“Remember the big band gig that my manager got us for tonight?” Tyler props his elbows on the desk and leans in toward me. His breath smells like coffee. Black. Nice.
There’s a rock of anticipation lodged in my belly.
“I figured we’d be jammin’ at a club, but we aren’t,” he tells me.
“Where are you playing?” I ask. Since neither of us are going to the prom, maybe he’s going to invite me to another one of his gigs. That would be great. If I ever got my nerve up, I was going to ask him out, but this works even better.
“We’re actually playing the Spring Fling Prom,” Tyler says and my bubble of expectation immediately bursts.
“You are?” So much for him asking me on a date tonight. The ball’s back in my court. I’m going to have to find the guts to ask him out another evening. “I’m surprised,” I tell him. “Your band seems entirely antiprom to me.”
“The original band cancelled because the bass player broke his thumb. The prom committee’s paying us a lot,” he says, looking down at the floor with squinted eyes. “It was a deal our manager couldn’t refuse.”
In the back of my head I hear a little voice telling me that now’s my chance to go for it. Ask him out for next weekend. Tell him you’re interested. Do something. Anything.
Drat. I’m a gutless wonder. I promise myself that I’ll “go for it” next time. Maybe I’ll take a trip to the roof tonight, look up at the stars, and find that boost in courage Tyler told me about. For now, I ask, “So, do you need a tuxedo? Is that why you’re here?”
Tyler doesn’t answer right away. Something on the floor’s attracted his attention.
Suddenly, he disappears from view. I rise up on my tiptoes and peer over the counter top. Tyler’s on his hands and knees, running his fingertips over a floorboard.
“Everything okay?” I ask.
“Sure,” he replies. “I saw something glitter near my foot.” And just like that, Tyler stands up, comes around the counter to where I am, and opens his hand. There it is, sitting in the center of his palm.…
My mother’s lost diamond.
The old Sylvie didn’t want a romance. She didn’t want to date. Then, even when she had a boyfriend, the old Sylvie never made the first move. And the old Sylvie definitely didn’t want to fall in love.
I’m not that old Sylvie anymore.
Next time is now. I don’t need to look at the stars tonight. I’m a woman who is going to make her own destiny! Starting this very second.
I desperately want to kiss Tyler.
So I do.
And it’s magic.
Twenty-four
Behind every frog is a handsome prince.
www.astrology4stars.com
“That was …,” Tyler stalls, searching for the right word. “Unexpected.”
Yikes, that’s not exactly what a girl wants to hear after she’s made the first move.
Tyler pulls away from me and runs his hand through his hair.
“I …,” I begin to apologize for jumping him like that. “I didn’t mean to … ,” My words peter out as I place the diamond safely in the cash register and close the drawer.
“Finally!” Tyler exclaims, and then, this time, he does the jumping.
Our kiss is perfect. This is how kisses should be! Not too rushed or too slow. Just the right amount of pressure. He gives a little, I accept. I move closer, he encourages it. The room feels like it’s spinning. Or perhaps time has stopped altogether. If this was a movie, there definitely would be fireworks bursting above the tuxedo shop.
“Wow,” Tyler says, when at last he steps away. “Unexpected,” he repeats, and this time I understand. Not that the kiss itself was unexpected, but rather the response that we both shared was a complete surprise. “Unexpected” turns out to be a compliment, not an insult.
We kiss again.
I don’t hear the doorbell chime when Cherise comes rushing in. “I came over as soon as I realized.…” She’s decked out in her doctor’s costume for the dance and waving my astrological chart in the air.
“Whoa!” She blushes. “I can see that Tyler got here first.”
“Realized what?” I’m a little embarrassed that Cherise just caught me lip-locked with her brother. I try to step out of Tyler’s embrace but he won’t let me go. And I’m actually glad he won’t.
“The stars!” Cherise explains why she’s come bursting into the shop. “Turns out Madame Jakarta was right. I’m sorry I ever called her a quack.” She strides over to the counter and lays out my star chart. “Madame Jakarta told me to rethink my predictions and in light of all that has happened, I did.”
“Ever since you told me you’d broken up with Adam, I’ve been poring over your chart.” She whips a brand-new Torah pointer out of her purse (Nathan bought her one of her very own) and stabs the chart with it. “When I made my initial prediction, Mars had entered Gemini. Gemini is the sign of twins.” She glances up at Tyler with a wink. “Every step of the way, I thought the stars were pointing to Adam, but I was wrong. Jupiter, Scorpio, Aquarius, even Mercury, were all indicating a different love. The love of a twin! My twin!” She slaps herself on the forehead. “I can’t believe I didn’t see this coming before now.”
“Cherise.” Tyler says his sister’s name with a tone I’ve never heard before.
“Yes?” she replied.
“Go away.” Tyler glares at her and points at the shop door.
