January 2020

One, Two, and Three live in the perfect world—so why aren’t they happy? “One!” The Perfection teacher’s shrill voice sliced the silence of the still room like a knife. One jumped, startled. The teacher’s voice sounded flat. “Please pay attention!” One shifted in her chair. She decided to try to concentrate on the teacher’s lecture to the class. The teacher droned on, her toneless voice never changing: “Perfection is part of life. Without it, no one can live. That is why we teach it.” Then, quite suddenly, a bell rang. The sound was like a wake-up call to the sleepy and bored students. One lined up with her classmates in a long line, then followed behind them as the teacher led the class to the cafeteria, a train of children following behind her as she went. At the cafeteria, One took her assigned seat at the front of the table, next to Two. A multitude of unappetizing white cubes adorned her plate. The food tasted bland like it always did. But even though it tasted like a piece of thin cardboard, as the teachers always said, it was “perfect.” After lunch, it was time for English. The kids lined up again and trailed behind the teacher like a snake of silence. In English, One practiced her handwriting on a sheet of milky-white paper, enjoying the perfect shape of her handwriting. She was copying a sentence from The Book of Perfection, a leather-bound tome on how to be perfect, when a sudden abnormality in her handwriting made her hand come to a stop: an a had not turned out the way it should. The curve of the letter was lopsided, like it was leaning out. One frowned. Whenever she practiced her handwriting, her a’s always turned out perfect. But this one hadn’t—was there something wrong? One shook the thought out of her head. Nonsense, she told herself. It must have been a trick of the light. She looked at it again. A now-perfect a stared back at her as if daring her to believe it had been imperfect a second ago. After school, One walked home with her friends Two and Three. Two was a shy boy who never said a word. Normally, he preferred to walk alone in silent thought, but today he walked with One and Three. Three was an energetic girl, much like One herself, but since talking to each other was not allowed in school, she expressed herself while walking home with One, when no teachers or parents could hear them. One told her about the lopsided a. She asked Three, “Could it be that this world is not perfect?” Three stopped and looked at her. “Of course not! Why would we be learning Perfection if not to help ourselves become perfect?” she said. “However, I always feel like I don’t fit in for some reason.” Saying this, she skipped up the road and, after saying goodbye to One and Two, walked into her house, a sturdy brick structure painted a deep shade of brown. Of course, in this perfect world, all houses are like that, thought One, whose house was identical to Three’s. After walking with Two a short way down the street, they arrived at his house, which, of course, was completely identical to Three’s in size and color, except for a number painted on the door: 2. Two said his goodbyes and stepped into the house, leaving One to walk to her house, which was adjacent to Two’s. One happily walked down the street, searching for her house.  There it is! The yellow-colored house with a brown 1 on it—wait. Why is it yellow? One was flabbergasted. She knew that all houses had to be identical in size and color. Was there a logical explanation for the bright-yellow color of her house? One stood in front of the yellow house, pondering how it had turned yellow. She heard her parents inside the house doing chores. They worked at a factory that produced copies of The Book of Perfection. She finally decided to go inside and ask her parents why. “Mom? Dad? Why is the house yellow?” Her mother turned to look at her while sweeping. “What do you mean? It’s brown!” she said. “No, come look at it! You’ll see what I mean!” said One. Her mother stepped outside and peered at the yellow house. “What do you mean?” she said again. “It’s brown.” *          *          * Selena waited outside her mother’s office door. Ever since she was six, she had been picked up from school by her mother, a private practice psychologist. But today, her mother had told her to take the school bus to her clinic, which was just adjacent to a glistening lake that shimmered in the sunlight. Suddenly, the door beside her opened. Her mother, Dr. Monica Grayson, stepped out. She looked distracted. Strands of her chocolate-brown hair were escaping her ponytail, which was normally pulled tight. She crossed the room, not noticing Selena as she ducked into another door adjacent to the one she had come from. Selena was bewildered. She had never seen her mother so frazzled and stressed! She decided to investigate and slipped unnoticed into the room her mother had come from. Inside, Selena found herself in an immaculate computer room. She saw several TV screens on a wide wall, all showing three kids, two girls and a boy, walking home from school. She heard One and Three’s conversation as they passed many identical houses. “Could it be that this world is not perfect?” asked One. Three stopped. “Of course not,” she answered. “Why would we be learning Perfection if not to help ourselves become perfect?” “Why would we be learning Perfection if not to help ourselves become perfect?” By now, Selena’s head was full of questions. What perfect world are they talking about? What is Perfection? And why haven’t I seen these kids before? She surveyed