The Perfection Paradox (18 page)

 
23.

The library
was busier than usual as Hannah took a seat at a desk half hidden
behind a shelf of books.

She pulled
her heavily annotated copy of the Great Gatsby out of her fraying
school bag. She was determined to get this essay done before the
bell marking the end of the day rang.

Hannah read
over her essay outline, making adjustments here and there in pink
highlighter. Nothing would interfere with her doing well on this
assignment.

“
Did you hear
about Kennedy?” someone whispered excitedly behind her.

Hannah rolled
her eyes.

That must be
the most asked question in the history of Rosewell High School.
Hannah had only been there several months and she was already sick
of hearing it. She’d heard them all by now.

“
Apparently
she’s a descendant of the Russian Royal Family”

“
Apparently
she got scouted by a modelling agency in New York but turned it
down”

“
Apparently
she designed a collection for Paris Fashion Week”

“
Apparently
she has the highest IQ test score ever recorded”

“
Apparently a
Hollywood director offered her the lead role in his blockbuster
movie but she said no”

Hannah
thought her head might explode.

“
No! What
happened?” the second girl responded.

Hannah peered
over her shoulder as subtly as she could manage.

She
recognized the two girls. They were seniors too. This wasn’t the
first time she’d overheard them discussing Kennedy.

Several weeks
ago she’d heard the chubby brown haired girl trying to convince her
flame-headed friend of Kennedy’s non-existent eating disorder, and
a month before that they had been musing over the idea that she’d
paid someone to imitate her and take the SATs in her place and that
was the reason behind her success.

Like most
girls who spent the majority of their time talking about Kennedy
Blakewood, Hannah had never seen them actually talk to her
before.

She tried to
block out their gossiping.

“
Apparently
Kennedy is paying Hunter
to keep chasing after her because she wants to win Prom Queen so
badly and she knows he’ll be voted Prom King!”

Hannah heard
a shocked gasp, “No way! Now that you’ve said it I can totally
believe that though! I can’t believe her!” she replied, disgusted
in Kennedy’s non-behaviour.

Hannah had
had enough. She gathered her belongings and tossed them into her
school bag before swinging a strap over her shoulder. She started
toward the main doors, identifiable by the neon exit sign that
hovered above them, biting her lip all the while.

“
She’s
such
an attention
seeker!” she overheard.

That was
it.

Hannah turned
angrily to face the two girls.

“
Excuse
me
,” She began, her voice breathless and
unfamiliarly confident.

“
I have been
trying to work here and it is impossible with you two babbling on”
She snapped, in a very un-Hannah-like manner, “If you want to make
up ridiculous rumours and lies about people why don’t you do it
somewhere people don’t have to listen to it, or better yet, focus
on your
own
life
instead of lying about someone else’s because you’re
jealous
of
them.”

The girls
were gawping at her with furrowed brows, clearly shocked, not quite
sure who this person even was.

Before they
could retort, Hannah strode away, feeling high on a concoction of
fear and excitement.

It was a
shame she wouldn’t get to finish her essay, but lambasting those
girls had been a sort of catharsis, and Hannah felt calmer somehow
for the remainder of the school day.

Her
confidence spilled over into her weekly volleyball practice. She
greeted the group of girls confidently as she entered the
gymnasium.

After a
training that was undoubtedly better than usual Hannah unlocked her
bike from the rarely used bicycle rack at Rosewell High School and
started her cycle home, the cold breeze pricking at her cheeks
painfully.

She parked
her bicycle in the rotting garage attached to the side of her house
and headed to the front door, intent on finishing her Literature
essay that evening so that she didn’t have to do any work on her
birthday the following day.

She pushed
the door open and a cacophony of cheers greeted her. She jumped
back, shocked.

Marie and
Jessica were stood in the living room, a large cake in their arms
with ‘Happy Birthday Hannah’ written on it in blue icing. Half a
dozen girls from the volleyball club were there too, cone-shaped
party hats pulled on to their heads and party blowers in their
mouths. Hannah’s parents watched happily from the kitchen, her
father’s arm draped casually around her mother’s
shoulder.

Hannah
couldn’t believe it, she was looking from face to face, attempting
to comprehend what her friends had done for her.

This was
for
her
, a
surprise birthday bash for
her
. She’d never even had a birthday
party before.

She felt her
eyes well up with joyful tears and she pressed her hand to her
mouth, laughing and crying all at once.

Marie and
Jessica lowered the cake on to the dinner table delicately and
rushed forward to hug her. They all sat down, chattering excitedly
about the look of astonishment on Hannah’s face when she’d walked
in and seen them. Hannah’s mother hurried into the kitchen to fetch
a knife. Hannah was still laughing as she scooped the cake into her
mouth,

“
Thank you so
much!” she said “This is awesome” she beamed at them, an unfamiliar
burn of gratitude warming her heart. She smiled in a way she never
had before, appreciative of the people who would always prop her up
when it seemed she might falter and fall.

So this is
what it feels like to have friends, to be a part of
something
, Hannah mused. She didn’t think
she had ever been so happy, with her friends by her side she felt
stronger all of a sudden, like bad days would be more bearable with
someone to share them with.

Later that
evening, when only Marie and Jessica remained, she told them about
her altercation with the two girls in the library.

“
I think I
know who you’re talking about… That girl is called Amanda, and her
friend is Emma I think? Amelia? Something like that… I know they’re
friends with Sarah Hughes from the volleyball team.” Marie
explained.

