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FAMOUS PHOTOGRAPHS WALLPAPERED MR OAKLEY’S journalis Jr waved to thousands who’d crowded the National Mall to hear his “I Have a Drea in the distance Over by the s, a lone man stood defiant in front of four Chinese tanks in protest of the Tiananmen Square massacre On the wall directly above my computer screen, a World War II sailor impulsively kissed a nurse in Times Square on the day Japan surrendered

Mr Oakley had told us a picture orth a thousand words, and these posters were his proof He was right Descriptions in my history textbook read like old news, but these photosdid, and protest injustice, like Tank Man did

And be swept away by romance, like that nurse

My gaze fell from the poster to my computer display, which was full of o, on the first day of school, our senior class had elected the Superlatives—like Most Academic, Most Courteous, and Least Likely to Leave the Ta Metropolitan Area Brody and I had been voted Perfect Couple That Never Was Brody had dated Grace Swearingen the whole summer, and I’d been with the yearbook editor, Kennedy Glass, for a little over ana other people was e but perfect

Andnamed one half of a perfect couple with Brodysnow for Labor Day next Monday in our beachside town He was the popular, ih twelve years of school, I’d liked him He was friendly and so handsome He also scared the hell out of me I couldn’t date so, was forever in the principal’s office for playing pranks, and had a daily dra list of exes And he would never fall for law-abiding, curfew-obeying, glasses-wearing me

So I hadn’t gone after hied me to I only found excuses to snap photos of him for the yearbook For the football section, I’d taken a shot of him at practice in his helmet and pads Exasperated with his teammates, he’d held up his hands like he needed help from heaven

For the candid section, I planned to use a picture frorinned devilishly as he leaned into his truck cab to grab so I’d cropped out the beer

For the full-color opening page, I’d taken a close-up of hi across his forehead He wore a green T-shirt that low Girls all over school would thank me for this when they received their yearbooks next May In fact, Brody had implied as much when I snapped the picture He made me promise I wouldn’t sell it to “a porn site for ladies,” which hy he was s

In short, he was the sailor in the poster: the kind of guy to come home from overseas, celebrate the end of the war in Tiirl off her feet

I only wished I was that girl

“Harper, you’ve been staring at Brody for a quarter of an hour” Kennedy rolled his chair down the row of coainst ht the desktop and stopped myself

Busted!