Picture Perfect — Heather MacAllister

Winner of the 1989 Romance Writers of America Golden Heart for best Young Adult manuscript.

"Life is what happens when you're making other plans." --John Lennon

When freshmen JJ Johnson and her best friend, Natalie, meet Reeve on their annual trip to summer camp, the senior barely notices them. They're used to it--the boys at school barely notice them, either. But JJ has the perfect plan. She and Natalie will spend the next year on a self-improvement campaign so that when they return as camp counselors the following summer, Reeve and his friends will find them irresistible. They'll finally have boyfriends and life will be perfect. At least that's JJ's plan. So they exercise, diet, get their braces off, and study Reeve's interests: poetry, horseback riding, and photography. To her surprise, JJ discovers she has a talent for photography and lands a coveted spot on the yearbook staff, along with a partner, Bailey, who has serious boyfriend potential. Then disaster strikes. Natalie can't go to camp this year. Worse, JJ's gorgeous, perfect, and popular cousin is going instead. One look at her and both Bailey and Reeve will forget JJ exists. No way will her plan succeed now. Still, JJ tries to attract Reeve, anyway. But the harder she works to get Reeve to notice her, the more she thinks about Bailey. Could the perfect plan be no plan at all?

EXCERPT

"You can't go on a cruise!"
I knew that sounded stupid, but I couldn't believe that Natalie, my best friend, was going to desert me for the summer.
"What about your job at the YOA camp? What about all our plans?" I stopped and lowered my voice significantly, even though I had dragged the phone into my bedroom closet as soon as Mom told me Natalie was calling. "What about Reeve Forest?"
"He's all yours!" she said. She didn't even sound sorry.
I just sat there.
"Come on, Janie." Natalie is the only one who still calls me that. Everyone else calls me JJ. "I know we planned on being junior counselors together this year, but Colorado is hardly the Mediterranean."
I knew she was right. I was just trying to imagine the Youth of America camp without her. Every summer since I could remember, our families had spent the first two weeks of July there. This year, Natalie and I had applied as junior counselors and we were going to stay on for the rest of July by ourselves. That was part of The Plan. Then there was Reeve Forest. He was the object of The Plan. By the end of July, he was supposed to be in love with one of us. That was the beauty of The Plan.
The reason for The Plan was that Natalie and I wanted to be popular. We weren't going to leave this up to chance, either. We'd just spent nearly our whole freshman year on Project Reeve, or PR, as we ended up calling it.
It all started toward the end of last July's camp session. Natalie and I had signed up for a calligraphy lesson in the art hut. The class was just starting, when someone came in late. I turned around to look and felt Natalie poke me with her elbow.
She didn't need to poke me. The guy who stood in the doorway had the blondest hair I'd ever seen. It was more of a silvery white, like little kids have, rather than a golden color. When the sun caught it, it seemed to glow. I guess he caught us staring at him, because he smiled. I smiled back, a real wide one, until I remembered my braces.
"Reeve, come in." The instructor, Mr. Forest, beckoned. "This is my son, Reeve. He's come a few days early for the next session. And, if I'm not mistaken, he's here to take some photographs for the camp newsletter."
I hadn't noticed the camera slung around Reeve's neck until then. I'd been too busy watching the way the skin crinkled around his blue eyes when he smiled.
"The next session, oh no!" Natalie whispered.
"We've still got three more days," I whispered back.