No Such Thing as Perfect Read Online Free PDF Page A

He’s here. The local diner was the only place I could think of to go for dinner that wasn’t the cafeteria, but Derek seems perfectly okay with it as he douses his fries in ketchup.
    “So how was the first week anyway?” he asks.
    I stir my milkshake. I ordered it thinking I would have the appetite for it, but after one sip, I don’t feel like eating or drinking. My nerves are frayed, which will pass, but a milkshake is dreadful right now. “It was all right. I missed you.”
    “I missed you, too. We have the whole weekend, though. Just us.”
    Kristen already made arrangements to stay with another girl on our floor, whose roommate went home to get a few things she’d forgotten, so Derek and I have some privacy. I was a virgin before Derek and I began dating, but over the past year, he’s been my first kiss, my first boyfriend, and my first everything.
    He leans across the table. “I don’t know about you, but I could definitely skip the movie.” We’re supposed to see a movie with everyone, but being close to Derek, thinking about spending time together, messes with my head. I don’t like to break plans.
    “I promised, though,” I argue.
    “They won’t care. Come on, Lily. We only get to see each other for a few days and then I won’t be able to come up until next month.”
    “Next month?” He’d been vague when I’d asked, talking only about how much he was enjoying rugby practice and what my brother’s been up to and asking about my classes. I should’ve known he was putting off telling me something.
    “Yeah, but I don’t want to focus on that,” he says, stopping the discussion before it can begin. “So why don’t we skip the movie? I’m sure your friends won’t mind. You’ll be able to spend plenty of time with them after this weekend and I know I’ve been thinking about nothing but being alone since you left.”
    We’d spent the day before we left for school locked in his room all afternoon, but I wanted to talk to him tonight. I wanted advice and I wanted to introduce him to people. I wanted to make him a part of what I’m trying to start here, but he’s right and it’s not worth arguing.
    “Sure, I’ll text them,” I agree. I turn off my phone after I do, because I don’t want to deal with the questions. There’s no point in trying to explain; it’s just a movie.
    Derek goes back to talking, this time about a party he’d been to the night before. “Jon was a mess. You should’ve seen it,” he says and takes a bite of his burger. I continue to stir my milkshake. When Derek finishes his fries, he grabs mine from my plate. I wasn’t eating them anyway. “There were girls all over him, though, so he thought it was a success.”
    “What about you?” I ask.
    “What do you mean?”
    “Do girls hang all over you, too?”
    He pours ketchup all over my fries. They’re more splattered tomato than food now, but it doesn’t stop him from eating them. I feel like I’m going to throw up.
    “Well, yeah, of course, but I behave. Don’t worry.”
    “I won’t,” I lie. “I trust you.”
    “You better,” he says and he finishes the last few fries before throwing money on the table. “Let’s go. I am dying to be alone with you. It’s all I’ve thought about for days.”

8.
    T elling Derek how I felt didn’t go how I’d expected. I’d never really had a plan for it, assuming it would never amount to much. Since I had realized it myself, he was always seeing someone. Although Rebecca ended up being over quickly, it established a pattern. He would end up hooking up with someone at a party or something, date them for a while, and it would end. Sometimes it ended before he hooked up with someone else, and other times it didn’t. He earned something of a reputation, but it didn’t stop girls from trying and it didn’t change the boy I knew. Every so often we would be sitting in my house and Jon would be doing something or Derek would help my mom with the groceries or I