I wheeled around and drove back to my house, where my mom retrieved the corsage from the refrigerator. By the time I left again, it was already four thirty, and I still had at least a fifteen-minute drive to Evelyn’s house. I was sweating profusely and breathing short, shallow breaths. This was such an important night and here I was ruining it because I was late. I drove eighty-five in a fifty-five, faster than I ever had before, on my way to her house. It was kind of like my fantasy about her, except instead of speeding heroically so I could comfort her sooner, I was driving frantically because I was having a mild panic attack.
I skidded to a stop in front of her house and hobbled on my artificial leg up to the front porch. She answered on the first knock, literally right after my fist made contact with the door, so when my hand returned for a second knuckle-rap the door was already opening and I nearly punched Evelyn with a palm-forward fist.
“Are you okay?” she asked.
“Yeah, why?” I said, breathing heavily.
“You look… sweaty.”
This isn’t really what anyone, guy or girl, wants to hear upon being inspected in their formal attire by their prom date.
“It’s really hot out.”
“Is it?” She extended her arm outside to feel the temperature. “Yeah. I guess.”
“I’m so sorry I’m late.”
“No problem.”
I looked at her for the first time. When you make your initial examination of the appearance of your female prom date, you must balance the competing obligation (and desire) to linger over the curves of her body long enough to appreciate the thought and care that went into her dress selection with the fact that her father is standing in the foyer immediately behind her, and he is looking at you looking at his daughter. I started with her feet, which were adorned casually in flip-flops—a nice choice, especially given the exceedingly non-prom-like wing tips I was wearing—that matched the color of her dress. The dress was a long silver gown with a thin mesh netting over a base of silk. It started at her ankles and ended below her shoulders. Her hair was glued and glittered like some kind of complex decorative piece of pottery that would shatter if it was dropped.
She looked beautiful. But I didn’t want to just say that: Hi there, you look beautiful. Because that was what I was expected to say. That’s what all gentlemen say to their prom dates. Mom had taught me that. Even if she hadn’t looked beautiful, I would have said it anyway. It was the appropriate remark for the occasion. Precisely because it was so appropriate, so perfunctory, however, I wanted to say something more so she would know she really did look absolutely beautiful, so she would know I noticed the way the elegantly shimmering dress matched her nails and the way it all radiated out from her big brown eyes like rays from the sun. But again, her dad was standing right there.
“You look beautiful,” I said, adding a slight but meaningful pause in between the second and third words.
“Thank you.” She beamed. “And you look very handsome.”
Which I didn’t, I knew. I looked very sweaty. But it was the polite thing to say, and Evelyn was a polite girl.
She invited me in for the exchange of wearable flower arrangements, a ceremony her mother was already poised to photograph with paparazzi-like eagerness. I unwrapped the six-dollar corsage my mom had given me. It was blue and white. I slipped it over Evelyn’s wrist, the flashbulb strobe-lighting the room. Evelyn’s mother produced a boutonniere and handed it to her. Evelyn removed the pin from the stem and stepped so close I could taste her perfume on my tongue.
“I’ll try not to stick you,” she said. Similar to You look beautiful, this is the obligatory line uttered by every human being who has ever installed a pin-attached flower arrangement to the lapel of another human being. It’s not funny—particularly if yours is the epidermis in question—but you have to laugh anyway.
We posed for a variety of other photos and then we were off.
I put a mix CD that did not include any of Ani DiFranco’s work in the car stereo.
By way of making conversation, I said, “Have you decided about college yet?”
She shook her head. “No. I was pretty set on Virginia Tech, but now with Mason and me being… on a break… I’m not so sure.”
“Whaddaya mean?”
“Like, maybe I just wanted to go there to be with him.”
I nodded. “Well, better to find that out now than go there, break up freshman year, and realize you had just followed him to school.” I wondered whether my words revealed too much glee over her partial singleness.
“At the same time,” she added, “I don’t want to not go there just because he’s there. I mean, maybe that’s the best college for me, you know? I can’t plan my entire life around avoiding him.”
“True, true. No one likes a reverse stalker.” I wished silently that she had applied to William and Mary.
“Do you think you’ll get back together?” I asked.
“No. I mean, yeah, probably. I don’t know.”
We were silent for a while, thinking. I knew they most likely would get back together eventually. I mean, historically speaking, a definite pattern had emerged: So far, 100 percent of their previous breakups had resulted in passionate reunions, in getting-back-together-agains. And as they say, history repeats itself.
But right now, tonight, she was more or less single. If ever I had a chance, this was it. It all seemed to hang on whether I won prom king. If I won, maybe that would give me the confidence boost I needed to be a fun dancing partner, and then to try to kiss her or tell her how I felt. And maybe it would help her think of me as more than a friend. If I was prom king, I might become, in her eyes, something more.
