No Such Thing as Perfect

by Daltry, Sarah

  “Okay, but you’ll see. I’ll be up in a month and I promise you’ll be happier with this arrangement.”

  “Whatever,” I say. I choose the passenger seat, mostly because Derek is on the other side of me and it’s easier to walk away in that direction. Maybe I’m being childish, but I don’t care. I can go back to school and work on my paper about Elinor and none of this is important. He’s just a guy. It doesn’t matter that he was always the only one. It doesn’t matter that everything I’ve ever told myself is one giant, glaring lie.

  ****

  Your analysis is shallow. It feels like you only understand emotion or humanity on a superficial level. Maybe try something that challenges your foundations, rather than grasping at them.

  “She’s gotta be kidding,” I repeat to Kristen. She’s been listening to me for the better part of an hour. “I’m not shallow. She’s shallow. God, half the kids in the class didn’t even read the book and I could recite the stupid thing.”

  “I don’t know. I mean, I don’t have any lit classes, but it could be good for you. She’s right. Try something new. You do have a tendency to expect the future to look exactly like the past.”

  “You’ve known me for a month.”

  “Technically almost two, but I live with you, Lily. You don’t like to be challenged, but maybe your professor is right. It’s only a paper, so what’s the worst that happens if you try something a little out there and it’s a disaster?”

  “Um, I fail,” I say.

  “One paper?”

  “Okay, well, maybe not fail, but I won’t be able to be get an A.”

  “So? When you die, your tombstone isn’t going to say, ‘Lily Drummond. B in Lit Study.’ I feel like you’ll survive.”

  “This is so ridiculous. I know everything about Elinor. Ask me. I don’t have time to rewrite this whole thing because she wants me to try something new. There is absolutely nothing wrong with doing what’s familiar. Why does everyone want things to be different all the time anyway?”

  Kristen reaches over and takes the paper out of my hand and tears it up. It’s a symbolic gesture; the original is saved on my laptop and I’ve memorized my professor’s comments. Still, I actually reach for the flickering scraps, ready to tape them back together only to be reminded of how shallow I am.

  “Write something else,” she tells me.

  “I can’t.”

  “Then go for a walk. And when you come back, come back ready to start over. There’s nothing wrong with starting over. People do it all the time.”

  Arguing with her is pointless, because people like her do. People like Kristen come away to college and make friends while grabbing a pizza menu in the lounge and shed who they used to be like another skin they’ve outgrown. But for people like me, the past is a guide to the future, a lesson in how many mistakes you’ve made and how to be better. Otherwise, it’s just a cycle of screwing up over and over again and that terrifies me.

  20.

  Rocks were complicated. I wouldn’t have thought so, but I’d studied for weeks because there were just too many kinds of rocks. I didn’t understand all the variations in rocks and how they were formed, but I kept making the flashcards. It didn’t stick, but I didn’t have much of a choice. I had never done poorly on anything. I was only ten, but rocks would be the death of me.

  ‘Explain the difference between slate and shale.’ I’d stared at the question for half the exam. I had been almost certain one was sedimentary, but I didn’t know which – and the other could have been anything. I knew these had to have been in my notes and on my flashcards, but after a while, the words became little dancing letters on the page, as sensible as if the question had asked me about folk art of the indigenous people on Neptune. They were words – something that had always been reliable – but these words were going to ruin me and I couldn’t make sense of them.

  It didn’t surprise me, of course, when Mr. Grunyan came to my desk with my test paper folded over. We all knew what that fold meant. When you did well, no one hid the results. They were displayed in massive red ink next to a sticker, but when you failed… well, the hidden number or letter didn’t matter because we all knew what the fold meant.

  “You made a mistake,” I said when he handed it to me, his eyes sad because I tried hard. I wasn’t the kind of student a teacher wanted to see struggle, because I did my work and I paid attention and I never complained. But being polite doesn’t mean you know shit about rocks.

