How To Be A Perfect Girl (4 page)

The girls’ locker room was about the same
size as the one at Walker; a quick count of the number of lockers
revealed that there were enough for everyone in school to have one
of their own—or two, if they really wanted. Val was surprised they
would get to keep their locks, since Walker had insisted that
students return their locks at the end of each semester. Perhaps it
was another one of those public vs. private school things, or
perhaps it was just a Walker vs. Palm Lake thing. Maybe every high
school let students keep their locks, and it was only middle
schools that had to ask for them back each semester.

The bell for the end of the class rang as
Val pulled the code card from her lock and found a pocket for it in
her bag, a large black satchel with purple trimming; it was large
enough to carry several books and binders.

Next up on the Tuesday schedule was Italian
class; even though the classroom was a floor above Palm Lake’s gym,
and about as far away from it as possible, Val found it with two
minutes to spare. It didn’t hurt that a large portion of the
freshman class was headed to the same place; all she had to do was
find a few of her classmates headed in the right direction, and
follow them to Miss Wells’ room. The seats were arranged in two
groups, leaving a pathway down the center of the classroom.

“Come in and sit where you like!” Miss Wells
beamed, “No assigned seats here. Sit with your friends or by
yourself. I won’t be offended.” She had a smile that made Valentina
want to smile too; it reminded her of her mother. “Oh, I love your
hair!” Miss Wells enthused, causing the whole class to turn and
look at the shy girl from Val’s algebra class. Her light brown hair
was arranged in curls that must’ve taken hours to organize.
“Thanks. I, uh, I like your hair too,” the girl said, in a voice
barely louder than a whisper.

“Why, thank you! It’s not as beautiful as
yours, but I try!”

The shy girl took a seat next to Val, and
smiled awkwardly by way of greeting; Val wasn’t sure if the girl
remembered her from earlier that morning. “Hi, I’m Val,” she held
out a hand.

The shy girl accepted it, “Carrie
Turner.”

Miss Wells swept to the head of the class,
red skirt billowing behind. “Welcome to your very first Italian
class! You’ll find that I don’t teach the ‘normal way’—I rely quite
a lot on speaking in Italian and actual exposure to the language.
After all, how can I tell if you know how to speak a language if
you never actually say a word in it?” It seemed like a valid
question. “Anyway, here are your syllabuses—or is it syllabi? I
never can remember. Oh well, grab one and pass the rest back.” Miss
Wells spoke rapidly; she barely paused for breath between words.
“Instead of reading the syllabi or syllabuses or whatever, I
thought we could just assign it as homework and talk about the
Italian language instead.”

“Is that the royal we?” Carrie whispered.
Val didn’t get it, but when Carrie looked at her for a response she
smiled and shrugged.

Miss Wells continued, “Italian is one of the
so-called ‘romance languages’. Now, does anyone know why they’re
called that?”

A boy raised his hand across the room; it
was Keenan, from Chemistry. “Yes?” Miss Wells called on him.
“Because, when you speak in a romance language, girls can’t help
but fall in love with you.”

The whole class laughed; “Not quite,” Miss
Wells looked around hopefully for another hand. “It’s because
they’re based on Latin,” Carrie whispered.

Val raised her hand; it took a few moments
for Miss Wells to turn from Keenan’s side of the class, “Yes?”

“Is it because they’re all based on Latin?”
Val asked.

“Bingo! Roman’s language, romance language,
get it? What’s your name again?”

“Oh, it’s Valentina.”

“Valentina. Well, let’s see if lightning
strikes twice, Valentina, shall we?”

“Um, ok.”

“Do you know what the conjugational
differences between Italian, Spanish, and French are?”

Val wasn’t sure she’d understood the
question, “Conjugational differences?” she asked.

“Yes—you know, the conjugation of verbs.”
The clarification did little to improve Val’s comprehension.

Carrie came to her rescue, “There aren’t
any,” she answered, loudly enough that Miss Wells could hear.
“Exactly!” the teacher exclaimed, “That’s what’s so great about the
Romance languages. They’re all so very similar—why, I bet if you
put an Italian and a Spaniard in the same room they could have a
whole conversation with one another even if they each knew only
their own language.”