On the other hand, maybe she’d just be happy that her good friend Josh Sundquist had won a popularity contest. Maybe she thought of me like a brother or maybe she valued our friendship too much to see if there was something more there. That was the problem. Back when I had been trying to date Francesca, the issue had been that I didn’t have a friend to help me understand the relationship. The problem with Evelyn? She was the friend.
It all came down to tonight.
Chapter 21
Obviously, you want to go somewhere fancy to eat on the night of prom, which is why our group chose one of the classiest joints in Harrisonburg, an upscale seafood establishment called Red Lobster.
There were six of us, three couples. After dinner, we went to one of the guys’ houses for more photos. Prom is nothing more than a practice round, a dress rehearsal for your wedding, and in no arena is this fact on more prominent display than the number of photos taken leading up to the event. Sometimes you get the feeling that the photos are more important than the event itself.
On the drive from the photo session to the school, Evelyn asked, “Do you think you’ll win prom king?”
“Honestly? Not really.”
Well, I thought I had as good a chance as the other three guys. And I wanted to win. Mainly to impress Evelyn, to sweep her off her feet with my popularity and esteem in the eyes of my fellow students. But relationships are all about managing expectations, you know?
“I think you’ll win,” she stated.
“How come?”
“Because you’re Josh Sundquist.”
“That is my name, yes.”
“And Josh Sundquist is a winner.”
I wasn’t so sure. But I said, “Thanks for saying that.”
“Seriously. You’re going to win.”
She reached over and grabbed my hand, squeezed, and released. It felt tingly and amazing. It felt like I was enough for her, like she liked me, like everyone in my class liked me and had voted for me. It felt like I was prom king.
“I hope you’re right,” I said.
Once we finally got to the dance, we were forced to endure for the sake of the parents and their all-important photographs a long, boring ritual known as “introductions.” The introductions ceremony would conclude with the naming of the prom king and queen, w
hich was great because it meant if I lost, not only would all my classmates know, all their parents would find out, too. A crowd of nearly one thousand would be on hand to witness my humiliation.
After you were introduced with your date, the two of you had to walk down a portable staircase in front of center stage. It is exceedingly difficult to walk on stairs with a hip-disartic-level prosthesis without a handrail, as was the case here. To make matters worse, Evelyn would have her arm hooked around my elbow, so her descent could easily knock me off balance.
As I stood there in line, awaiting our turn, I thought of this experience I’d had when I was a freshman. I was still fresh off the boat from homeschooling, nervous about navigating the halls of the school on my artificial leg.
One day, as I was about to head down a flight of stairs, this upperclassman I sort of knew from one of my classes walked up beside me. She was flirty and pretty. I remember she seemed so much older. As I took my first step down the stairs, she hooked her hand through my left elbow as if I was escorting her somewhere, and said, “Let’s go, darling!”
In an instant, I felt like I had grown five inches taller. Here I was, a lowly freshman and former homeschooler, and this attractive senior girl had seen fit to bestow her attention upon me. Not only that, but our bodies were touching. She had looked at me and thought, Hey, I’d like to grab that boy’s arm and hold on to it. She wanted to be seen walking down the stairs with me, arm in arm. It was like a dream, that moment.
In the next instant, however, I foresaw how poorly this would turn out. Obviously, she had never seen me walk down stairs, which I managed by holding on to the handrail with one hand and gripping my books under my arm with the other. I would then bend my right knee, descending first with my artificial foot, which would land stiff-legged two steps below and support my body weight while I brought the real foot down beside it. I would repeat this process, two steps at a time, stepping all the way down the staircase. Anyway, it worked all right as a means of descent, but it was not smooth enough for me to keep my balance while a pretty girl held on to one of my arms.
But as we started to walk down the stairs together, I was too mortified to say anything. She had made this wonderfully kind and ego-inflating gesture, and as her reward she was going to trip the disabled guy. She held on for the first awkward step as I placed my artificial leg two levels down. Then I lowered the rest of my body to that stair in one quick motion, jerking hers along with me. She ripped her hand back like my arm had turned into a hot stove. We walked the rest of the way down in silence. I kept my gaze on the stairs, focusing on keeping my balance. We parted without a word at the base of the stairs, and after that we never spoke again. I don’t mean to make it sound like she was a jerk. The feeling was mutual. Shame. Shame and embarrassment on my part; shame and guilt on hers. That moment in the stairwell may have set a world record for the shortest romantic relationship of all time. And after our breakup, there was just too much baggage between us to be able to acknowledge each other anymore.
I could not let that happen to Evelyn and me. I would walk down smoothly and most importantly, I would not fall.
As I neared the front of the line, I forgot all about the prom king race. My fear was concentrated on those six steps.
I was next. As I limped across the stage, into the bright lights, I heard the vice principal read our names. Evelyn made it to the center a moment before I did and waited for me. We joined arms, her forearm linked under my left elbow. The audience applauded politely.