Cherise begins to protest, but then, after Tyler gives her a long, sinister look, she snatches up her chart and heads out. “See you tonight,” she tells us, disappearing through the door as quickly as she entered.
“Cherise has a way of ruining a moment,” Tyler says with a laugh. “Truth is, I came here to ask you to the prom. I’ve wanted to ask you for a while, but then the whole Cherise-astrology-Adam thing happened and I thought I lost my chance.”
I look at him with squinted eyes as things begin to jell. “It was Wednesday when I found you standing by my locker. I was glad for the coincidence and gave you Cherise’s skirt. It wasn’t a coincidence, was it?” He shakes his head. “Were you planning to ask me out?”
“Kind of.” Tyler half shrugs.
I immediately recall him asking if I wanted to go to the Corner Café after school. I didn’t realize he meant without Cherise. It’s all becoming clearer. “You did ask me out, didn’t you?” When Cherise told me that some guy was going to ask me out, I never imagined it might be Tyler. I assumed that Adam was the one she meant. We both did. “I’m completely thickheaded,” I tell him.
“You’re not,” he assures me. “I wasn’t very clear then. But I plan to be now. Will you go with me to the prom? I know I’m playing with the band, but there will be breaks between the sets and we could have dinner first, then go to the after-party at Tanisha’s, if you want. I know you like her and—”
“I can’t,” I interrupt. As much as I want to go out with him, tonight’s prom is impossible.
Tyler looks crushed. “Do you have other plans?”
“No,” I tell him. “It’s just that I didn’t expect to go. I never finished my costume.”
“Oh.” Tyler’s face lights up. “Is that the only thing holding you back?”
“I suppose so.”
“Problem solved,” Tyler tells me, then pulls out his cell phone. I have no clue who he’s calling, but what I hear him say is, “She said yes.”
“No I didn’t,” I call out to the mystery person on the other end of the call.
Tyler snaps his phone shut. “You said that if you’d finished the costume, you’d go.”
“I didn’t say that,” I pause. Grinning, I add, “Though I suppose it’s true.”
“Good,” Tyler says, looking out the front door of the tux shop. “Now you can go with me.”
In walks my father. Wanda’s with him.
“My horoscope today said ‘Tonight’s the night for second chances.’” Tyler smiles. “Okay, so I didn’t really read my horoscop
e, but that’s what I imagine it would have said.” He goes on, “I got up early, determined not to let opportunity slip by me again. So, I called for backup troops.” He informs me that he didn’t tell Cherise what he was up to, because she might blab. “Besides, she locked herself in her room this morning to review your natal chart.” He stops for a second. “Or was it the lunar one?”
I cannot stop smiling. “Natal charts are more accurate,” I tell him with a smile.
Turning, I face Tyler’s “troops.”
My father’s standing in a stream of afternoon sunlight. There’s a hanger in his hand. I look closer. He’s holding the Cinderella dress out toward me. The multicolor patchwork of fabrics shimmer in the sun’s sinking rays.
Now finished, the dress doesn’t do justice to Tanisha and Jennifer’s design. No. It is far more beautiful than even they could have imagined.
Without a word, Dad hands me the dress. I take it from him, sliding the fine materials through my fingers. It’s amazing. Vera Wang herself couldn’t have made a more perfect gown.
“When Tyler called, Wanda and I were more than happy to help out,” Dad tells me. “Put it on, Sylvie.”
“What about the tuxedos left at the hotel?” As I ask, it dawns on me that my father wasn’t really out collecting tuxedos. He and Wanda must have been sewing all afternoon.
“A little white lie.” My father takes a box from Wanda and gives it to me. “Wanda sewed while I ran a quick errand.” The box feels heavy in my hands. Slowly, filled with anticipation, I lift the lid.
Clear plastic slippers. The modern equivalent of glass.
A tear rolls down my cheek. But this tear’s an entirely different kind than the tears I shared last night with my dad. The tear that’s falling now is not born of confusion. It’s made of pure joy, appreciation, and true love.
I stretch up and kiss my dad on the cheek. Then I take the dress and hustle into the back room to try it on. The dress fits. The shoes, too. I haven’t a clue where my father found faux glass slippers in Cincinnati, but they’re just my size. As if they were created specially for my feet.
Dad brought the tiara I’d bought at the costume shop with him. I place it on my head and I’m ready.
I walk out of the back room, feeling more beautiful than ever. I might not have makeup on and I don’t have a comb to run through my hair, but in this gown, I know I glow.
Tyler is standing by the shop’s register, exactly where I left him. He’s wearing a tuxedo. Black jacket, black pants, and … oh well, black shirt with a black cummerbund and black bow tie. I must say though, he’s not looking so much Darth Vader tonight as Bond, James Bond.
My father steps forward, offering his arm. I move into his embrace. There’s no music, but he gracefully spins me across the floor all the same.
