15

English class is eerily empty, like a plague just wiped out half the female contingent. At first I can’t think where they’ve gone, but then I remember, and it totally freaks me out to know that somewhere in the school my mom is teaching girls to avoid boys like Brandon. And me, I guess.

I wait for Paige to appear, and when she finally does I pat the seat beside me so she’ll come over, but instead she rushes to the back corner of the room. I wave, but she just buries her head in her People magazine and turns bright red. Something about her body language makes me think we may not be repeating our date.

I’m about to turn back to face the front of the class when I’m joined by Jessica Pantley, the ditziest member of the cheerleading squad. She studies me for a moment, then unpacks a pink notebook adorned with flowers and proceeds to write down her observations: “cute dimples, honest face, minimal acne.”

“I can see what you’re writing, you know,” I say.

Jessica lifts a finger to her lips to shush me, then narrows her eyes. She looks uncomfortable, as if the exertion of concentrating is overwhelming. She takes a deep breath and writes: “thoughtful, disarming.”

Until recently, I would have thought that seeing my character dissected in Jessica’s pink flowery notebook is one of the oddest things that could happen to me in English class. But that was before I began to attract companions like Taylor and Morgan and Paige.

“You’d like to know what I’m doing, wouldn’t you?” says Jessica in a high, singsong voice.

“I must admit, I’m slightly confused, yeah.”

“It’s what I always do before I go on a date with a boy. I study his face and make some notes. That way I can decide if he’s someone I’d like to be with.”

It’s tempting to imagine that I’ve misunderstood her. But as she gazes at me with enormously wide blue eyes, the thought of being her boyfriend is actually quite appealing.

And then I remember Paige—

“I was sorry to hear about you and Paige,” she says, as though all that gazing doubles as mind reading.

“What are you sorry about?”

“Oh, about you two not working out. Paige sounded absolutely brokenhearted, but I think she’ll get over it eventually.”

I look over my shoulder at Paige, who ducks beneath her People.

“I didn’t even know we’d stopped—” I begin. But then I realize that will make me sound like a complete loser. “I guess we’re just not meant to be together, you know?”

Jessica nods sympathetically and takes my hand between hers, holding me in the spell of her unwavering gaze.

“Maybe you were meant to break up for a reason,” she suggests.

“What reason?”

“Well … so that we could go out.”

Even though I’m transfixed by Jessica, I can feel Paige’s presence ten feet behind me. It would be so wrong to agree to a date with Jessica less than a day after dating Paige. That would make me the worst kind of player.

“I was thinking tomorrow, after school,” she says.

God, she has beautiful eyes.

“If the weather’s nice we could go to Brookbank lake.”

Blue flecked with green. Aquamarine eyes. Turquoise eyes.

“So what do you think?”

“I’d like that very much,” I tell her.

Jessica smiles and nods energetically, then places her hand on my leg.

English is definitely my favorite class.

As soon as I get home, I pull up Google and begin a new search: breast measurements examples with images. I’ve always heard people say that a picture is worth a thousand words, and some pictures are worth even more than that.

The screen fills with links to breast measurements, and images, and tips for augmentation/reduction, and all I can think is how I’ve been misusing the Internet until this moment. Clearly the Web was created so that I can have information like this at my fingertips. From now on I’ll treat technology with appropriate reverence.

I trawl through images of double-A cup, double-D cup, and everything in-between. There are pictures of different breast types—pert, pendulous—and detailed instructions on how to calculate your bra size. There are even warnings about the dangers of silicone implants, although the images are kind of gross so I go back to admiring the other ones.

After fifteen minutes, I’ve learned enough to know that Zach may have been on to something when he said Paige is barely a 32A. I close the screen, and I’m about to get up when Mom walks in and sits on the sofa beside the desk. I’m glad she didn’t come in a minute sooner.

“So how was the date last night? Now that Abby’s not here, you can actually try being honest.”

“It was good. I had fun.”

“So you’re going out again?”

Uh-oh. I really don’t want to admit that I’m going on a date with a different girl so soon. Then again—

“Yeah, I’m going on another date tomorrow,” I say, hoping she’ll assume it’s with Paige.

“Oh, that’s nice. You must have made a connection then.” She hesitates a moment, then stands up.

I’m so pleased she misunderstood me that I conjure a broad smile, and she smiles back. But somehow her smile seems empty, like I’ve just told her the very thing she didn’t want to hear.