Where Perfection Lies. . . [01]

Everything I Am and Am Not . . .


I walked over, sitting down on the floor in front of Liv. Getting the recognition of my presence from Becca and Neal. I looked up, Becca was holding back her laughter and slowly turning red in the face when Liv, who wasn't preoccupied, realized I was there.


"So what do we do in English?" Liv asked mechanically, like she did every day, I found that I should be used to this welcome, she didn't really say "Hi" anymore.

She raised her thin eyebrows, her blue eyes setting their icy gaze on me. I paused as a surge went through me to say something smart, like "It's nice to see you too." But that wasn't me: the passive, soft-spoken, grey eyed nobody.

I thought it over in the blink of an eye, "the irony stuff."

Liv paused, I could tell the gears that rusted away behind her cold, lifeless eyes were at work, formulating her next excuse or escape plan.

"Oh wait a sec." She began, leaving Becca, Neal, and I sitting there. She walked to her books purposely placed there in the untidy way that any non-blue-eyed newcomer would be yelled at for. Across the room, you could hear her immature voice, filled with the ring of a five-year old's,

"I'll be right there," like our lives depended on her being there to function normally, "I just have to see if my brother has eight examples highlighted." And awkward silence settled over me, even though the room was filled with fluttering conversation. The realization that she was going to use me took its icy grip over me again, just like the eyes that pierced into me.

The fact isn't that Liv is abusive. Physically, anyway. But it's that she has those cold, lifeless blue eyes, making their home in her shallow sockets.

Not that all shallow people have blue eyes, I don't want you to get the wrong feeling about it, because there are plenty of shallow people with brown eyes too. And it's not that blue eyes are prettier, because on some people they aren't. It's because those people with blue eyes have it easy, really I mean it. They don't have to keep themselves neat and presentable. Like us grey or brown eyed people do.


This society of Sardis, the almost 16 years I've known it, has always loved the blue-eyed people. As Hitler's Aryan race did.

But it is different - they just need blue eyes, no blonde hair or inhumane facial measurements.

Just blue eyes. Those blue eyes set them apart from others. Not in the fact they have less melanin in their eyes, or because they have one different chromosome from their mother. But because. Well I don't even know, that is the way it is.

It has always been this way, well as of recently. But recently they also started banning the old movies, the ones where a main character would have brown eyes.

It really is awful. They are guaranteed B's in school. Don't ask me the reasoning for it, but they just are. And a few of them deserve the good grades others just have gotten the idea that they rule the world, like Liv thinks, and that everyone is just dying to help them out. Well there is sort of an irony in that . . . because a lot of people do die. Here in Sardis there are a lot of deaths every single day, a lot of people my age too. They disappear and are simply declared dead.

The bell rang, and I walked out the door, and Callum walked up behind me: I knew he was there but refused to turn around. He tapped me on the shoulder and then slung an arm around my waist.

"Callum, go away." I said, now was not the time to make this day worse.


"Why?" he asked, and I turned to face him. His deep blue eyes stared back at me expectantly.


"Callum, just go away."


"Gee Isabella, don't have to be so bitchy now, do you?" I turned away from him and kept walking. He and Liv should go run off together. They'd be perfect for each-other.

Callum just stood there, thinking maybe I would stop and wait for him or something, well I wasn't planning on it. I turned the corner and he screamed "ISA!" I rolled my eyes and walked out the door across the inner court, to make the day worse this detour meant I would be late to my next class. . . .

"CAN MY LIFE GET WORSE?" I yelled at the sky, but there was a bolt of lightning that struck and I couldn't even hear my own yell over the violent clap of thunder that echoed the flash of lightning.

I walked to the door, scowling at the ground, not even going to look up. The door was propped open for students to go through and I rushed inside and rang the water out from my hair.

Going up the stairs, I was nearly soaked to the skin. I slipped a few times on the steps and was ignored. I got to up the stairs and looked out the window, Callum was standing in the doorway across the way, he wouldn't go outside to get wet.

I smiled and laughed to myself, and stuck my tongue out at him, being sure he couldn't see me.

