he probably threw a “bro” in there also, because Drew Looper used words like “bro.”

  Way to go with the ladies, bro.

  Snort. I mean, how excruciating.

  And again, Zachary was grinning. Thereby proving, once and for all, that he didn’t need me to “take care” of him. Despite what Maya had told me at the lockers.

  Finally Ms. Cronin announced that in the remaining six minutes of class we should get started on our “sunflower-inspired” drawings, so I drew a bunch of daisies with berets and curly French mustaches. Only my drawing was so bad that I crumpled the paper into a ball and jump-shot it into the trash.

  Suddenly Zachary was standing behind me. “Hey, two points,” he said cheerily.

  “You mean three,” I said. “Here’s the line.” I tapped the chair behind me. It was a joke, but he just nodded like, Oh right, of course I knew that was the three-point line.

  Then he cleared his throat. “Uh, Finley? Are you mad at me?”

  “Why would I be?” I asked.

  “I don’t know. You were weird on the phone yesterday. You don’t seem to be talking to me today. And this morning at Maya’s locker, you took off as soon as I came over.”

  “Because I had to return a library book. To the library. Why do you think it was about you?”

  “I just . . . never mind.”

  We stood there, not looking at each other.

  “So I called Maya yesterday,” he finally said. “She said Chloe was having this party on Saturday.”

  “Yup,” I said.

  “But Maya’s not going. She said you were, though.”

  Great, great, great. “You know what, Zachary? Maya doesn’t decide my calendar for me.”

  “Oh,” Zachary said. “No, I know. That’s not what I meant.”

  “Yo, Mattison!” Drew Looper shouted. “Someone is wai-ting for you.”

  Dahlia Ringgold swatted Drew’s hand. “Shut up, you really, gah, I swear.”

  Then Jonathan Pressman pointed at Dahlia. “Hey, Mattison. Mattison, Dahlia just said—”

  “One sec,” Zachary called over his shoulder. His almost-purple eyes met mine. “Anyway, Finley, if I did something, I’m sorry.” Then he went back to his table.

  And I thought: Sorry for what? Talking about me to Maya?

  Also: Dahlia Ringgold? Please. She can barely form sentences.

  Also: “Mattison”?

  I mean, okay: As a name it beat Freakazoid, but that was a pretty low standard. This seemed to me like a prime example of Croaker behavior: calling each other by their last names. What was wrong with using first names? Last names seemed so cold and impersonal. Generic.

  Why did boys—specifically Croakers—want to be generic?

  Why did Zachary?

  CHAPTER 12

  Three centuries later, school was over for the day, but I didn’t wait on the steps for Maya. I figured she wouldn’t show up, since she had to be degumming desks, plus I didn’t want to deal with Hanna and Olivia. It wasn’t just because I knew they would both want to talk about Maya. I also knew that Olivia would ask me to take her photo, and the truth was, I wasn’t ready.

  How can I explain this? Maybe it will sound crazy, but for some reason, ever since art, I couldn’t stop thinking about those van Gogh sunflowers. They weren’t the sort of perfect, supermodel bouquets you saw in flower shops or magazines. If you gave them to someone as a present, the person would probably say, “Hey, thanks for the half-dead flowers.” But they were beautiful anyhow, because they were droopy. No—not because they were droopy. Because they looked real. The opposite of generic.

  And I started thinking about all the pictures Dad took of me when I was little, how so many of them were from holidays and birthdays and vacations I couldn’t remember. But if you asked me about all those events now, what I’d see was the photo. Really, it was almost as if the photo had replaced the memory in my brain.

  So then I had this idea: Taking pictures wasn’t just about showing my friends looking supermodel perfect. Some of these yearbook photos could actually be what people remembered. When they were ninety, someone could ask them if they remembered Olivia Moss from middle school, and they’d probably blank on the actual person. But maybe they’d see my photo of Olivia Moss. Or rather, their memory of my photo. And if my photo was just some zitless, fakey-fake fashion-mag pose, it would be like the actual, droopy-sunflower person named Olivia Moss never existed.

  Same for Maya.

  Also for Zachary, who I refused to photograph as generic “Mattison.”

  That is, if he still wanted me to shoot him for the yearbook. Which, come to think of it, I didn’t know for sure, since it was Maya who’d told me he wanted a photo in the first place. And considering how I’d acted in art, it wouldn’t be surprising if he changed his mind.

  Anyhow, after basketball practice I decided to go home to read that book about portrait photography. Maybe I could learn something about taking ungeneric, sunflower-type portraits. Also, I desperately needed to clear my head.

  The house was quiet when I walked in the door. Mom had left a note saying she’d taken the Terrible Two to Gymboree, so I made myself a mug of hot chocolate, brought it upstairs to my bedroom, and turned on my computer.

  First I checked to see if Maya had e-mailed me. She hadn’t, which was not a shocker, really, because you couldn’t use the school computer lab for personal stuff. So I sent her a quick hey, how did it go today message to her home account, nothing about the Life Cycle or our sort-of-fight or Zachary.

  Then, since my computer was on anyway, I speed-read Mom’s blog to see if she’d written anything about Awesome Daughter. This was what she’d posted today, around the time I was in art:

  You all know how committed I’ve been to providing gender-neutral toys for the twins—unpainted blocks, puzzles, clay, etc. Gotta confess, guys, lately I’ve been wondering if maybe I should just give them the toys they clearly prefer—a truck for Max and a tutu for Addie.

  If you give your toddler son a truck, will he end up
hating poetry? If you give your toddler daughter a tutu, will she hate her body when she reaches puberty? Please tell me I don’t need to worry about putting negative gender-typing thoughts into their impressionable little heads.

  How gender-neutral is your toy box? Comment below!

  Xox,

  Jen

  This was kind of warped, I thought. Most of my own toddler years were a swirly blur in my head, but I had a distinct memory of Mom handing me a Barbie on her way out the door to work. Did she actually believe that Dentist Barbie’s voice chip had put “negative gender-typing thoughts” in my brain? Such as what—brush your teeth every day? And that because of Dentist Barbie I now “hated my body”?

  Plus, it seemed she was saying that girls were as messed-up as boys when they “reached puberty.” I was pretty much an expert on this topic, so really, if she wanted the truth about boys and girls, she should have asked for my input.

  Well, she wanted comments, didn’t she?

  I typed:

  Dear Mom,

  You gave me Dentist Barbie when I was five and guess what—I don’t hate my body. In fact, I currently practice good dental hygiene.

  Love,

  Awesome Daughter

  And then, to prove that I was the Davis who knew about the Infinite Weirdness of Boys Reaching Puberty, I opened my science binder, took a sip of hot chocolate, and spent a few minutes updating the Amphibian Life Cycle:

  Drew Looper: Croaker. Way to go with the ladies, bro. *shove*

  Jonathan Pressman: Croaker. How long has he had that huge-ormous Adam’s apple?? Looks like a wad of bubble gum stuck in his throat. Lately has developed a turpentine smell.

  Cody Bannister: Tadpole with Croaker tendencies??? Wearing Angry Birds Band-Aid on left elbow. (No reason to assume it’s ironic.) Bizarre new haircut, which possibly means he’s attempting to give himself a Croaker makeover. Also said “Bless you” when I sneezed today in social studies, which for him is definite progress.

  Zachary Mattison: Frog. Maybe too much of a Frog. Although now associating with Croakers and going by the Croaker name “Mattison.” Can you be a Frog or a Frog-plus with Croaker tendencies? Can you evolve in reverse?