Page 29 of Eye of the Beholder

Mina spreads the book open to a bookmarked page as I sit. “I want you to do the first fifteen questions in each section. We’ll skip the essay portion.”

“Fine,” I say. “And Lydia wants you to go to her room while I’m taking this.”

“No cheating,” Mina says, and she stands.

As she leaves the room, she looks just as apprehensive as I know I do. When she’s gone and the door is closed behind her, I take a deep breath, pull out a pencil, and start the test.

10

Mina

Ienter the den of uncertainty.

I mean, I like Lydia. I actually really like her. She’s always been nice to me, even though we don’t hang out or anything, and she’s just a likeable person. But I do have reservations about this part of the afternoon.

The colors in Lydia’s room are similar to the colors in mine—yellow and pink—and somehow that makes me feel slightly less nervous. Yellow is just a happy color, like sunshine. It’s hard to be nervous when sunshine is shining in your face.

Or so I think right now. I’m sure the nervousness will return.

“Hi,” Lydia says when she looks up at me from one of the chairs she’s placed in front of her vanity. “How was the tutoring?”

I shrug, playing absently with the necklace I’m wearing. It’s a little flower pendant; I wear it most days, and when I’m nervous, I have the bad habit of fiddling with it.

“He’s taking a practice test so I can see where he needs the most work,” I say in response to Lydia’s question.

Lydia pretends to shudder. “Better him than me,” she says, and I smile.

“What are you doing for college?” I say. “Where are you applying?”

Lydia blushes slightly—a look I’m surprised to see on her. “Oh, I don’t know,” she says. “I’ve applied to a few of the in-state universities, but…well, I’d kind of like to work for one of those match-making companies. Online dating and stuff. Or I could travel—visit my pen pal in France. Or maybe be a beautician. Those are my current thoughts.”

I look at her room, at the excess of cosmetics and hair-styling tools laid meticulously on her vanity. “That looks like it might suit you,” I say, smiling. She smiles back.

“Let’s start!” she says.

I can’t help but feel a little bit bad. Cohen is at least getting help on his ACT, but I’m doing nothing for Lydia. What is she getting out of this?

I look to her. “Lydia, this is really sweet, but you don’t have to do this. I don’t want to inconvenience—”

“Oh, no! No! Don’t back out now!” she says, and amazingly, she actually looks crestfallen. She stands up and comes to me. “This is one of my favorite things to do! I mean, obviously if you really don’t want to do any of this stuff”—she gestures to her vanity—“no one is going to make you. But if it’s me you’re worrying about, don’t. I love doing makeup and hair!” She hesitates and then goes on. “And you’re lovely, but I think I could help you feel more confident. When you like how you look, your confidence increases. Do you like how you look?” she asks, and coming from anyone else, that questions might be offensive, but Lydia somehow delivers it in a way that conveys nothing but true curiosity.

“I don’t know,” I say, but it’s a lie. I sigh. I’m doing a lot of that today. “No,” I say. “Not really.”

“Then please let me do this for you,” she says. “If you hate it, we’ll get rid of it and you never have to touch beauty products again.”

Her voice is so pleading, her words so similar to what Cohen said about trying on new clothes, that I nod. I am curious, if nothing else. I pause for a second, and then I say, “What about my eyes?”

She beams at me. “I’m thinking some subtle eyeshadow—nothing gaudy, because that’s so not you—and then some—”

“No,” I say, cutting her off. “I meant the colors. The brown and blue.”

She tilts her head, looking incredibly like Cohen when she does. “What about them?”

I shrug, feeling self-conscious. “They look weird.”

“No, they don’t,” she says. “I would kill to have eyes like that. It’s like those huskies.”

Excellent. I’ve always wanted to be compared to a dog.

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