What Senior Prom Taught Me

“Ow!” I was jolted awake by a sharp knee to the back. ‘What the hell?” in one swift move I took the pillow from underneath my head and slammed Rachael in the head.

“Hey,” she moaned groggily, “What was that for?”

“You kneed me,”

“I was sleeping!”

“Can you two shut up?” Natalie sat up in her bed and held her head, “My head is killing me.”

“Aw it sounds like someone has a hangover,” I laughed.

“Funny,” She deadpanned, lying back down and turning away from us.

“Doesn’t anyone care that Lina could have poked my eye out?” Rachael rubbed her left eye with a pout.

“Call me when I don’t have a headache.”

“Why would we call you?” I retorted. “We’re in your room.”

“Shut up!” Natalie shouted, throwing a pillow at us.

I stretched, chuckling lightly. I felt the effects of our drinking last night as well. I smacked my lips and reached for the water I placed beside me the night before to cure the dry mouth that plagued drinkers everywhere. As I laid back down, the night came back to me in short flashes. I didn’t feel like I had drank that much the night before, but I had to have been more inebriated than I thought, as my memory was hazy. The timeline of events were organized in my head as snippets of a movie, the last clip causing me to sit bolt upright in bed.

“I made out with Dean last night!”

Anna, Natalie, and Rachel sprang to life with my exclamation, any affects of their hangovers wearing off.

“You WHAT?” Natalie was the first to speak, excitement bubbling in her voice.

“I knew you liked him,” Rachael narrowed her eyes with a smirk.

“Wait, who’s Dean again?” Anna looked between the three of us in confusion.

“Lina’s delicious co-worker,” Rachael answered quickly before turning her attention back to me. “Tell. Us. Every. Detail.”

“Delicious? What are you? A horny grandmother?”

“Stop skirting the subject, D’Ambra.”

“I dunno. We were drunk. It just happened,” I groaned laying back down, covering my face with my hands.

“Is he a good kisser?” Natalie asked.

“Really good,” I admitted after a beat. Although, I didn’t really have much to compare him to as someone whose track record of kissing boys was countable on one hand. “But that’s beside the point. Work is going to be so awkward on Sunday.”

“Who made the first move?” Anna questioned.

It was clear that my obvious mortification at the events that took place the night before was not going to save me from the interrogation. Anna, Rachel, and Natalie needed every single horrifying detail to scrutinize and draw the only obvious conclusion: Dean was madly in love with me. I knew how high school girls worked (being one myself), and the fact that we made out the night before had nothing to do with the fog of alcohol and hormones clouding our better judgment.

“He did, I think,” I replied.

“I don’t know Lena,” Natalie’s voice lilted in a sing-song. “It seems like he might have invited you to the party for a reason.”

“Guyssss,” I whined. “Just because we made out doesn’t mean we like each other,” I made eye contact with each of my friends to drive the point home. “Maybe he won’t even remember come Sunday,” I added, more for my benefit than theirs. “How were your nights?”

“A whole lot less interesting,” Rachel sighed. “I talk to a lot of attractive dudes though. I wish I could transfer to Hendricken,” she sighed wistfully.

“Same,” Anna also sighed. “I gave my number to a guy named Michael, but we’ll see if actually texts me. But I think you should write a scientific paper on your theory, Rachel. Dean has so many good-looking friends!”

My phone buzzed, distracting me from the conversation at hand. The girls were trying to suss out the possible scientific reasoning behind pretty people flocking to other pretty people.

“Ohhh, is that Dean?” Natalie cooed as she noticed me staring at my phone.

Do you still want to work on our English Project today? A Text from Ian lighting up the screen.

“Ian,” I replied with a smirk before turning my attention back to my phone.

Ew. How’d you get this number?

Oh God! I must’ve put the wrong number in my phone. I have to go throw up now.

Gross. Your house or mine?

You have a hammock.

Fair enough. I’m at Natalie’s right now; wanna meet in like an hour?

I stood up and stretched, ignoring the aching pain in my head with the movement. I made a mental note to drink a lot of water.

“Sorry Chicas, this chick has to bounce.”

“What?” Anna’s eyes widened with horror. “We haven’t even begun to discuss your drunken hook up!”

“Sorry!” I shrugged, my face a beacon of insincere apologetics. “English project with Ian.”

“Ugh! Doesn’t he know this is more important?” Natalie slammed her fists on her bed.

“I guess not, see you guys on Monday,” I quickly gathered my things and headed from the room before the three could ask me more questions. It was the first time in six years I was ever happy to have an English Project to complete on a Saturday. The last thing I needed was to dissect a meaningless hookup.

***

The door to my backyard fence swung open, alerting me to Ian’s arrival.

“Oh, oh geeze,” Ian pretended to walk back through the door. “I think I have the wrong house. Sorry to disturb you old hag.”

“Whoo, I’m glad I didn’t eat anything yet today, I surely would be throwing it up right about now.”

Ian chuckled, dropping his bag and taking a seat next to me on the hammock.

“You brought your computer?” I asked, once he settled.

“Did I ever?” Ian wiggled his eyebrows as he pulled his laptop out of his bag with vigor.

“Do you always have to be a total spaz?”

“Rather be a spaz than ugly. Like you. OHHHH,” He reached up his hand for a high five. A high five that he completed with his other hand.

“I think I’m too hung over for this,” I sighed.

“Hungover, ay? Why are you hung over? And more importantly, why are you hung over and I wasn’t invited to also become hung over.”

“Sorry bro, it was a girls only invite. I went to a party that one of Dean’s friends threw.”