  “I’m sorry,” he said and I believed him. The apology wasn’t going to fix it, though. There, under the dreaded crease, was something I only imagined from books I’d read. At ten-years-old, you don’t expect to see an F on a test, especially when you study. Three red scratches, but they were three scratches that screamed, ‘you’re not perfect.’ And that wasn’t an option.

  “But-” I couldn’t argue, though. I had wasted the exam time on shale and slate and left a bunch of answers blank and even several of the ones I did fill out were wrong. I had failed.

  Failure was an abstract concept. I knew to fear it. I knew it meant I wasn’t good enough and I knew that it would be some kind of record of that imperfection, but having never experienced it, I didn’t really understand it. You only failed if you didn’t try, if you didn’t work hard enough, but to fail when you had done everything you could was something you could feel in your soul. Every doubt inside your head was confirmed in that one letter, because you knew someday you wouldn’t be able to keep up and there it was, laid out like a bleeding injury on a white test page.

  “I’m available after school this Thursday for retakes,” Mr. Grunyan said. I was young and there were retakes still, but even if no one else knew, even if my parents didn’t ask – although I knew they would – Mr. Grunyan and I would know.

  “It’s not that big of a deal,” Jon said on the bus ride home, and it wasn’t for him. He’d come home with bad grades, not to mention bruises from fighting and dirty clothes and once he had brought home a note from a teacher because he’d cursed in class. But in the second grade, I had asked my teacher for chocolate milk instead of white milk once and she’d called my mom to verify that it was okay; I’d been punished for three weeks. I wasn’t allowed snacks or to watch TV because “good girls don’t ask questions. Good girls behave and do what they’re told.” It was about milk, but I had upset the process. I had tried to think for myself.

  “She’s going to kill me,” I said.

  “No, she won’t. You might be grounded, but it’s just one F and you can make it up.”

  But he was wrong. The makeup was irrelevant.

  She asked as soon as she got home.

  “Before you get upset,” I started, but I didn’t get to finish. She was in my bag and pulling the paper out, with its crease down the middle, staring at it. Her hand shook as she clutched it, watching it and waiting for the letter to change. “I can make it up,” I offered.

  I think I could’ve handled it if she had yelled at me, if she’d turned to me and given me a lecture. I could have made up the test and I would’ve tried even harder, but when she did turn to look at me, there was nothing in her eyes. She looked at me like she couldn’t believe she had ever hoped for anything from me and then she threw the paper at me. It didn’t hurt; it was paper after all. But she threw it aside and looked at me like I was as meaningless as a creased test. She said nothing at all, shaking her head, and leaving me alone in the room with the disappointment.

  I did make up the test and I got an A, after seeing Mr. Grunyan for help and having him explain rocks in a different way, but it really didn’t matter, because the failure never fades.

  PART II:

  HOVERING

  21.

  I hate the fall. Now that the weather has finally caught up, it’s freezing and all the trees are bare. It’s only been a few days since I got back and yet fall just came in, blanketed the entire world in death, and then left things for us to mourn.

  “You mind company?”
Campus is dark but I don’t have to turn around to recognize his voice. I don’t stop walking and I don’t turn around, but I shake my head as invitation.

  “Fall is so depressing,” he says when he’s beside me. “Do we need an annual ceremony to remind us that everything ends?”

  “I was just thinking the same thing.”

  We walk around the quad, not speaking, but it’s pleasant. There’s a faded light in the library windows and music is playing from some of the dorms, but it’s all away. Both physically distant and almost surreal. For nearly thirty minutes, we just walk, our breath meeting the chill in the air and the only sound outside of the echoes of dorm life are our shoes on the crunchy remnants of leaves.

  “What brings you out here?” he finally asks, after we’ve circled the quad several times, but it’s a question with no timeline. It takes another circle before I reply.

  “I don’t know. I’m just walking. I screwed up a paper and I don’t know how to fix it and things just all seem to feel like they’re out of control,” I explain.