We strode to the front of the stage and I stopped where it ended, dropping off into the dark abyss that was the portable staircase. The auditorium went silent while the vice principal waited for us to clear the stage so he could read the next pair of names. Someone coughed. I wished that we had practiced this ahead of time, or at least discussed it. I could’ve given her some pointers, lowered her expectations a bit. Or suggested we forgo the arm holding altogether, which would have made it easier for me to balance. But I couldn’t very well let go of her arm now, not with all these people watching and her being unprepared for it. I made a single tentative movement, placing the heel of my artificial leg on the top step. The steps were narrow, not wide enough to fit the length of an entire foot, artificial or otherwise. Thus I had to balance solely on the heel of my prosthetic foot. As I moved the rest of my body down to that level, Evelyn stepped with me, then paused while I planted my prosthesis on the second step. Once my balance was set, we moved down together. The spotlights onstage still lit up our faces, but our feet and knees were enshrouded in darkness. Without a handrail, the middle steps of a six-step staircase are the scariest section, because you have departed the safe nest of the wide, flat stage, but you aren’t yet in the warm embrace of the auditorium floor, either. In other words, if you lose your balance, you’re going for a tumble.
But I was careful. And Evelyn never retracted her hand, even when it was clear that I was having great difficulty, even though a thousand people were watching us struggle. She held on through all of it, until the next names had been called and we were finding our seats in the mercifully anonymous darkness.
Unfortunately, it wasn’t long until I heard Vice Principal Harry Maguire say, “Would the following nominees come to the stage.…”
I felt a shot of adrenaline. Evelyn whispered in my ear, “Good luck.”
When Mr. Maguire got to my name, I walked down the center aisle, but instead of going up that precariously handrail-less stairway in the middle, I veered to the left so I could use the one on the wing, which had a nice, stable rail bolted into the brick wall. I listened to the way the audience clapped after my name. Were they clapping louder for me than for the other three guys, all of whose names had already been called? I told myself that they were.
The four of us lined up in alphabetical order—Trevor Binot, Joseph Chuk, Jon Heinrich, and me. These three guys were not only on the football team, they were the football team. In other words, they were the guys you’d expect to be on this stage right now. They were the popular guys, the ones with cars from this decade.
“Ladies and gentlemen, your prom court!” Mr. Maguire said after the girls were onstage, too.
Then, two girls came out from backstage, each holding a crown sitting on top of a red satin pillow. The girls were both freshmen, and they were dressed in almost-matching gowns. They reminded me of the flower girls at a wedding.
I glanced once more at my three competitors. It occurred to me that perhaps it wasn’t so bad that they were more popular than me. In fact, that they all ran in the same social circles could be to my advantage. The three of them would, in effect, split the “popular” vote. And that would leave me as the only possible candidate for everyone else to vote for. I was the nominee of the commoners, the voice of the people. All those cynics who hated the popular crowd, all those who were disengaged from the social politics of high school but whose name I had always remembered when we passed in the hall, all those would be my votes!
“And this year’s prom king is…”
I was the populist hero of the huddled masses! The forgotten majority, the underappreciated poor in spirit and the less than popular, they would flock to me! They would vote for me! I would be their king!
“Joseph Chuk!”
The audience burst into applause. I numbly followed suit. With regal grace, Joseph inclined his head so the flower girl could place upon it the majestic crown, bejeweled as it was with hard plastic gemstones. That was my crown. I was supposed to be the one wearing it. Joe waved to the crowd, acknowledging the adoration of his faithful subjects. I was supposed to win prom king, to have the confidence to dance, to confess my feelings to Evelyn. This was my prom. It was supposed to be perfect. For me.
As I walked back up the aisle to sit beside Evelyn, I didn’t make eye contact with anyone in the audience. These people had seen me lose. They had chosen not to vote for me, and now they sat there all smug, watching my walk of shame.
“Don’t worry about
it,” Evelyn whispered as I sat back down. “It’s just a stupid popularity contest.”
Chapter 22
The night was already over. It was a nonstarter, a failure to launch. I might as well drive home right now, I thought. But I couldn’t abandon Evelyn. She held on to me when we walked down those stairs. I could stick with her for one night of shame and humiliation.
We walked into the open section of the cafeteria that had been converted into a dance floor for prom. There were a lot of decorations, and it was clear that substantial thought and time had gone into making sure they fit together as part of some overall theme. It was hard to say what the theme was, exactly, but it apparently had something to do with fairy tales, castles, and large cardboard stars with glitter on them. The room was already packed with several hundred people, and on one side the DJ had set up shop with several towers of speakers, blinking lights, and, yes, a disco ball.
I was pleased to find the DJ had just started a slow dance. Fast dances are hard. There is a lot of moving, and all this moving requires either skill, the ability to fake skill, or the ability to not care what people think about your lack of skill. I lacked all these traits. Slow dances, on the other hand, were simple. You just put your hands on the girl’s waist and then spun around in circles until the music stopped. No skill required.
We Should Hang Out Sometime Page 9