“Dean? Isn’t that someone who works with you at Shores? The one Laura Johansen always talks about in Chemistry?”

“Sure, I mean, I don’t know what Laura talks about in Chemistry, but I have to assume it’s that very same Dean.”

“She makes him sound like a real dick.”

“It’s Laura,” I rolled my eyes. “He’s pretty nice. Kind of a goof ball, but nice. And a pretty good kisser.”

I knew I would have to say it sooner or later, and I thought perhaps if I dropped it into the conversation nonchalantly Ian would gloss over the last statement. However, the darkening of Ian’s expression let me know that my plan had backfired.

“And you know that how?”

“I work with him, duh.”

“Do all the employees of Shores have to kiss each other?” he gave me a look to signify I better spill the beans.

I sighed. Ian and I had pretty much the same argument anytime a person of the male persuasion and I did anything slightly less than platonic. And it wasn’t in that I’m-your-best-guy-friend-who-is-secretly-in-love-with-you-way, but in over-protective brother way. It was endearing the first few times, but not after the seventieth.

“We made out at the party last night, okay?” I threw my hands up in defeat. “I was drunk and it was a mistake. Now work is going to be way awkward tomorrow.”

“You should be careful with that,” Ian warned. “He could’ve taken advantage of you.”

“Dean’s not that kind of guy.”

“You don’t know him that well. I just don’t want you to get hurt!” Ian added defiantly after receiving a death glare from me.

“It’s fine, Ian. You don’t have to worry about me so much. Let’s just work on our project.”

Ian huffed, but didn’t push the subject further. As he booted up PowerPoint, I went over my notes on The Awakening. It was our turn to present and lead the discussion. Our last discussion, on our last book, which would be Ian and my last English project of our High School careers. It was a momentous occasion. However, the sheer tedium of the whole thing made it kind of hard to really soak in the nostalgia. The birds chirped around us as we constructed the slides that would help us direct the flow of the discourse that Monday. By a sheer force of will or perhaps by the sheer force of apathy, we finished the presentation in under three hours.

“That was easier than I thought,” I yawned with a stretch as I watched the save bar progress from empty to full, signifying that our work was truly done.

“Do you think we should add more?”

“Nah,” I flicked my wrist. “PowerPoints are supposed to be pithy. We’re meant to elaborate on the slides.”

“Someone’s listening in Mrs. Smith’s class,” Ian nudged his elbow into my rib.

“Well some of aren’t too dense to enjoy history,” I mirrored his actions.

Ian pulled me into a quick noogie in retaliation.

“What do you wanna do now?” I matted down the hair Ian displaced.

“Food?” he shrugged.

“Kays?”

“GET OUTTA MY HEAD, WOMAN!”

I rolled my eyes and hopped off the hammock, excited for the first time since, well, my last meal. We briefly stopped inside my house so I could grab some money and Ian could stash his bag before we headed off down to street to our favorite lunch spot. Kay’s was essentially heaven on earth, if heaven was a hole-in-the-wall sandwich shop. It was that perfect trifecta, of cheap, tasty, and old-school charm that made every single sandwich worth every penny of the five dollars they cost.

“Oh boy!” I hopped a bit as we walked along. “I can’t wait to have sweet, sweet Kay’s in my mouth.”

“I would say ‘that’s what she said’, but that’s just too easy.”

“The world thanks you. How was hanging with Hannah last night?” I couldn’t hold out any longer. I needed the sweet, sweet gossip perhaps even more than I needed Kay’s.

Ian’s shoulders slumped, “Same as usual. I invite her to hang out just the two of us, and then Monica and ‘Manda are invited. She doesn’t even ask anymore. Are they like her body guards and I missed the memo?”

“Could it be that maybe she’s not interested and she doesn’t know how to tell you?” I winced as the words came out of my mouth.

I didn’t want to say it, but as Ian’s oldest and closest (in proximity and years-known) friend I felt it had to be put out into the world. Ian had been trying to move his relationship with Hannah out of the friend-zone for the better half of our senior year. All his advances seemed like they were being rebuffed by her, and sometimes boys were a little slow to get the picture.

“The thought crossed my mind, but she’s super flirty when we’re together. I think so at least. It’s just, I can’t make any real moves on her with her two girl friends always around,” he ran his hands through his floppy light brown hair with an exasperated sigh.

“Well, maybe she’s just really traditional. You know, Victorian Era traditional,” Ian shot me an glower, causing me to shrug before adding, “I dunno. You know she’s weird about that stuff.”

Hannah was fun, carefree, and a little bit of a wild child. However, she was all those things in every aspect of her life except one: her love life, if you could even call any aspect of high school romance a love life. She was a First Class on Arab Emirates with the sleeper cabins prude. Basically a prude of epic proportions, stemming from her eighth-grade boyfriend that tried to go up her shirt after one year of dating. Not that I would condone anyone pressuring anyone into doing something they weren’t ready for, but I was continually shocked by the lack of sex drives so many of my friends had. Especially since that’s what teens were known for.

“Maybe you should try and set up a casual double-date type scenario,” I suggested after a few minutes of thoughtful silence. “That way you can put on the moves—as terrifying as thought is—but give her the comfort of the power in numbers.”

“Heyyy,” Ian stroked his chin and gazed towards the skies. “That’s not a bad Idea! Sometimes you’re not totally stupid!” he draped his arm across my shoulder, pulling me in for a hug as reached Kay’s parking lot.

I grimaced under his too tight embrace. Somehow, I was great at helping everyone else with his or her relationship problems while somehow only leaving my relationships in a mess of confusion and awkwardness.