As Makeup Runs Down Your Cheeks

“You know, dances creep me out kind of.” Erin said as we were walking down the halls of school. There were huge posters all over campus with reminders in neon green to buy tickets for the prom in a month or so.

“I get what you mean, who would want to be in a room filled with snobby people and crappy music?” I asked as we passed a group of girls gossiping by the ticket table.

“The ticket prices are ridiculous too.” Erin said. There was a poster above the table informing the student body that tickets were fifty dollars per ticket.

“I know right? I mean why do girls get all worked up over finding the perfect dre- ah!” I squeaked as I felt someone latch their arms around me, kiss my neck, and lift me off the ground. As I was set down, I spun around and smacked Bryan in the chest.

“You scared me you jerk!” I laughed and reached up to give him a kiss on the cheek. He smiled and pulled something out from his pocket and showed them to me. They were tickets to the prom.

“Monte you did not seriously waste a hundred dollars on me did you?” I said and eyed the tickets. I grabbed them from him and checked to see if they were fake, as if Bryan were trying to pull a prank on me. But sure enough, the tickets were real.

“Yes I did Juliet, Erin you‘re going too.” Bryan said after taking the tickets back from me.

“What the flip-mode? How did I get into this? Ronnie!” Erin whined as Ronnie walked up to us and innocently pulled out two tickets from his pocket as well. Erin smacked him and grabbed the tickets from his hand, just as I did, she inspected them to see if they were fake. She shoved them back in Ronnie’s hand and groaned.

“We don’t want to miss the prom, come on Erin! I’ve yet to take you to a dance and when I finally do you are going to bitch and moan about it?” Ronnie argued.

“She can bitch all she wants now but please Erin, save the moaning over Ronnie when you‘re alone.” I said and giggled as Erin’s eyes widened .

“Gross Juliet! You know I don’t do that.”

“Hey! Paybacks a bitch isn’t it? And you know it’s true.”

“No it is not!”

“Whatever. Bryan, I don’t even have money for a dress or anything. I don‘t even know if I really want to go I mean…really?” I said. Angrily, Bryan put the tickets in his pocket and sighed.

“Fine Juliet, make excuses. I know you do. If you two don’t want to go then we wont.” he said and walked away. Ronnie dropped his and Erin’s tickets to floor and followed Bryan.

“Just one dance is all we wanted.” he said looking over his shoulder and turned a corner. Erin bent down and picked up the tickets before stuffing them in her binder. I stared off down the hall and looked at Erin.

“Please tell me you’re feeling just as bad as I am.” I said. Erin nodded vigorously and sighed. We walked to the locker room quietly and talked more as we began to change. I laughed as Erin squeezed herself into a blue muscle tank and pulled on black basketball shorts.

“That shirt makes your rack look huge.”

“I know.”

“Ronnie’s already seen your boobs so why-”

“No he hasn’t.”

“What?”

“Ronnie and I haven’t…you know.”

“Oh…really? I could have sworn you would’ve by now.” I said, shocked. Erin and Ronnie have been together at least longer than a year now.

“Nope, were waiting for a special moment. Oh, oh…Oh! Dang Juliet, prom! Prom would’ve been special. That’s probably why he…Oh gosh! I’m stupid. Now I remember, we said prom. If we were together still by prom we would. I’m so stupid and selfish. Juliet we’re selfish!” she panicked.

“We?! You’re the one who forgot your promise to Ronnie! I didn’t make no promises to Bryan.”

“Juliet, it’s not about that now. They wanted to treat us special, make us feel like Queens at prom but we shot our own boyfriends down to go! Sure, you and Bryan may not have sex but he still wants to treat you right Juliet. The boy loves you and wants to go to prom with you. This is a big thing, the most memorable night of our senior year and we won’t take part.”

“Technically, I would’ve been a junior.” I muttered while pulling on a yellow tank top and gray basketball shorts.

“Shut up Juliet. We should go, for them. For us.” Erin said as we began to walk out of the locker room. The class met out on the bleachers in the gym and as always we were last out.

“Guys!” Erin called to our boyfriends, who were walking by. Ronnie took one glance at her and shook his head, Bryan barely even looked at me.

“Wow, that was brutal. What’s up with them?” Max asked coming up the benches. He was walking with Robert and Omar.

“Alright guys, take a lap around the track and then meet up in your teams for volleyball.” our gym teacher, Mr. Fey, said after taking role. We jogged down the benches and waited for the guys to catch up. Sad to say, we were a lot quicker.

“We kind of shot them down on prom.” Erin said.

“That’s low. No offense, but you girls should even be lucky that they were willing to spend two-hundred dollars just to take you two. Two-hundred dollars together, we needed that money for the band. All of us are spending the band money just for this, and it goes to waste because you two don’t like dances. I would be pissed too.” Robert said running on the side of me.

“We know that! Fudge man, we were talking about it in the locker rooms. We want to go, we’ve opened our eyes but these morons don’t want to talk to us so we can’t tell them!” Erin yelled. People passing us up began to stare, two of them being Ronnie and Bryan. Ronnie stared at Erin and sprinted off, leaving Bryan behind.

“Juliet, come here.” Bryan said slowing down. I slowed down and jogged around Max and Erin to Bryan’s side.

“Bryan, I’m so sorry about earlier. I feel really bad about hurting your feelings.” I said. He shrugged and began to pick up his pace.

“Julie, it just saddened me that you made such a huge deal about the prom. I mean if you don’t want to go with me then-”

“I want to go now. Everyone’s right, it’s one of our most memorable nights of the year and I don’t want to blow it off. I’d rather spend it with you than anyone.” I said catching up.

“So we’re going to go?”

“Yes.”