I rest my head on Dad’s shoulder and think about Cherise’s dancing prediction. “When Neptune’s moon is high in the sky, a guy you love and who loves you will ask you to dance.” I don’t have to look through my telescope to know that one of Neptune’s moons is way up there tonight. I’ve fulfilled Cherise’s prediction. Who’d have guessed it would be by dancing with my father.
I’m passed from one partner to the next as my father slips my arm off his and onto Tyler’s. I’m not in love with Tyler, but there sure is potential. Loads of potential.
Being a man of few words, my dad has just one for us. “Go,” is all he says.
A car horn sounds outside. Jennifer and Jordan, Tanisha and Lee, and Cherise and Nathan have swung by in their limo to pick us up. Apparently, Tyler planned for us all to quadruple date.
I whisper to Tyler I’d rather go out just us.
He winks and tells me we have plenty of time for that. “We’ll have many, many dates just for us. Dates here in Cincinnati, dates in Cleveland in the fall, dates in New York when you come to visit.” I can hardly wait.
But tonight, we’re going to the Spring Fling Prom. We’re going to dance until our feet hurt. And kiss until we’re breathless.
Twenty-five
You have won the romance lottery.
Rejoice in your good fortune.
The stars are twinkling just for you.
Go out there and shine.
www.astrology4stars.com
I know what you’re thinking. You’re wondering if the diamond falling out of my mother’s engagement ring really might have been a sign that love was headed my way.
Maybe Cherise’s prediction was never meant to be about me and Adam. Perhaps, all along, it was supposed to be Tyler who was written in the stars.
Or maybe not.
It doesn’t matter.
From here on out, Tyler and me, well, we’re forging our own destiny.
And it’s going to be perfect.
About the Authors
Stacia Deutsch and Rhody Cohon are the coauthors of the award-winning Blast to the Past chapter book series. Together, they have also ghostwritten for a mystery series and published two nonfiction texts. In the Stars is their first romantic comedy. Stacia wrote adult fiction before Rhody convinced her that they should work together and write children’s literature instead. Stacia is married with three children and lives in Irvine, California. Rhody and her three children live in Tucson, Arizona.
LOL at this sneak peek of
Crush du Jour
By Micol Ostow
A new Romantic Comedy from Simon Pulse
My mother always tells me not to bite off more than I can chew.
“You run yourself ragged, Laine,” she says. “You’ve got too much on your plate.”
She’s wrong.
I’ve got an appetite for achievement, fine. That much I’ll give her. But these days, that’s par for the course. I mean, college applications are up by, like, a million percent. It’s a cutthroat competition. Where it used to be that your GPA and test scores were the most important aspect of your candidacy, now they’re just the appetizer, or a playful sort of amuse bouche. You’ve got to bust your butt on extracurricular activities, and knock it out of the park with your interview and essay questions. And if you happen to score well on an AP exam or two? Well, that’s merely the icing on the cake.
If I sound like a girl obsessed, there’s a reason. My parents split when I was little, and when it comes to tuition, it’s really just Mom and me footing the bill. And while my mother’s got a great job as chief restaurant critic for the Philadelphia Tribune, we’re not exactly millionaires. I need to qualify for financial aid if I’m going to go somewhere other than Penn State.
Talk about type A, right? A junior in high school, and my cups—and my transcripts—already runneth over. Between advanced placement courses, SAT prep, extracurricular activities, and part-time jobs, I don’t have a lot of free time. But, you know—if you can’t stand the heat, get out of the kitchen.
I can stand the heat. Trust me, my life sometimes feels like one major pressure-cooker.
My mom would love it if I spent this summer at the pool club with my best friend, Anna, who’s working as an au pair for a Cabana Club couple, flirting with boys and lazing in a lounge chair. That’s what I did the past three summers, despite being highly allergic to sun. Anna and I had a good time—no, make that a great time—but times have changed.
When it comes to boys, I guess I have sort of a love-’em-and-leave-’em reputation. I can’t help it: I see a cute guy and I immediately go all mushy. It’s a disease. But now that we’re revving up for senior year, it’s time to get serious. I mean, I’m way too busy to let a guy distract me. No matter how yummy he is. I mean, I do date, but it’s never anything serious. I reserve my seriousness for college planning, and all things related. Crushes are just a tasty little candy bowl to dip into when I’m running low on spice in my life. Or, to mix metaphors, if my life is a giant sugar cookie, then crushes are the rainbow sprinkles on top. If life is like a pizza, then crushes are the pepperoni topping. If life is … a cheeseburger, than crushes are a side of fries.
Y
ou get the point. I may like my French fries (and I do), but they’re never going to take the place of a solid main course.
I know some girls think I have my priorities mixed up. And I’ve been called a tease by some of the boys I’ve dated, boys who wanted to be more than a side dish in the menu of my life. But college isn’t just a pie-in-the-sky fantasy, and as I’m constantly reminding Anna, too many cooks spoil the broth.
My life, my broth. Boys will have to be back-burnered.…
For now.
In the Stars Page 17