I walked on, now I was in a hurry to get to my class before the bell rang. I slipped two more times before reaching the corner. I turned around it at ran into someone head on. Within a second I thought I was going to fall again, but a strong arm caught me. My wet books crashed to the floor along with its. Wet hair draped over his eyes, and the words caught in my throat when I saw blue. I swallowed and forced myself to smile a little. Then he let go of my waist and I stood up straight, straightening out my damp clothes and brushing my auburn hair away from my eyes. His face was down, starring at my feet and mud-covered shoes. Then he looked at my eye level and I was transfixed into looking straight into his eyes.

They were cerulean blue. Well, one of them was. The other was gray, just like one of my eyes. I gapped, looking into his eyes. And he opened his mouth as if to say something, then closed it and smiled a little. After a second of an awkward gaze at each other, he looked down at the ground quickly like I had, and he asked "Do you know where room A203 is?"

"Oh yeah, I'm going near there." I answered, unsure how to react to his eyes. If he had one blue eye, was he still under that category? Or was he like me an exception, but ignored most of the time. "You can come with me. I'll show you where it is."


"That would be nice, thanks." And his eyes scanned over me again, "did you fall outside or something?"


"Oh, no just walked, bad day."


"I know what you mean." He assured, there is no way he knew what I meant, he couldn't have just had a bad friend ignore him until they need something. Then had a guy call him a bitch and to add an insult, expect him to forget it. Or gotten soaked outside and ignored when he was wet and slipped.


"Right. Come, we're going to be late."

We walked on in the hallway, people walking past us. None of them looked directly at me, but a few girls' eyes danced over him. When we got to where my room was and I said: "A203's the next door on your right."


"Thanks. Maybe I'll see you sometime."


"Maybe." The bell had rung and both of us were late, but either late or not, I doubted I would ever see him again, he's too attractive to be interested in me, the only chance is going be coming to this class.

He walked away down the hallway and I turned into my room. Mr. Keys looked up at me:

"Nice of you to join us, Miss. McLaughlin."I handed Mr. Keys my homework and said I got caught out in the rain, which was a perfectly valid and true excuse. Then walked back to my seat in the corner of the room.

Edward swivelled toward me, "Sweatshirt?" He asked warmly.


"Thanks." I extended my hand out to take it as he tossed it over to me, I caught it and pulled it over my wet shirt. Then I tied my soaked hair up into a loose ponytail. I took a deep gulp of air, and a rush of electricity came into me. There was no defined or patented smell to his sweatshirt, just a clear, softening smell that clung to the fabric. The sweatshirt didn't fit amazingly, but what did I care, it was warm.


"Callum?" Edward prompted.

I raised an eyebrow at him, then nodded and added bluntly, "I tried to avoid him while he was being an ass."


"More or less than usual?" I laughed. Edward had always made me laugh, even though he had just recently begun talking to me. Deep inside me, I hoped he always would make me laugh, not forever, because here in Sardis forever could end tomorrow. But as long as this absurd time would allow, because time is what forever depends on, and time never ends in Sardis. Neither do rules.

I looked into Edward's eyes and wished that somehow his perfect eyes wouldn't be so perfectly blue. Because as the way they are, Sardis would not ever allow me any closer than wearing his sweatshirt.

Both of us knew it, so did Liv. Liv also knew that I had loved Edward since I met him, when Aira and I had referred to him as eye-candy.

Ouch. Why did I think of Aira? I bit my lip and turned away from Edwards perfect gaze. It had been almost a month since Aira left. They tried to convince me she died, so I wouldn't go looking for her. It hadn't worked, and every time that it stormed since, I swear I see her. Someone always leaves during a thunderstorm.

The heavy rain hit the windows, echoing in the silent room. The clock ticked toward 2:20, when the bell rang and would let us go to eleventh period. Thunder rattled the window panes. And my eyes wandered out into the inner court, the last place I saw Aira actually "alive," as the authorities put it.

A light caught out in the inner court, in the exact place she had been when I last saw her.

Unfortunately I slowly slipped into the painful memory of that day; We were talking calmly in the common rain. A bolt of lightning lit the sky, and she made a bad joke about what happens in a thunderstorm, with someone leaving and that jazz. I heard her voice trail off behind me. I turned around to look at the distorted face I knew she would make on the subject: the expression that would put a smile on my face no matter my mood. Except when I turned back to face her, there was no strange contortion. No Aira. I turned around wildly, thinking maybe she somehow passed me, maybe something happened besides everyone's worst nightmare. But she was gone. I yelled out, and my tears were hidden by the rain. A teacher rushed out to me, I had been standing there for what felt like a few seconds, when in fact the bell had rung. He seemed to know what had happened before I could even try to explain it. My best friend was gone, somehow she was gone for what could be forever.

