by Liz Czukas
“I’m like the chambermaid to the prom queen,” I murmured to Cassidy. She patted my back soothingly, but had to pull her hand away hard to get unstuck from my duct tape.
“Sorry,” I said.
She shook her head and smiled encouragingly. “I think it’s finally collecting enough fuzz and stuff to be less sticky. It was easier to get off this time.”
I shook my head, eyes heavenward. “My life is a joke.”
“Can we get this over with?” Kim said loud enough to get some nasty looks from people around us.
“Bitter much?” someone nearby sniped at her. I thought it might be the mean girls from the bathroom earlier.
Maybe we did need to consider a pig’s blood/fire-starting scenario, if Snipey McSniperson was any indication. I didn’t even like to think that such high school clichés were real, and yet, there they were live and in full color right in front of me. It was prom queen, for heaven’s sake. I’m pretty sure no one was going to get into medical school on the basis of whether or not they were once the most popular person in their high school.
When the nominees for queen were announced, the second name was Amy Byers. Troy’s ex. And even though Troy hadn’t exactly been the prom date of my dreams this evening, I did feel bad for him having to stand on the stage and watch Amy step forward into the spotlight. Even from my position at the back of the dance floor, I could see Troy breaking out in fresh sweat.
“Poor guy.” Cassidy laid a hand on her heart.
“I know. I feel for the big lug.”
Onstage, Olivia took Amy’s hand to complete the chain of would-be queens. Feelings of stabbiness washed through me, but then I remembered Olivia was used to clutching hands with mortal enemies while she waited for gaudy crowns. The girl had been doing pageants since she was six months old. I scanned the people on the platform. Of all of them, I really only cared about Tara and Bethany for queen.
Not surprisingly, however, it was a clean sweep for the cheerleading squad and the football team. Well, Olivia and Tara are technically on the Dance Team, but that’s just semantics. Olivia was queen, and she accepted her crown with her big pageanty smile and a practiced wave to everyone. Austin, of course, was her king. Stop the presses, right?
“Ugh, I think I’m going to barf!” Kim faked heaving.
“I don’t know,” Neel said, tilting his head like a scientist studying a lab rat. “At least she’s a professional. I mean, look at that wave.” He raised his hand in imitation, tilting it just so. “If you’re going to have a prom queen, it might as well be a pro, right?”
“Not bad,” I said. “You might have a future in the Miss USA pageant circuit.”
“Nah, I wouldn’t want to crush Olivia’s spirits with all my winnings.”
“Very charitable of you.”
He nodded. “I’m a real humanitarian.”
“Goddamn Nobel Peace Prize in your future, dude.” Pat slapped Neel’s shoulder.
The DJ took over, soothing my eardrums with his smooth, professional voice, after the assault of microphone feedback and Principal Moss. “And now we’d like to ask that everyone clear the floor for the king and queen’s first dance.”
Everyone scooted backward as best they could, closing the already small spaces between us. I ended up wedged between a table and Kim’s backside, with my head tilted to avoid the feathers sprouting from her hairpiece. Still, every time she craned her neck to see the dance floor, her feathers brushed against my neck. I squirmed until someone behind me touched my hip.
“Back up.” It was Schroeder, beckoning me into a small space in front of him.
“Thank you.” I stepped back with a full-body wiggle to shake off the ticklish sensation of Kim’s headpiece.
“You looked like you were going nuts.” His breath tickled the spot on my neck where the feathers had brushed, and I shivered. He hadn’t moved back at all when I did, and every inch of me was aware of his proximity. If I had motion-sensor lights, I’d be lit up like the Eiffel Tower at night.
I shifted my feet, trying to find a comfortable way to stand away from Schroeder without seeming unnatural and still see the dance floor. The rest of the prom court would be out to join the king and queen any moment, and I’d never pass up an opportunity to watch my jock brother make an idiot of himself on the dance floor.
“So is Phil going to make you call him Prince Philip from now on?” Schroeder asked.
I grinned, looking back and up at him. “Oh, he already does.”
“For some reason, I believe you.”
“It doesn’t seem totally outside the realm of possibility, does it?”
He laughed and stepped closer to me as yet another person made their way past us, putting both hands on my hips. “It’s hot in here.”
“Not if you’ve had an ice-water bath. I’m nice and cool.” I patted my hand on the bodice of my dress. It was almost dry on the outermost layers, but there was still a definite dankness up against my skin. “Well, except for the parts where I’m covered in duct tape.”
“You can’t even tell,” he said. “You still look really nice.” Then he looked down and his hands left my hips. “For a girl named Kidney, anyway.”
I elbowed him gently. “Shut up.”
The song ended, and people clapped in a halfhearted way while the DJ wound into a well-rehearsed bit about bringing everyone out on the dance floor to join our prom court. It was another slow one. I don’t know, maybe plastic crowns are supposed to make people feel romantic.
“Wanna dance?” Schroeder asked.
“Sure,” I said.
With the floor already crowded, and the caterers working furiously to remove most of the remaining tables from the room, it was easiest for me to just turn around to face Schroeder. We took up a dance pose. That might be my favorite part about high school guys who do theater—they all dance the old-fashioned way, rather than the ham-handed way I’d suffered through in middle school.
