Page 124 of Mr. Picture Perfect
My mom made a noise right then that was halfway between a laugh and a fart. “Honey, darlin’, you have got to learn a serious and fundamental life lesson right now before I lose my dang mind. As cute as you are, and as gorgeous as I think you are despite what you say about these other boys that’ll be there, it ain’t your looks that’s got Cole hooked on you. When you go to take your showers, or when you’re not in the room … me and him talk, y’know.”
“He andI,” I groaned, “and please, spare me. You don’t—”
“Do you think it’s mygorgeous looksthat made your dad fall for me? I wasn’t any more of a colorful peacock when I was seventeen than I am right now, y’know.”
“It’smalepeacocks that are the colorful ones,” I mumbled.
“Your daddy fell for me because I burned a batch of cookies in home ec class.” She chuckled. “I felt like I’d made the whole school stink to high heaven. Your daddy, sweet, sweet Elmer, he was in my class, and while all the girls had alaughabout how bad a baker I was, he stood there in front of everyone, took one of my burned cookies, and would you believe it? He ate the whole dang thing!”
I made a face at her. “Gross.”
“I found it to bedarling. Andbrave. He encouraged me. I knew that with his support, I’d do better next time. That’s what a good match does for each other, y’know? They make each other better. They hold each other right up. They fight for one another. Oh, my Elmer, he even stood by my side as I made my next batch.”
“How did those come out?”
“Burned them, too,” she said quickly. “Anyway, fast-forward all these years, your darlin’ father has still been my number-one supporter, and that is all I have ever wanted foryou. Cole may find a bunch of pretty boys at Cissy’s big gladiator-fightin’ arena …”
“Gladiator-fighting—?”
“… but who areyouto decide what Cole wants? He’s made it more than clear what it is he wants.You, Noah Lawrence Reed. It’syouwhose burnt batch of cookies he wants to eat. And maybe if you’d take off your glasses and look …”
“Literally can’t see without them.”
“… you’d realize he’s not interested in anyone who shows up at that event tonight. He doesn’t need to see what else is out there. He’s got the perfect man right here at home, and he’s been carin’ for you since you two were children playin’ out in the yard!”
She’d lost me there. “Mom, you can’t possibly know that. We were kids who could barely stand each other.”
“You were kids who played every day in the yard.”
“And I barely remember any of it. In fact, I had to betoldwhat had happened to Cole and why you and his mom had a falling out. Yes,” I then said, answering the stunned look on her face, “I had that fateful talk with Cole’s mom you’ve been wanting me to have. She even fixed me a glass of water with melon and ice cubes she grabbed using her tiny pair of hot pink tongs.”
Despite all the bewilderment on her face, my mother gasped in slow motion. “Oh my gosh, she still has them cute little tongs?”
“And she told me about the bloody incident with Cole getting hurt, something I don’t even remember.” I hugged a pillow to my stomach and buried the bottom half of my face in it. “At least I don’tthinkI do,” I added in a mumble.
My mother looked away right then, as if the mere mention of Cole’s mom sent her mind astray down a path of woeful memories.
Suddenly, she said, “Well goodness, you just made my point.”
“What point?”
“About Cole carin’ for you since y’all were boys.” She turned to me. Her voice was small. “How else do you think he got hurt?”
I lifted my face from the pillow, staring at her questioningly.
“You two were playin’ around on that old rusty jungle gym in his backyard,” she said. “Your foot got stuck. When he climbed up to free you, he fell and scraped his face, probably on a nail or some jagged edge of somethin’. Then he climbed right back up to free you again, even though he was already hurt and bleedin’. You told me all about it on the way to the hospital.”
My mind fled my skull at her words.
I was grasping with phantom fingertips at a ghost of a hint of a fraction of a recollection of such a memory.
A jungle gym. My foot twisting uncomfortably.
A boy coming to my rescue.
Then falling.
“That …” I could barely say the words as the memory tried to surface, as if through murky waters. “That was … was Cole …?”
