Perfect Couple Read Online Free Page A

it as a joke. Really it was just wishful thinking, I guess. I wasn’t even sure Quinn was gay.”
    Quinn put his gloved hand on Noah’s shoulder. “I did the same. Principal Chen called us both into her office and told us that if we had something to say to the school, we could go ahead if we did it in a way that wouldn’t disrupt class.”
    My friend Chelsea raised her hand. “Those were secret ballots, I thought . How did Ms. Chen know they were yours?”
    “Because she’s creepy ?” Quinn said.
    “Careful,” Ms. Patel spoke up.
    “She’s really old,” Noah said with a sideways glance at Ms. Patel. “You know how she’s always telling us in assemblies that we’d better not try to slip anything past her.”
    Ms. Patel bit her lip, trying not to laugh.
    “Anyway,” Quinn said, “we decided to do it here in study hall because we wanted to come out in front of the peoplewho’ve encouraged us the most.” He put his hand over his heart. “For me, that’s Harper.”
    “Awwwww.” A chorus of girls’ voices echoed how I felt. I’d tried to support Quinn any way I could, but I hadn’t expected him to acknowledge me in front of the class.
    “And for me,” Noah said, “that’s Harper and Brody.”
    “Brody!” Sawyer yelled a raunchy, “Aoow!”
    Brody thumped him on the back of the head.
    Sawyer turned around and took a swipe at Brody. Brody leaned back in his desk to dodge the blow.
    “We also wanted to come out in front of Sawyer,” Noah said, “so we’d catch him off guard, before he had the chance to work up any jokes.”
    “Oooooh,” said the class. All eyes were on Sawyer now. It wasn’t often that somebody stuck it to Sawyer.
    Quinn went on, “And of course, Sawyer is our study hall’s student council representative. He can help us address our grievances to the school if anything bad happens.”
    Sawyer nodded. He must take his position seriously. I’d been as surprised as anyone when he nominated himself for student council representative at the beginning of the year. We’d elected him because nobody else ran. But it was nice to know he would step up for Noah and Quinn if they needed him.
    Then he muttered, “I’ve got nothing. Good material takes time.”
    “Exactly,” Noah and Quinn said together.
    Their speech seemed to be winding down. Before anybody else could heckle them, I called, “Cupcakes!”
    “Cupcaaaaaakes!” several people cheered.
    As I slid out of my desk, Brody cracked a smile at me. “You made coming-out cupcakes?”
    “Yeah. Wait till you see them.”
    “Do you need help?”
    “No, thanks.” There was only one container. I’d hidden it on the counter at the back of the room, underneath a huge folded poster of the periodic table.
    I was halfway there before I realized that I’d just turned down an innocent excuse to interact with Brody. When it came to guys, I was a little slow on the uptake.
    Brody was standing beside his desk now, stretching. I grabbed the container and brought it to him. “I mean yes,” I said, “I need your help. Could you open these on Ms. Patel’s desk?”
    “Sure. What are you going to—Oh.”
    I pulled a camera out of my pocket, the small one I carried when I didn’t have my expensive one, so I never missed a shot. “Say cheese,” I told him.
    “Cupcakes!” He held them up.
    It was another killer picture of him, I realized with dismay. Brody was a little too photogenic. I wanted my best work to go into the yearbook, but I couldn’t get away with slipping a photo of him onto every page.
    I shot a few more candids of the class while I waited for him to deliver the cupcakes to the front of the room. Then I cornered Quinn and Noah against the whiteboard for the commemorative picture I really wanted. They put their heads close together and held up their cupcakes. I’d used rainbow papers, and each cake was topped with a plastic rainbow and a cutout photo of someone in the class. So Noah’s cake had his face on top, and