“Doubt it,” Carrie’s voice had fallen back
into a whisper, so only Val heard the remark. Miss Wells continued
talking about how speaking Italian was really like speaking four
languages, which seemed to irritate Carrie. Val tried to
acknowledge her classmate’s numerous guffaws and whispered
criticisms, but it soon became hard to do, in addition to paying
attention to Miss Wells. As a result, by the time the bell
interrupted one particularly long-winded sentence, Val had only
taken about a half-page of notes.

Avery was at the Student Gov. meeting after
school; she paid no attention to Val, and gave the same directions
as Raelyn had given the day before, “This first week is all about
getting to know your peers, especially if you’re a freshman. That’s
why we meet every day the first day of school; if you want a
particular office, start floating the idea around and see what kind
of response you get. We’ll vote for leadership positions next
Wednesay, so be prepared.”

Val had completely forgotten about her
agreement with Aiden, so she was surprised when he presented her
with a deck of Mini Monsters cards. “Here,” he said, “For you. I
can show you how to play now, if you want.”

Behind them, someone laughed. Val groaned;
she thought she knew who the laugh belonged to, and she was too
worn out to endure more of Alex’s joking. “King nerd, do you really
think this goddess wants to learn to play your stupid card
game?”

“It’s not a stupid card game!” Aiden
protested.

“Oh, of course not, King Nerd. I humbly
apologize. What I meant to say is—“ he smirked, “—look at Val, and
then compare her to the type of girl you see playing at cards.
Notice the distinct presence of self-esteem? And—perhaps more
importantly—notice how she’s actually, you know, attractive?”
Alex’s posse followed him to where Val and Aiden were sitting. Alex
leaned on the table between Val and Aiden.

“You’re wrong,” Aiden whispered, “She’s
actually interested in Mini Monsters!”

Alex laughed, “But not really, right?” He
looked at her.

Val looked pleadingly at Alex, and then at
Aiden. She gulped, “I’m sure it’s a great game and all—“ she
said.

“But you don’t want to learn how to play.”
Aiden finished for her.

“I’m sorry, I’m just really busy and—“ Val
held out the starter deck for Aiden to take.

“And you have much better things to do than
play card games. Like give me a lap dance,” Alex raised his
eyebrows suggestively.

“Keep it. I have fifty more at home,” Aiden
replied, waving away Val’s hand and the cards; he grabbed his
backpack and walked from the room.

“You’re a jerk!” Val glared at Alex; she
tried to chase after Aiden, but Alex blocked her way.

“Come on,” he said, “do you really want
people to associate you with King Nerd and his card game? Here’s
what you should do with those,” he took the cards from her hand and
tossed them into the nearest trash can.

Val was so mad tears were coming to her
eyes, “Why are you so mean?”

“I’m not mean,” Alex laughed, “I’m the
nicest person at Palm Lake. I just saved you from ruining your high
school experience by getting mixed in with the wrong crowd.”

“Who says he’s the wrong crowd?.”

“I do—and everyone else does. It doesn’t
take a genius to figure out that, if you wanna be class president,
you don’t hang out with the unpopular kids.”

Val scowled, “And I suppose you think you’re
popular?”

“I know I am,” Alex’s whole entourage
nodded, “I’m funny, and attractive, and yes, a little mean, but at
least I’m honest. If you want to get ahead at Palm Lake, you should
mix with the people whose dads run Fortune Five-hundred companies,
not the ones whose parents design card games.”

“What does it matter what your parents do?”
Val asked.

“It matters because that’s one of the ways
status is determined. Look, sweety, you have a choice here. You can
choose to be friends with me and be popular or you can choose to
play card games with King Nerd and disappear from this school
without leaving the faintest trace. And that would be a shame.”

Val was torn; she knew that at least part of
what Alex was saying was true. At Walker she’d lived it; social
rules that regulated who she could be friends with if she wanted to
be popular. She’d hoped that high school would be different. “I
hate this place.”

Alex smirked, “Me too. Now, how about that
lap dance?”

Chapter 5

Wednesday was a little better than the two
previous days, since Val only had to sit through a couple of
teachers going through their syllabi. Geography class was the first
of the year, so Val expected a syllabus session in that class, and
her English Composition teacher hadn’t finished on Tuesday, so
she’d expected that class to be boring as well.