“Hope you don’t stick to my dress too bad,” I said as he set his right hand against my back.
“I’ll take my chances.”
Schroeder was a good dancer. I already knew that from the play we did last year where we were partnered, but I didn’t really remember how good until he pried his fingers off my dress to spin me under his arm. I smiled at him, remembering how much I’d looked forward to rehearsals back then.
“This is the way it was supposed to be,” he said.
“What?”
“Prom. You were supposed to be my date, you know.”
I blushed, glad of the heat in the room and the swirling lights on the dance floor to cover it up. “Oh really? What about your other six dates?”
He smiled. “We were ticket partners.”
Prom tickets were cheaper in pairs (um, way to reinforce the stereotype that it’s impossible to be fulfilled as a single girl in high school, school administrators), so the eight members of the No Drama Prom-a had all paired up to get tickets. I’d paid for mine, of course, but he was right, we had been partners. A fact I’d had nothing to do with, I’ll have you know.
“Sorry about that. Are you all sad and lonely without me?”
“Nah, we took in Ryan.” He cocked an eyebrow at me. “You know, your cast-off date?”
I scowled at him. “You make me sound like such a . . . I don’t know, a player.”
“I’m just teasing you. Take it easy.” Using his right hand to guide me, he pushed me away for another underarm turn.
When I came back around, I huffed at him. “So you just get to pick on me and spin away anytime I confront you on it?”
“Pretty much.” He led me into another turn, this time adding a few more rotations to it before bringing me back.
“That’s annoying.”
He grinned. “I like to call it alternative conflict resolution. It’s going to catch on for international diplomacy, mark my words.”
And of course, I had to laugh. He was the master of the artful dodge. If he didn’
t want to give you a straight answer, you were never going to get one.
Schroeder managed to work us through the crowd to more open range in the middle of the floor, and we were able to do more than just a few underarm turns. He had me rolling out, then snapping back to a reverse hold. Finally, my vintage dress could do its thing, swirling around my legs and making me feel like Ginger Rogers.
I laughed as he whirled me through a twisting arm thing I could never repeat by myself. “God, I love dancing with you!”
His grip slipped, leaving my arm flailing, and he dropped the rhythm for a couple of steps. Shaking his head and blushing, he murmured, “Sorry.”
I just shook my head, laughing even harder. “So much for Ginger Rogers and Fred Astaire.”
“My fault.” He settled us into a more sedate, standard rhythm. No more fancy footwork, and he seemed to be avoiding eye contact.
The song ended, and the DJ flipped into a pulsing backbeat that got a few screams of approval from various girls.
Schroeder rolled his eyes. “That’s my cue to sit this one out.”
“Oh.” I startled as his hands dropped away from me, feeling the shadow of his warmth on my waist. “Um, okay.”
He turned, narrowly avoiding a collision with Cassidy, Lisa, and Ally as they stormed the floor, looking for me. I allowed myself to get swept into their stampede, joining in when they started to dance, but my eyes followed Schroeder off the floor. I couldn’t shake the feeling that I’d done something wrong.
15 Wherein Ryan and I consider the nefarious motives of professional photographers, and Schroeder takes up the unwelcome new hobby of being a jerk
TAILS
The line for the official prom picture was still long, but Ryan wanted to get it done. Personally, I thought he was just trying to get out of dancing more, but I wanted to get the picture, too, so I kept my thoughts to myself. The photographers were set up behind a series of black curtains that blocked the backdrop from view, so we couldn’t see the couples having their picture taken. I suspected it was to prevent people from photobombing them, or harassing them behind the photographers’ backs. But it also gave the illusion that you might be undergoing something more malevolent than a photograph.
“What do you think they’re doing back there?” I asked Ryan.
“Taking pictures . . . ?” He said it like he wasn’t sure of the answer.
“It’s just so secretive-looking. Maybe they’re making people sign a contract with Satan or something.”
“Maybe they’re fingerprinting people and demanding DNA samples,” he suggested. “You know, under the pretense of identifying who is in the pictures for later.”
I giggled. “Maybe they make you watch a sex education video before they’ll take the picture.”
“Then you’ll just have to flash ’em your condoms and we’ll skip the video.”
While I laughed, Ryan stood on tiptoes, as if he could see over the top of the draped section. “Nope,” he declared. “Just boring old photography.”
“You having fun tonight?”
“Yeah.” He smiled at me. “You know, apart from my car dying.”
“And my zipper.” I twisted to remind him of the collage everyone had built on my back.
“Don’t take this the wrong way, but I’m a little more concerned about my car.”
“I’m hurt.” I did a fake pout.
“All right, who’s ready for some picture-taking magic?” Neel’s voice pulled our attention to the end of the line, where the entire No Drama Prom-a Crew was gathering.
“Hey, guys!” Ryan waved past the two couples between us and them.
“Hey!” Cassidy called. “Good timing! We were wondering where you were. Heart, we need you in the picture with all the girls.”
Happiness cartwheeled in my chest. “Really?”
