Perfect (Book Three)

Twenty: Life Imitates Art.

Thursday afternoon at lunch, Aria turned the corner to Rosewood Day's administrative wing. All the teachers had offices here and often tutored it advised students during their lunch periods.

Aria stopped at Ezra's closed office door. It had changed a lot since the beginning of the year. He'd installed a white board, and it was chock-full of blue-inked notes from students. Mr. Fitz—Want to talk about my Fitzgerald report. I'll stop by after school —Kelly. There was a Hamlet quote at the bottom: O villain, villain, smiling, damned villain! Below the marker board was a cutout of a New Yorker cartoon of a dog on a therapist's couch. And on the doorknob was a Do Not Disturb sign from a Day's Inn; Ezra had turned it to the Disturb side: Maid, Please Clean Up This Room.

Aria tentatively knocked. "Come in," she heard him say from the other side. She'd expected Ezra to be with another student—from snippets she heard in class, she'd thought his lunchtime office hours were always busy—but here he was alone, with a Happy Meal box on his desk. The room smelled like McNuggets.

"Aria!" Ezra exclaimed, raising an eyebrow. "This is a surprise. Sit down."

She plopped down on Ezra's scratchy tweed couch—the same kind that was in the Rosewood Day headmaster's office. She pointed at her desk. "Happy Meal?"

He smiled sheepishly. "I like the toys." He held up a car from some kids' movie. "McNugget?" He offered the box. "I got barbecue."

She waved him away. "I don't eat meat."

"That's right." He ate a fry, his eyes locked with hers. "I forgot."

Aria felt a swoosh of something—a mix of intimacy and discomfort. Ezra looked away, probably away, probably feeling it too. She looked around on his desk. It was littered with stacks of paper, a mini zen rock garden, and about a thousand books.

"So..." Ezra wiped his mouth with a napkin, not noticing Aria's expression. "What can I do for you?"

Aria leaned her elbow on the couch's arm. "Well, I'm wondering if I can have an extension on the Scarlet Letter essay that's due tomorrow."

He set down his soda. "Really? I'm surprised. You're never late with anything."

"I know," she mumbled sheepishly. But the Ackards' house was not conducive to studying. One, it was too quiet—Aria was used to studying while simultaneously listening to music, the TV, and Mike yammering on the phone in the next room. Two, it was hard to concentrate when she felt like someone was...watching her. "But it's not a big deal," she went on. "All I need is this weekend."

Ezra scratched his head. "Well...I haven't set a policy on extensions yet. But all right. Just this once. Next time, I'm going to have to mark you down a grade."

She pushed her hair behind her ears. "I'm not going to make a habit of it."

"Good. So, why are you not liking the book? Or haven't you started it?"

"I finished it today. But I hated it. I hated Hester Prynne."

"Why?"

Aria fiddled with the buckle on her Urban Outfitters ivory suede flats. "She assumes her husband's lost at sea, and so she goes and has an affair," she muttered.

Ezra leaned forward on his elbow, looking amused. "But her husband isn't a very good man, either. That's what makes it complicated."

Aria stared at the books that were crammed into Ezra's cramped, wooden bookshelves. War and Peace. Gravity's Rainbow. An extensive collection of e. e. cummings and Rilke poetry, and not one but two copies of No Exit. There was an Edgar Allan Poe collection Sean hadn't read. All of the books looked creased and worn from reading and rereading. "But I couldn't see past what Hester did," Aria said quietly. "She cheated."