Page 42 of The Wrong Prom Date

“So…” I prompted.

“So, it needs some work,” he replied. “Your writing is clean, but it’s the content I’m concerned about. You’ve written down facts like you would a grocery list. There’s no heart to your story and no thread binding the facts together. I want you to dig deeper and give the reader of your biography a reason to want to keep reading it.”

It was a little hard to dig deeper when Liam hadn’t answered my questions. “I’m finding it difficult to get more information out of my assignment partner,” I said. It was the understatement of the century considering how much of a disaster our interview had been, but something stopped me from ratting Liam out completely.

Mr. Randall let out a tired breath. “Part of this assignment is about learning to work with others and uncovering their story. You need to consider what questions will be most effective in drawing out the answers you want. Why don’t you try questioning Liam again with this in mind?”

I withheld a groan that had worked its way up my throat. I was trying to distance myself from Liam, not get to know him better. I didn’t want to uncover his story, but it was clear my assignment wasn’t going to get me the grade I needed unless I made some improvements. I’d have to work harder on it, that much was obvious, but it didn’t mean I had to interview Liam again. I was just going to need to get more creative.

I started nodding, hoping it would get me out of the classroom quicker. “I’ll think about what you’ve said and do my best to make it better.”

Mr. Randall passed the paper back to me and smiled. He’d gone to a lot of effort making notes all over the page. The notes only made me sad though. They were a reminder of how much I was failing in his class, and it felt like I was letting myself down.

“I’ll see you tomorrow, Teagan. Have a good night.”

“Thanks, Mr. Randall. You too,” I said, as I dashed toward the door.

My night was going to be filled with the cries of Mrs. Jensen’s baby, so I doubted it would come anywhere close to being good.

* * *

“You’re late,”Mom slurred at me from the top of the stairs when I finally made it through the front door just before midnight. She was in her pajamas, clutching an expensive bottle of red wine, and there was makeup streaked under her eyes. I didn’t want to know what she’d been doing tonight. It’s not like she cared where I’d been.

Thanks to my meeting with Mr. Randall, I hadn’t had time to go home between school and babysitting. It was the middle of the night, and I doubted Mom had even realized I wasn’t home until now.

“Well, I’m home now,” I grumbled as I dumped my bag by the door and started toward the kitchen. Mom didn’t come after me, and I was almost glad she didn’t feel the need to question me about my evening. I wasn’t sure I could handle dealing with her right now. I was exhausted and starving. The Jensens always told me to help myself to anything in their fridge, but there hadn’t been a chance to eat because baby Sarah had cried all night long.

Not one bit of my homework was finished, and I was too tired to try and slog through it now. As I opened the fridge, my heart plummeted. Mom must have been really hungover today because the food I’d left in there this morning was all gone and the fridge was emptyagain.

Tears pricked the corners of my eyes as my stomach started to moan in complaint. I closed the fridge and leaned my head against it as tears began to silently stream down my face. Where the hell had my mother disappeared to, and why was I stuck with this stranger in her place?

Before Dad left us, Mom had taken pride in caring for our family. The fridge was always fully stocked, and she would have noticed that I hadn’t come home from school. She would have known that I was babysitting tonight and would have offered to drive me there and pick me up. That life no longer felt real to me though. It felt like some dream that had happened to someone else, and it was never coming back.

I scrubbed the tears from under my eyes and tried to tell myself that I was stronger than this. I might not be able to control my life today, but my future would be different. It would be happy and bright. I’d leave this dim life behind forever and hopefully one day this would all seem like a dream too.

15

Liam

“I’m never going to be able to learn these stupid lines,” I groaned to Zeke. The words were almost blurring on the page I’d read them so many times. I knocked back the last dregs of my protein shake. It was the same flavor I had for breakfast every day and I’d just completed a grueling workout with my trainer, same as always.

I was used to the routine, but I sometimes wished there was a little more variety in my life. I could have done with a little more free time too. With school and homework now taking up so much of my day, it felt like I had no time for anything else including learning my lines. I’d never had so many to memorize all at once, and I didn’t usually have to retain them for long periods of time.

I was jealous of Teagan for having the entire script committed to memory already and worried she made me look bad in comparison. I had to admit, I was impressed by her commitment though, and her skills onstage had floored me in rehearsals. She was a very talented actress, and her gift was wasted in a high school play.

“You’ll learn the lines,” Zeke said. “You’ve already got almost half of them down.”

I placed my script down as I looked at my assistant. “Yeah, but as soon as I learn the second half, the first half will fly out of my brain. It’s a scientific problem, I swear.”

Zeke chuckled. “Well, if you say it’s a scientific problem, then it must be true…”

“I pay you far too much to take this crap,” I grumbled.

“Probably,” Zeke agreed. “And, speaking of crap, your mother called this morning.”

I groaned. “Please don’t drop theM-word before I’ve had my morning coffee.”

“She’s been leaving messages for you to call her back,” he continued, completely ignoring me. “You know she doesn’t like to be kept waiting, and you’ve been dodging her calls ever since the party last weekend. It’s nearly been a week.”

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