  “You really do put a lot of stock in rules, don’t you?”

  I nod, but he catches it because he’s looking. I like the way he looks at me. It’s a curious look, but I’ve been struck before by his eyes and the depth of them that when he looks at me, I feel complex. Jack also has a sincerity in his look and I can’t remember when – or if – someone looked at me like that last.

  “What happens if you break them?” he asks.

  “I don’t.”

  “But if you did?”

  I stop, the leaves resistant to my feet digging them into dust, and look away from the buildings with life in them, towards one of the academic halls that rests in darkness with only a sole security light to give it presence. I really hate the fall, because the smell of wood smoke and the crispness of cold make me want to love it. I want to picture Halloween and childhood and fireplaces and cocoa, but all I can think about is the fact that even the trees know nothing is permanent.

  “When I was a kid, before… well, when I was really young, I loved to play in the woods,” I say. “There was a massive forest behind my house. I mean, it probably wasn’t massive at all, but when I was five, it felt it. My brother was just my brother and I wasn’t a girl and he wasn’t a boy and no one cared about appearances and rules. We used to stay out in the woods until it got dark – and then we would stay longer, just to see if we could. There was one night my dad came to get us, during the summer, and it was after dinner and his flashlight was the only thing that made the woods real, part of this world. I lived in my imagination in those woods and everything was possible.”

  Jack sits on the curb under the streetlight, but he doesn’t interrupt. I join him, the cold concrete sneaking past my jeans, but it keeps me grounded. Memory feels a little too strong tonight. Fall does that.

  “Eventually, I was told I couldn’t go in the woods, because girls didn’t do that and girls wore dresses and sat quietly and they behaved and they followed the rules.”

  “That’s stupid,” Jack says.

  I laugh and it feels good. I can’t remember the last time I laughed so naturally. “It is. But that’s not the story.”

  “So tell me.”

  I rub my hands together and place them between my knees. It grows cold quickly in New England during autumn, but this is quiet and easy and I don’t want to go inside. Not yet.

  “There was one day. One day in high school. A year ago almost. It was right after my birthday, right after… well, it was a confusing time. And I came home from school and no one was there and I don’t know why. I don’t know what it was that day in particular, but I needed to go to the woods and I wanted them to be the same.”

  “Nothing ever stays the same. It’s both the greatest comfort of life and the singular tragedy of it.”

  “Who said that?” I ask.

  Jack laughs. “Fuck if I know. I think I did.”

  “Well, you should make that a thing.”

  “A thing?”

  “A thing,” I confirm. When he smiles, it’s a simple smile, one that sneaks into your world before you can decide if you want to allow it, before you can decide if the other person deserves your smile. I want to deserve it. I don’t know why. He’s just a guy and I’m just a girl and it’s fall and it’s cold, but his smile lightens some of what I’m carrying.

  “What happened in the woods?” he asks. He’s watching me speak and it makes me uncomfortable, but in a way that I enjoy. He’s listening and it’s so new to have someone truly listen like this that I almost want to stop and ask what he wants in return. But I don’t think I can handle it if there is a cost.

  “You’re right. It wasn’t the same. It was November and the snow came suddenly and the trees were bare. Plus I was eighteen and they weren’t big and the woods weren’t massive. I could see the neighbors on every end of the woods and instead of feeling lost and secure, I felt like I was being inspected.” I pause and look up at the sky, but the lights from the street and the buildings washes out any stars.

  “There was something new, though. Something about the trees,” I continue. I can’t believe I’m still talking and that he’s interested. I pause again, because it sounds stupid, but he nods to encourage me to go on.

  “I looked up at the sky and even though the woods had gotten small, the sky was still huge. It seemed endless and I tried to remember. I tried to picture it the way I remembered, but instead, I imagined a new version. Something that had never existed. I imagined woods and a lake and a clear sky with the moon and the stars. I could hear the owls crying. It all felt more real than everything I knew, and it was all in my head.”

