moving again. That would have been the 26th of September.
Arnie and I had three classes together, and one of them was Topics in American History, a block course, period four. The first nine weeks were being taught by Mr Thompson, the head of the department. The subject of that first nine weeks was Two Hundred Years of Boom and Bust. Arnie called it a boing-boing-going-going class, because it was right before lunch and everybody's stomach seemed to be doing something interesting.
When the class was over that day, a girl came over to Arnie and asked him if he had the English assignment. He did. He dug it out of his notebook carefully, and while he did, this girl watched him seriously with her dark blue eyes, never taking them off his face. Her hair was a darkish blond, the colour of fresh honey - not the strained stuff, but honey the way it first comes from the comb - and held back with a wide blue band that matched her eyes. Looking at her, my stomach did a happy little flip-flop. As she copied the assignment down, Arnie looked at her.
That wasn't the first time I had seen Leigh Cabot, of course; she had transferred from a town in Massachusetts to Libertyville three weeks ago, so she had been around. Somebody had told me her father worked for 3-M, the people who make Scotch tape.
It wasn't even the first time I had noticed her, because Leigh Cabot was, to put it with perfect simplicity, a beautiful girl. In a work of fiction, I've noticed that writers always invent a flaw here or a flaw there in the women and girls they make up, maybe because they think real beauty is a stereotype Or because they think a flaw or two makes the lady more realistic. So she'll be beautiful except her lower lip is too long, or in spite of the fact that her nose is a little too sharp, or maybe she's flat-chested. It's always something.
But Leigh Cabot was just beautiful, with no qualifications. Her skin was fair and perfect, usually with a touch of perfectly natural colour. She stood about five feet eight, tall for a girt but not too tall, and her figure was lovely - firm, high breasts, a small waist that looked as if you could almost put your hands around it (anyway, you longed to try), nice hips, good legs. Beautiful face, sexy, smooth figure - artistically dull, I suppose, without a too-long lower lip or a sharp nose or a wrong bump or bulge anywhere (not even an endearing crooked tooth - she must have had a great orthodontist, too), but she sure didn't feel dull when you were looking at her.
A few guys had tried to date her and had been pleasantly turned down. It was assumed she was probably carrying a torch for some guy back in Andover or Braintree or wherever it was she had come from, and that she'd probably come around in time. Two of the classes I had with Arnie I also had with Leigh, and I had only been biding my time before making my own move.
Now, watching them steal glances at each other as Arnie found the assignment and she wrote it carefully down, I wondered if I was going to have a chance to make my move. Then I had to grin at myself. Arnie Cunningham, Ole Pizza-Face himself, and Leigh Cabot, That was totally ridiculous. That was -
Then the interior smile sort of dried up. I noticed for the third time - the definitive time - that Arnie's complexion was taking care of itself with almost stunning rapidity. The blemishes were gone. Some of them had left those small, pitted scars along his checks, true, but if a guy's face is a strong one, those pits don't seem to matter as much - in a crazy sort of way they can even add character.
Leigh and Arnie studied each other surreptitiously and I studied Arnie surreptitiously, wondering exactly when and how this miracle had taken place. The sunlight slanted strongly through the windows of Mr Thompson's room, delineating the lines of my friend's face clearly. He looked . . . older. As if he had beaten the blemishes and the acne not only by regular washing or the application of some special cream, but by somehow turning the clock ahead about three years. He was wearing his hair differently, too - it was shorter,