Pushing Perfect by Michelle Falkoff
1.
During the summer between eighth and ninth grade, I turned into a monster.
It didn’t happen overnight; it’s not like I woke up one day, looked in the mirror, and let out a dramatic scream. But it still felt like it happened really fast.
It started at the pool with my two best friends, Becca Walker and Isabel DeLuca. School had just let out for the summer, and though the weather still felt like spring, the sun was out and the pool was heated and Isabel had a new bikini she wanted to show off. Normally she hated going to the pool with us, since Becca and I spent most of our time in the water swimming laps to practice for swim team tryouts, but Isabel had gotten all curvy and hot and kind of boy crazy, and there was a new lifeguard, so getting her to come with us wasn’t that hard.
We couldn’t get Isabel to actually swim, but that was okay; Becca and I spent most of the day racing. I usually won when we swam freestyle, but Becca always killed me in the butterfly. I was terrible at butterfly. We raced until we were exhausted, and then we got out of the water, dripping in our Speedos as we headed for the showers.
“Your butterfly’s getting better,” Becca said, stretching her long, muscular arms over her head. With her wingspan and power I’d never catch her in butterfly, but it was nice of her to say I was improving. Becca was always nice. Isabel was a different story.
“Thanks,” I said. “Not sure it will be good enough to make the team, though.”
“You never know. We don’t have to be perfect to get on. We just have to be good enough. And if you talk to your parents, we’ll be able to spend the whole summer practicing.”
The goal was for me to stay with the Walkers for the summer, instead of going on the family trip my mom was planning. Dad had just gotten forced out of his own start-up once it went public, and Mom thought he needed to get away while he figured out his next move. She’d rented a condo in Lake Tahoe for the whole summer, and I really, really didn’t want to go. I hadn’t brought up the idea of staying behind with the Walkers yet, though, since I was having trouble imagining my parents saying anything but no. “I’ll do it soon,” I said. “I’m just waiting for the right moment.”
We both rinsed quickly under the showers and then pulled off our swim caps. Something stung as I removed mine; I reached up to my forehead to feel a little bump there. I ran over to the mirror to look at it as Becca shook her braids out of the swim cap. “I’m going to miss these when they’re gone,” she said.
“Are you sure you can’t keep them?” The bump hurt a little, though all I could see was a spot of redness, not the protrusion I’d have thought based on how it felt. I took my hair out of its bun and brushed it over my face so Becca and Isabel couldn’t see the bump. They’d always teased me for having perfect skin, and I knew they’d find it amusing that I didn’t anymore.
“Braids are way too heavy for swimming. Besides, you promised we’d cut our hair off together. You’re not going to bail on me, are you?”
“Nope. I’m in.” I’d never had short hair before, and besides, what did it matter? I always wore my hair in a bun or a ponytail anyway. It was kind of handy to have long hair now, though, to cover this thing on my face, which was starting to throb.
We went out to tell Isabel we were done for the day. She was lounging on a towel near the lifeguard station, where some cute high school guy was sitting in a tall chair that gave him a perfect view of her cleavage. “Finally!” she yelled. “I thought you guys were going to stay in the water forever. I’m bored. Let’s get frozen yogurt.”
“Can’t today,” I said. It wasn’t true, but I couldn’t stop thinking about the red bump. I just wanted to go home.
“Suit yourself,” Isabel said. “We’ll just go without you.”
Usually that was enough to get me to change my mind; I hated feeling left out. It wasn’t going to work today, though. “Have fun,” I said, and texted Mom to pick me up.
“Come over later,” Becca said. “We’ll be at my house.”
“I’ll see if I can,” I said. Maybe the bump was just a temporary thing. I watched them walk away and then pulled my hair back into a bun as soon as they were gone.
“Oh, sweetheart, it looks like you’ve got a pimple,” Mom said when I got in the car. “I can put some concealer on that when we get home.”