The bell rang angrily startling me back into my awful reality. I stood up just as the rest of the class did, as Kathryn turned to face me. For some reason unknown to myself, I had been given an escort in between my classes since Aira left. And Kathryn would come with me, like usual.

Edward stood up, staring at Kathryn. She had blue eyes like he did. And she hated me, I was the reject that stood between him and her. They were made for each other. Both beautiful, smart and humourous. I found it hilarious that she had been the one to protect me, when she wanted to kill me herself.

"See you later Bells." He said looking directly into my eyes. And looking off into the distance behind me, he said emotionlessly, "Kathryn." He nodded and smiled at me as he left.

I walked out the door, Kathryn hustled to catch up saying. "Wait Isa." I didn't wait.

"Isa, are you okay? You didn't look fully there right before the bell rang." Kathryn asked me sincerely, striking me off-guard for her new found kindness.

"I'm fine." I said, sounding like I was programmed to say it, and I couldn't help but wonder, maybe I am. The look on her face made her appear more beautiful than she was normally. And it slowly made me hate myself for getting in her way of Edward. They would be the perfect couple for each-other. Both beautiful, smart and humorous. But she was unconvinced, "seriously, what is wrong."

I answered back smartly without thinking, for the first time in my life I didn't consider how my reaction would make someone feel,

"Have you ever noticed that EVERYONE calls me Belle or Bells, or even Isabelle?! But not Isa!? Or are you too blonde to realize that! Or that my best friend for life is gone, as of a month ago? And I'm not that social! It isn't easy for me to get to know someone. Seeing as I get hurt too easily."

I paused, almost tripping down the stairs. Why had I said that? I couldn't bring myself to look at her perfect blue eyes. "And can't you see that Edward doesn't like you! He can't even look at you! He isn't ready for perfection yet. He is probably working his way up, really slowly mind you, to your lev-"

"STOP!" Kathryn yelled at me. "Why do you put yourself down like that?"

"Like what, I'm only stating the truth. You know that thing that hurts."

Kathryn got silent, she clenched her jaw and looked up at me, shaking her head. "Wh- why do you do this to yourself? Dwell on your best friend? Bells, she's gone. She isn't coming back."

Hot tears rushed into my eyes. "How do you know!? You weren't there, you weren't talking to her, laughing with her, when her voice caught, and you turned around and she wasn't there anymore! Not even a body. If there was a body they could show me, I wouldn't press the subject, but there isn't."

Her voice deepened, "Belle, she's not alive." I walked forcefully into the next classroom. Kathryn shrugged helplessly and sat down in her seat, luckily far away from me, for her sake. And I buried my head in my arms.

Footsteps echoed near me, and a familiar voice asked politely, "are you hungry?"

I lifted my head from the desk to see Andy sitting there, the desk pulled over close to mine. A mischievous smile spread across his face when I looked at him.

"No." I said sadistically and looked at him curiously.

"Good, I wanted to keep my head." He laughed uncomfortably at his joke, just as Callum walked into the room.

A great urge to hide took hold of me, along with an urge to kick Callum where the sun doesn't shine. Or better yet, make him irreversibly jealous.

"Andy." I said quietly, and he leaned in slightly, his hair was messy enough to drive a girl insane, in a strongly attractive and compulsive sort of way.

Then I put on my best, and no doubt terrible flirtatious act.

I set my hand softly on Andy's arm, and with the other I touched his neck softly. Leaning into him gently, I kissed him lightly on the cheek-not even kissed, just brushed my lips over his defined cheekbone. As I shifted away, I saw the boy I had met in the hallway appear in the doorway. I focused on him as Andy breathed lightly into my ear. And out of the corner of my eye I saw Callum's jaw drop. I felt Andy's lips part by my ear as my eyes rested on the boy from the hallway.

A familiar voice whispered into my ear, "Why did you do that?"

Continue. . .
But the voice wasn't Andy's. It was the voice of the boy whom I met last hour in the hallway, the one who was standing in the doorway, the one whom my eyes were now glued to.

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