Seven Letter Words #Wattys2016

Part 37

Her eyes looked to mine, "I just can't see myself getting dressed up and having a night of fun and forgetting just yet. My brother hasn't even been buried a week. Something like that just makes it feel like the world is moving on without him too quickly. I mean, Ken wasn't the only boy from our hometown to sign up. There were a few from the graduating class the year before him and I know of three from my class. Having a prom seems trivial."

"That's the exact reason why you need to go. What if those other boys don't come home? What if the ones from your class are going to dance with girls for the last time ever at prom?" Her lips turned down and she pulled her eyes from mine. "Life has to keep moving, Juliet. If we stopped every time someone lost their life, we'd spend our entire time here grieving and not really living."

"So let them go. Let all the other kids in my class have their night. I don't want it. I want to give my dad these tags and then go home. I want to put this year behind me and start looking at the future so I don't feel like I'm stuck here drowning in the year my brother lost his life."

She was breaking my heart. "That's up to you, but missing your prom isn't going to bring him back. I think you should go and have fun. You should sneak drinks in the parking lot before, and take terribly awkward pictures with your date that you'll look back on and laugh at with your kids. Then you should dance all night, because there isn't another time in your life—except maybe your wedding—when you get to party with that many friends at once. You made it to your senior year. Some kids don't. And you of all people should know that a few of your classmates won't make it another year beyond that night."

"I just don't see how I could make it through the night. I guess I'll have to see how I feel when we get back."

"Don't you have a dress already?"

"Yes, but I hate it. Dress shopping is something all the girls look forward to, but it makes me want to scream. I don't even feel like brushing my hair, how am I supposed to get excited about trying on a million dresses again?"

"I'm sure you'd look beautiful in anything you put on. Just walk in to the first store and grab something. Your date isn't going to be looking at the dress, he's going to be too busy checking out all the skin it doesn't cover." She lightly whacked me across my chest. Her delicate laugh made me smile.

"What about you? What was your prom like?"

"I got drunk in the parking lot, took a horrible picture with my date and danced until my feet hurt."

"What was she like?"

"Who?"

"Your date?"

I laughed and shook my head, "She was tall and pretty. Danced like a stripper and drank like a sailor."

"Sounds charming," she said sarcastically, earning another laugh.

"Oh, she was charming all right," I pointed ahead to a hotel in the distance and she nodded.

"Eww. Spare me the details," she practically gaged, wiggling her toes before dropping her feet to the floorboards and stretching. Her smooth skin peaked out from beneath her shirt and the realization that some other guy was going to put his hand there when he danced with her on Friday made me unreasonably annoyed.

"I'm not as much of a player as you think I am." I didn't even know that I really cared what she thought until the words fell from my mouth. I'd never before worried about the impression I gave a girl, or if she thought I was worthy of more than a few quick hook ups. It mattered with Juliet, and I wasn't sure what to do about it.

"I never said you were." She dropped her hands and looked at me curiously. She hadn't been judging me at all. "You deserved to have a good senior prom. I think the nation practically owed it to you." She chuckled softly, her cheeks turning slightly pink with her joke.

"The nation owed me a post prom fuck?" I asked, daring her to answer.

"It's the least we could do," she said dramatically, her delicate hand covering her heart. Why did that make my stomach float and my heart beat a little rougher in my chest? She was beautiful and funny, charming and so innocent it almost made me feel guilty that I wanted to kiss her again. She was perfect...and she'd never be mine. Her lips straightened out again as she looked at me. If I could have heard her thoughts I bet she'd been thinking about my hands on someone else. It was as if someone stole the light right out of her eyes.

"Then I'll have to cash in that rain check some day." I pulled into the lot of a small chain hotel and parked near the lobby. I took the keys from the ignition, but didn't move to get out of the cab. We watched each other for a minute.

"Rain check? You mean your intoxicated pole dancer didn't do her part for this country?" she laughed and winked dramatically. She thought I was teasing, and when I didn't deny it her laughter fell away and her brows drew together in question.

"She was drunk, Juliet. And I don't mean tipsy, cute drunk. I mean sloppy, had-to-hold-her-up-all-night-and-then-keep-her-hair-out-of-the-toilet kind of drunk. I spent the night of my senior prom in the small bathroom at the hotel making sure my date didn't throw up on herself."

"You can't be serious?"

"Cross my heart," I answered, drawing it over my heart.

"What a shame." She might have said the words, but she hadn't meant them. I could tell by the way her lips curled up into a coy smile and the corners of her eyes wrinkled with the lift of her cheeks. Juliet was happy about my failed conquest, and for some reason that made me happy too. 

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