  “It sounds beautiful,” he says. “And there’s nothing wrong with wanting to imagine beauty when the world seems to be lacking in it.”

  “You asked what happens if I break the rules, and here I am talking about trees.”

  “So? If it makes you happy, embrace it.”

  “Do you ever feel alone?” I ask.

  He looks down and his breathing slows, as if it hurts to answer. Like he’s trying to find the oxygen to reply. “In ways I don’t think I’m ready to tell you about. I don’t feel alone, Lily. I am.”

  “You used my name,” I point out.

  “Sorry. Should I go back to Elinor?”

  I shake my head. “I don’t think so. I think I’ve been living too long as Elinor. Maybe you were right the day we met. Maybe the real story is Marianne’s.”

  “Or maybe it’s not about someone else’s story, Lily,” he says and he stands. I don’t want to go back yet, but it’s freezing and the lights are going down in the dorms and library and it’s getting dark. He reaches a hand out to help me up and I hold it longer than I should and longer than I need to, but neither of us mentions it.

  “Thanks for walking with me, Jack,” I say, and we make our way back to our dorm. As we cross from the quad into all the streams of light, the spell is broken, but it doesn’t matter. Kristen was right; a walk was just what I needed.

  ****

  Not sure what brings me there, I gather my laptop and copy of Sense and Sensibility and head to Jack’s room. I didn’t ask. I haven’t seen him since last night and we didn’t make any kind of promises, but I need to rewrite this paper and my mind felt open when I was talking to him, so I go in spite of it being odd. When he doesn’t answer after I knock twice, though, I start to think I’m a moron.

  “You could have at least checked with him before bringing your computer,” I mumble to myself and I’m about to turn around when the door opens. He’s dressed, but his eyes are heavy, almost like he’s been sleeping. He stands in the space between the door and the room and takes in my full arms.

  “Writing that paper?” he asks.

  “Yeah. I’m sorry. This was stupid. I shouldn’t have… I mean, I didn’t think,” I stutter.

  “Hold on, okay?”

  He shuts the door and I stand in the hallway, wondering if I should go back to my
room as the minutes pass. I’m ready to leave when he opens the door again. This time, he opens it all the way and invites me in.

  “Alana,” he says, which I don’t understand at first until he moves aside. The girl on his bed is beautiful, but not in the way you normally recognize someone as beautiful. It’s not a physical beauty, but a sense that she has walked through the world and survived something awful. Grace, I guess people call it, but I’ve never seen it in person before.

  “I’m sorry,” I say. “I didn’t realize you had company.”

  “I was just leaving,” Alana replies. “Jack, I’ll… call you, I guess.”

  He’s just a guy – a guy who picked up a book for me. Our lives are not linked in any way. He owes me nothing, yet in some of the emptiest moments since I started school, he’s been there. Coincidentally, sure, but he’s been there. Yet as I watch Alana flip her long, dark hair up into a rubber band and she and Jack avoid looking at each other, I feel like an intruder not just in his private moment with her, but also in his life. They don’t make eye contact at all and the silence in the moments between her getting off the bed and leaving lingers once the door is closed.

  “I shouldn’t have come.” Breaking the silence seems almost sacrilegious, but the soft buzzing of Jack’s overhead light is humming inside my brain. “I’m sorry. I interrupted something.”

  “It’s nothing,” he says finally and lifts his head.

  The only guys I’ve really known, beyond quick conversations in class or as Abby’s recent interests, are Jon and Derek. Since arriving at college, the illusions I’ve held about Derek are slowly peeling away, but they’re still the precedent for guys in general for me. So seeing Jack in pain bothers me. It changes my perceptions and I don’t do well with that. My own agony is something I bury as much as I can, but I gather that mine is only the superficial flaking off of what I see in him. And it terrifies me to feel so helpless.

  “I never asked,” I comment. “I told you I had a boyfriend, but I never asked about her. I should’ve asked.”