My Life Plan...Undone

Ch. 32

Phone calls, texting, FaceTime, and dates fill our days for the next few weeks. Of course there's still school, but exams are over and we just have a few weeks left to senior year so now it's all the fun and sometimes obligatory stuff. Fun stuff like senior fun days and field trips to the beach and amusement parks. Obligatory stuff like boring award ceremonies.

A kind of combo of the two is the Sports Banquet. I've never been, obviously, since the idea of me being an athlete is borderline laughable. The banquet is an annual thing where students of all the school sport teams are invited along with their families to celebrate another year of memories, wins, team work, and so on. Some students are honored. It's just in the school cafeteria, but it's all catered and supposedly a fun night. Matt is, of course, going and being honored as the swim team captain and he's asked me to be his date. I'm both excited and nervous. Excited because it's our first school function that we're attending as boyfriend/girlfriend. Plus, Matt's being honored and that fills me with pride even though I've only seen a handful of his swim meets. What i'm nervous about is sitting at the dinner with his parents! I've met them before, but it's always been just a few minutes here and there. Some small talk. Having dinner with them is a whole other ball game and for the first time to be in such a public place!

The dinner is dressy casual, so I decide to wear a floral maxi dress, wedges, and I wear my hair down and straight. I keep my makeup fresh and natural, which honestly is my style anyway, but I want to make sure to look pretty for Matt's parents without being too "made up". Matt asked if I wanted to ride together, but I wasn't sure if I wanted to ride in the car with his parents and extend the length of my nervousness. I didn't express this to him, but when he told me his parents would be driving separately I breathed out a sigh of relief.

When I get in Matt's car, I give him a kiss hello and put my hand in his when he offers it above the gear shift. "You look beautiful," he compliments me and I compliment him on his powder blue button down shirt and dark dress pants. How does he look so good no matter what he's wearing? It took me an hour to look "naturally" good.

"Ready?" he asks before putting the car in drive.

"To celebrate you? Of course," I smile.

"And to spend the evening with my parents," he chuckles.

"Mhm" I answer and look out the window at the passing houses.

Matt gives my hand a supportive squeeze, "It'll be fine. My parents love you."

I turn my head, "How can they love me? They hardly even know me."

"From the few times they've met you they really like you. And you might not remember this, but my mom used to volunteer at school all the time when we were in elementary school. She said she remembers you and how sweet and polite you always were."

I laugh, "I was like 6, she doesn't think I could change since then?"

Matt joins me in laughing, "Apparently not. And besides you haven't changed. You're still the same sweet girl," he lifts my hand that he's holding to kiss it making me blush.

At least Cara will be there with Trey so I have a built in friend tonight. Jenn isn't coming, because she had other plans and Dan didn't really mind if she came or not. Over time it's become pretty clear that their relationship has an expiration date. They enjoy each other's company, but I don't expect them to last past high school. Cara and Trey on the other hand. Meant to be. They've got that rare connection that you can see lasting forever even though they're so young. I'm looking forward to seeing how they navigate college long distance next year. I like to think that Matt and I are more like Cara and Trey than Jenn and Dan. That easy, forever kind of love. At least, that's how I feel inside.