“Of course! Ooh, you should come back by us!” She beckoned us with rapid hand motions. Cass was normally a pretty animated person, but tonight she was on overdrive. I hoped there were enough exclamation points available in the area.
I glanced at Ryan. “You mind?”
“Nope.” He took my hand and stepped out of line, waving the two couples after us ahead before joining the big group.
“Where are Lisa and Marcus?” I wondered. “I wanted to get a picture with the three of us.”
Cassidy laughed. “I’d be surprised if Lisa gets him off the dance floor at all tonight.” She did a decent imitation of Marcus’s smooth dance style. The boy thought he was the love child of Justin Timberlake and Usher.
“Good point.” I elbowed Ryan. “You could learn a thing or two from Marcus.”
He laughed, a hard, barking laugh. “Yeah, right.”
“He hates dancing,” I told Cassidy.
She gasped, drawing back in mock horror with a hand on her chest. Whispering loudly behind her hand to Ally, she said, “If we don’t move, maybe the alien won’t notice us.”
Ally laughed and joined in the whispering. “Do you think it knows we’re talking about it?”
“Maybe we could drive it off with our awesome dance skills,” Cassidy hissed.
“We might anger it.” Ally shook her head and held up a staying hand to Cass.
“Are you enjoying yourselves?” Ryan asked.
“Immensely,” Ally assured him.
“What are you jerks going on about?” Neel pushed his head between Ally and Cassidy.
The playful bickering went on for a while, making me laugh. I’d felt really good about my decision to come to prom with Ryan, but at the same time pretty guilty about ditching out on my friends. It was a huge relief that they didn’t seem to resent my choice at all. Maybe I should have insisted on just adding a ninth chair to the No Drama table for Ryan. But he’d had tablemates all planned out with Tim and a couple other techies, so that wouldn’t have worked. This was the best outcome I could have hoped for, I supposed.
Behind the girls, Dan, Pat, and Schroeder seemed to be enthralled by something on Pat’s phone.
“What are you guys doing?” I asked.
“Just checking the baseball score.” Pat flashed his phone at me, displaying a dizzying set of statistics in some kind of grid.
“That’s a baseball game?”
“They’re called box scores, dummy,” Dan said.
My sports knowledge pretty much ended with identifying the proper ball that any given sport was played with, though I’d been known to mix up a volleyball and a soccer ball depending on the design of the thing. “If you say so.”
“What’s the score?” Ryan nudged me closer to the guys so he could get a look.
I was about to accuse him of being the worst gay guy ever again but remembered to keep my mouth shut just in time. This secret-keeping business was not for me.
“Next!” The teacher assigned to chaperone the line called us forward, and Ryan took my hand again.
“Come on.”
We slipped into the mysterious curtained-off area to find a giant blown-up photo of a beach at sunset with a hand-painted sign that read MOONLIT BEACH.
“On the marks, please.” The photographer and her assistant bossed us around for a bit, getting us into the traditional pose with Ryan standing just slightly behind me, his hands on my waist and both of us turning our heads to face the camera. It felt forced and totally unnatural. When the photographer told us to smile, I burst into laughter.
“I’m sorry, I’m sorry! Hang on.” I tried to compose myself, but the whole thing was just so stiff and uncomfortable. “Do we have to stand like this?”
I could see the photographer get annoyed, like watching a spill approach the edge of a counter. “It’s a classic pose.”
“Exactly.” I shook Ryan’s hands off and turned to face him. “I feel silly, don’t you?”
“What do you want to do?” He looked suspicious.
“Um . . .” I tried a few different positions, but nothing felt right.
“We do have other students waiting,” the ph
otographer said.
“All right, all right.” I grabbed Ryan’s hand, forcing him into an over-the-top tango stance with our cheeks pressed together. “How about like this?”
“Whatever you say.” She clicked the shutter, and the professional flashes burst all around us. “Exit to your right.”
“No, wait! We’re doing a group shot with the people behind us.”
She sighed irritably. “Step to the right, please.”
The No Drama Crew squeezed in, filling the curtained area well beyond capacity. The crabby photographer’s face said exactly what she thought of this whole situation, and it wasn’t positive.
“Why would you take a job at a prom if you hate people so much?” I whispered to Ryan.
“Beats me.”
The No Drama Crew was determined to get their fair share of photography time. Neel took charge, arranging people into groups for pictures. The guys, the girls without me, the girls with me, each pair of ticket partners. Except when she got to Schroeder.
“I don’t have one,” he said.
“Oh, come on, Heart’s right there.” Ally pointed at me.
“She didn’t come with me.” He looked at Ryan.
“Oh my God, don’t be such a pain in the ass,” Cassidy said.
“She’s not part of the No Drama Prom-a.” Schroeder shrugged.
Embarrassment heated my cheeks.
“You’re not going to get your picture taken by yourself, are you?” Neel said. “She’s standing right there. Heart, get in there.”
“I—I don’t—” I could tell I wasn’t welcome. There might as well have been a force field around him.
“See?” Schroeder shrugged again. His tone of voice was casual, but there was something about his posture that made it perfectly clear I’d abandoned him, and he wasn’t happy about it.
“I don’t mind,” Ryan said. “It’s not a big deal.”