Mr. Phillips hadn’t let the first class take
any of the wind out of his sails; he had started Tuesday’s class
off with a “magical” fruit punch experiment, in which he challenged
the students to mix different colored punches to get a specific
color of purple, which he swore would taste like grape, “but only
if you get it exactly right.”

Today the class commenced with a
demonstration of the effects of liquid nitrogen upon various
classroom objects. Mr. Phillips dunked one of Jenny’s pens; when it
came out and he smashed it with a hammer she whimpered like he’d
hit her instead. Keenan raised his hand; when Mr. Phillips called
on him he asked, “So where can I get some of this?”

“Well,
you
can’t. But if you were a chemist,
you could order as much as you wanted.”

Keenan grinned mischievously, “How do they
know if I’m a chemist or not?”

Val thought she knew the answer, “They must
do a background check to find out if you have a chemistry degree or
something,” she whispered.

Mr. Phillips smiled, “Best not to say. I
don’t want to give anyone ideas, after all. The point is—“ he
segued into the day’s lesson.

Val was surprised when Keenan took out a
pristine notebook and cracked it open. “What are you doing?” she
asked incredulously.

“I am going to take notes,” he replied.

Val laughed, “No, seriously, what are you
doing?”

“Taking notes. Don’t worry Val, this is just
a one-time thing. It’s not like I’m gonna become as studious a
note-taker as you because I paid attention to one Chem lecture.” He
said “studious note-taker” like it was a distasteful idea, but Val
took it as a compliment.

“Alright, then. If you want, I’ll let you
copy my notes to catch up,” she pulled her first page of notes for
the day from her notebook and slid it across the table to Keenan.
He snatched it up, frowning.

“You seriously wrote
‘smashes pen with hammer’?” he laughed, “Geeze, you write
down
everything
.
You might as well set up a tape recorder and use that for your
notes.”

Val stuck her tongue out at Keenan, “Tape
recorders don’t capture equations.”

Jenny shushed them; “Fair enough, but
still—I know who I’m cheating off at test time,” Keenan joked.

“You better not!” Val shot back. Jenny
glared daggers her way, so she decided she had better be quiet for
at least a while. It took her the rest of the class to catch up on
her notes; when Mr. Phillips finished, she looked at Keenan’s
notebook to see what he’d written down. She’d filled four pages of
notes; he’d barely filled a page. “You know I was serious about the
no-cheating thing, right?” Val said.

“Yeah,” he shrugged, “I’ll get by, even if
you won’t let me cheat. This may surprise you Val, but you can
learn things without taking notes. Sometimes just listening
attentively is enough.”

Valentina put her materials away; she had
forgotten about the page of notes she’d let Keenan borrow, until he
held it out to her, “Thanks.” She nodded and added it to her
Chemistry notebook as the bell rang.

For the few Palm Lake students who were
lucky enough to escape the doldrums of extracurricular activities,
the bell after seventh period marked the end of their day. For Val
it meant a short trip to the cafeteria for the third day of Student
Gov in a row.

They had all been trained
to gather in their class corners without being directed; when Val
arrived, Alex was already there joking with his friends. Jenny was
sitting with the other three Student Gov girls whose names Val had
barely learned, and Aiden and his friend were nowhere to be seen.
Val had been hoping he’d be there, so that she could apologize
again for the day before. Not that any of it was her fault;
it’s all that stupid Alex’s responsibility, him
and his stupid social rules
. She didn’t
feel like talking to him, so she sat next to Jenny. The other girls
all shared classes with Val, but she found it hard to distinguish
between them; they all had the same tastes in fashion, the same
interests, and today the trio were even wearing their hair the same
way. Across the table, Ella was whispering excitedly with Zoey.
Ella had a face that reminded Val of nothing so much as a mouse—or
maybe a ferret, and Zoey’s chin was so broad that she looked like a
toad in the right light. Sophia was the only member of the Trio Val
would classify as good-looking; even though her cheeks had a
vulpine tilt, her green eyes helped soften their impact. Sophia was
listening intently to Jenny debrief her on the day she’d had. Jenny
wasn’t exactly one of them as far as Val could tell; they treated
her more like a leader—with respect, but also as an
outsider.