Hannah was
barely considering the two girls anymore, focusing instead on
Kennedy.

“
I feel bad
for her, I really do.” she stated, absent-mindedly trailing her
fingers along the spines of the books on her bedroom
shelf.

 “
How
can you possibly feel bad for her?” Marie replied, “Her life is
perfect!” her tone was flabbergasted, almost hysterical.

Hannah let
her fingers drop slowly from the row of paper worlds on her shelf.
She turned and gazed out of her window. The spider webs and dead
insects had disappeared with summer. The January gloom brought
frosted panes of glass and a chilling draft that snuck through the
cracks in the windowsill.

“
She must be
under so much pressure” Hannah mused, voicing her thoughts as they
swam across her mind, raw and unfiltered, “Her brothers all went to
Ivy Leagues, they were all sport stars, and she has to follow in
their footsteps…”

“
But it’s not
like it would be for us” Jessica explained, lounging on Hannah’s
tiny bed and drawing figures in the dust on her windowsill, “It’s
not hard for her, it’s just natural. It’s easy.”

“
Which makes
people love her or hate her… And those that hate her want to see
her mess up” Hannah rebuffed, “ They want to see her
fail”.

Jessica
shrugged, not agreeing, but not really disagreeing
either.

“
Liking or
disliking someone says nothing about the person you aim your
affection or hatred towards. Instead it says everything about
you.”

She tugged on
her ear thoughtfully, “People hate it when someone gets everything
they want, especially when they get it as easily as Kennedy does.
They want to see the girl who has everything lose
something.”

“
I don’t get
how you can say she gets everything easily, she must work so hard.”
Hannah argued back, although it in some ways it was more to herself
than to her friends.

“
Hannah,
there are geeks with no social lives who are salivating at the
mouth over Kennedy’s SAT score, yet she’s at every house party,
every PTO fundraiser, every charity ball…” Jessica cocked her
eyebrow in a way only she could do, before continuing. “She’s the
best at everything she does and she does it with
no
sacrifice whatsoever.
She’s never had a pimple, never had a bad hair day, never made a
fashion faux pas.” She said this last sentence jokingly, rolling
her eyes flamboyantly and waving her hands animatedly. Her two
companions giggled.

“
I can
understand why some people might want to see her crash and burn,
it’s hard to believe she’s human sometimes, that she’s capable of
feeling sad or disappointed, or jealous…” Jessica’s trailed off as
she thought, “Can you imagine Kennedy Blakewood feeling
envy
? It’s just
absurd.”

Hannah
shrugged, “You never know what goes on behind closed doors. It
can’t be easy to keep up this
façade
of happiness and flawlessness
all the time”

Jessica
looked up at her from the bed she was reclining on, smirking,
“That’s what you
still
don’t get. It’s not a ‘
façade
’. It’s who she is, who
she’s
always
been.”

24.

Emily tore a
piece of French bread in half and smothered it in garlic butter.
She was sat across the table from Cody Schmidt, Rosewell Varsity
Footballer and arch-nemesis of Hunter Campbell.

Emily was
feeling very pleased with herself. Some girls would have given up
on a guy when the endless one way flirting and hint dropping
amounted to nothing but the occasional smile and casual
“
hey
” in the
hallway, but not Emily.

Instead, she
had decided to employ a new tactic. Dating the rival.

Hence she was
now sharing a basket of baguette slices with Cody, smiling and
nodding at his endless Football anecdotes and drunken adventures
which usually seemed to end with him hooking up with a
‘
super hot
’
cheerleader. Emily wasn’t quite sure how to respond to these
stories, but Cody was at least talking to her animatedly, and
seemed to
really
appreciate her frequent nods.

They were sat
at the window of an Italian restaurant Emily used to celebrate her
birthday at every year before her father left. It had seemed bigger
back then, almost magical. Now it felt out-dated and tacky, the
plastic vines on the wall were covered with a layer of dust and the
linoleum-like table covers, checkered red and white, were faded and
scratched from years of use.

Several lamps
swung from the ceiling, shining harsh precise light on the table
directly below, but not managing to reach the four surrounding
tables that sat in relative darkness.

The tables
and chairs had all been sloppily painted a garish red, but that had
been long ago. Parts of the chairs had chipped away and some of the
paint had faded on the well-used handles.

As Cody
gobbled on a piece of bread he looked at Emily curiously, tilting
his head a little.

“
You know,
you’re actually kind of pretty,” he muttered, spraying Emily with
lumps of chewed up bread.

He leaned
across the table, placing his hot sweaty hand on
Emily’s.

Emily didn’t
know what he was going to do until it was too late. His lips
pressed against hers, and Emily felt like he’d done this many times
before with many different girls.

She could
taste all his past kisses at the touch of his lips. Hunter would be
the same she knew, he had kissed girls before her, but all of
Hunter’s kisses were simply preparation, leading up to the moment
he kissed her.

To Cody, she
was just another mouth, just another tongue, plenty had come before
and plenty would come after, but with Hunter, she was the final
one.

He forced his
tongue into her mouth; it felt like a grotesque swollen slug trying
to choke her.

All of a
sudden, Emily really didn’t want to be there with him, with a whole
meal ahead of them, just him and her,
alone
.

Emily’s face
flushed wildly. Her stomach squirmed hollowly and she felt a chill
run down her spine
.