The Price of Perfection

3: Confusion

Luna had a new tutor. He was tall, slightly intimidating, definitely attractive, and clearly smart.

Her last tutor had stopped showing up to her tutoring sessions. When she asked the office why, she was told a vague answer about the tutor having to switch to another student for scheduling reasons. Luna knew it was probably that she was too curious and easily distractible to stay on task. Tutors often got annoyed with that.

The tutor's name was Edward Smith. He had recently moved from Washington D.C. where he had studied to become a tutor to the students in New York City. He never expected to end up tutoring a student like Luna, who asked too many questions to get any actual work done, but pulled off a relatively convincing innocent look when he tried to get back on topic.

Luna never liked history. She found it quite boring and useless to learn. Her past tutors always told her that "those who don't study history are doomed to repeat it," but Luna felt like she would never do anything big enough to make it into a textbook. She liked finding some way to stay entertained during this subject, and that was usually to get on a topic that was more interesting to her. 

Today, though, for her entire tutoring session, Luna stayed off of the topic of the first World War by asking endless questions about the Reform Program. How it was started, who started it, what it's original purpose was, who was currently in charge of it, and how many people worked there. She asked them so quickly that Edward was unable to get a single sentence in to get them back on topic. He was annoyed, but couldn't resist responding to a child's curiosity. Because that was all it was, right?

* * *

After tutoring, Luna headed to the dance building. She still felt confused and worried about Winter, and she did not feel any more educated on Reform. Edward had answered all of her questions in a detached way, as if reading straight from a dictionary. He didn't even get flustered or have to research an answer.

Not long after Luna arrived, Leona showed up. Not more than five seconds later, in walked Winter Jones. 

Winter was not a dancer. She had likely never set foot inside the dance building before that day. Nevertheless, she set her bulking dance bag down in the locker room as though she never belonged anywhere else. 

Leona threw her best friend a sideways glance. It clearly asked, "What is she doing here?"

Luna just shrugged back and got to work sewing her new pointe shoes. She thought back to when she had seen Winter at the lunch table, looking so different. Had the Reform Program forced her to do more "pretty" things like wear skirts and makeup and switch from soccer to ballet? Had they changed more about her than her appearance?

She was so deep in her thoughts that her fingers slipped on the needle and she poked her thumb. Luna watched the blood well up around the tiny hole.

Sighing, she dug around in her dance bag to find the box of bandages that she kept for emergencies. Winter came up to Luna as she was carefully wrapping the bandage around her thumb.  

"Are you alright, Luna?" She asked. 

"Yep. It's just a tiny thing." Luna replied, holding up her thumb covered in the skin-colored bandage as evidence. "Since when do you dance?" She asked, changing the subject. "I'm not trying to be rude or anything."

"Oh, well, a while, I suppose. As long as I can remember." She left it at that. "By the way, I just wanted to apologize for totally blanking on your name earlier. Like Lizzy said, I've just been away so long that I've forgotten a lot." She said, speaking of the woman who had come into the lunchroom to comfort her. 

"It's fine," Luna assured her. "I get it, and I understand completely." But she could not get her mind off of what Winter had said. 

As long as she could remember? Everyone in the school knew that Winter Jones was always number one on the soccer field. Not the stage. 

But when they all got out into the studio and the teacher began class, they could all see that whomever Winter was now really had been dancing as long as she could remember.

* * *

When Luna got home, she ran to her room to take a bath. She despised the feeling of dried sweat. As she waited for the water to warm up, she messaged Leona. 

Luna: I really am confused by what Winter said. What makes her think she's always been dancing? Being gone for a few months can't make you forget something like that. 

Leona: I know, I was wondering what she was doing, coming with me, and then she said she was in ballet!

Luna: This is kind of scaring me. Is no one else suspicious? Winter wasn't nobody.

Fiona, Luna's cat, was slinking around Luna's legs as she finished the conversation, saying goodnight to her friend. 

Luna slid into the bathtub, letting the water embrace her as Fiona curled up on the bathmat. Luna stared at the bubbles, watching them pop slowly. She stayed like that for a long time, staring.

When she was brought out of her trance, it was by the soft sound of her cat, bumping the door with her head. Luna had moved to wrap her arms around her legs, she was shivering. The bubbles were long gone, and checking her phone, she saw that it had been two hours since the conversation with her friend.

Luna got out of the bath, allowing the water to drip off of her and onto the mat. After wrapping a towel around herself and letting the cat out of the bathroom, she paused. She felt like there was something she should be remembering, something that would help her solve her many questions.

She got dressed for bed, trying to think of what it could be, but like the bubbles, the thought was gone.

* * *

The Reform Program was founded the year after World War Ⅲ ended. It was not called the Reform Program then, but the name was quickly adopted. The founders believed that a perfect society could eventually be achieved, but every single person would need to be perfected for that to happen. 

So, they started with the basics. The outer layers of society, of humans. They knew they could not change human nature, and it is human nature for us to immediately judge others on their appearance. After all, that's the first thing humans notice, how they recognize other people. 

So, every person began changing in their own little way. Everyone exercised more to achieve and maintain a perfect body mass index. Schools changed from a day full of academics to a wide range of exercises throughout the day with a shortened period of private tutoring. 

The founders wanted everything that could be controlled in a natural way to be perfected first. Everyone was monitored by their wristband and would follow their given schedule and diet plan exactly. 

Their society maintained a healthy weight range with the percentage of obesity lower than it had been in centuries. People were happier from the exercise they were getting and the time spent outside or with others. 

Of course, to reach perfection, every aspect of every life had to be perfect. Eventually, the founders of the Program realized that not every person could reach perfection just by exercising and eating right.
The founders were completely obsessed with public image. They wanted other communities to point to them and say, "What a great society they have! Look how happy and healthy and pretty everyone looks!"

But technically, perfection, or beauty, or happiness is strictly an opinion. The founders wanted it clear. So they got to chose who was pretty and who was not. Who looked healthy enough and who did not. They decided "these people, the ugly ones and the fat ones, we'll put them through our program. We'll send them through a program that will change how they look, change how they think, and change how they act. We'll create a program that will perfect our society."