Page 56 of 10 Things I Hate About Prom
And they don’t turn back on.
Chapter Eighteen
Senior lock-in is asterrifying as it sounds.
Everyone gathers in the gym after school on a Friday, armed with sleeping bags and their cutest pajamas to spend the night locked in a room that smells like feet. Which is exactly why I’m leaving as soon as I’m done helping Anna.
“Places, everyone!” I announce with a clap as Anna puts the finishing touches on her ensemble for the occasion—a silver sequined dress with matching crescent moon clips woven through her locs.
“Seriously?” she replies dryly.
“Just because this is a one-person performance doesn’t mean we can’t take it seriously.”
She fidgets with the star charm on her bracelet as she peeks out from our hiding place in the equipment closet to get a glimpse of the steadily growing crowd. “This isn’t a performance.”
“All promposals are performances,” I reply indignantly. “Or at least the good ones are.”
I sound like I drank the Cordero Prom-Craze Kool-Aid, but the point remains. If anyone deserves the picture-perfect promposal, it’s Anna, and I’m here to make sure that happens. It already took twenty minutes of pleading—and fifty dollars—to let us dip out of tech week rehearsal early so we could make it here in time to set things up, but Anna is well worth the emotional labor (and cash).
Even if I have no idea who she’s actually asking.
Anna’s been so tight-lipped about this new development in her love life, you’d think she was sworn to silence by the CIA. Still, helping her pull off her down-to-the-wire promposal has been a welcome distraction and a good way to free myself of the negative prom-related karma hanging over my head.
“She here yet?” I ask, peeking over her shoulder to scan the room despite not knowing who I’m looking for.
Anna slams the door shut like she just saw a ghost, leaning against it with an expression that screams pure terror. “Mmm-hmm.”
“You okay?”
Anna nods, biting her lip so roughly it creases the purple lipstick she spent ten minutes perfecting.
“You sure?” I reach out to rest a hand on her trembling shoulder. “Because you seem lik—”
“I’m asking Tessa,” she blurts out with so much force it makes the basketballs behind us wobble. “To prom. Right now.”
It takes my brain several beats to process what she just said, leaving me standing there open-mouthed. “Tessa?” I choke out, picking my jaw off the sticky floor. “As in Tessa Hernandez?”
Anna nods again, and I almost short-circuit from the effortof understanding how Anna, Tessa, and prom wound up in the same sentence.
“I know I should’ve told you when I first asked for your help, but I panicked. I thought it might make things weird, or you’d be pissed and wouldn’t want to talk to me again, and I realize how screwed up that is and I’m sorry,” she rattles out at top speed, careful not to step too close to me despite the cramped space we’re sharing.
Anger is the last thing on my mind, but I can’t blame her for not wanting to tell me. Especially after I spent almost a month sabotaging a slew of promposals meant for Tessa. I hadn’t planned on prepping for a real one. “Didn’t you two hate each other, like, five minutes ago?” I could’ve sworn I saw her scowl at Tessa in chem last week.
She shrugs, running her hands down her arms like she’s fighting off a chill. “We started talking again two months ago. Our parents made us go to this college networking thing. It was just a bunch of wannabe politicians handing out their business cards to anyone who’d give them the time of day. Unless we wanted to listen to someone give us their ten-step plan to eliminate world hunger, our only option was to talk to each other.”
Reconnecting while avoiding strangers—the world’s most relatable love story.
“It…didn’t really work out, at first. We went through too much shit for things to go back to normal overnight. I said some stuff I really regret over break, about how she can’t just waltz into my life again like nothing happened. And then you said something may have happened between her and Joaquin over break, and that drove me nuts, even when I knew it shouldn’t. But…she didn’t give up. Every night she’d text me, telling me she wanted me in her life, even if it was just as a friend. And eventually that turned into something more.”
Suddenly, Joaquin’s story about spring break with Tessa makes a whole lot more sense. Him finding her crying on the boardwalk. Anna’s subtle prying about their relationship, and her general irritation toward his promposal attempts. “Why didn’t you tell me before I agreed to help Joaquin ask her?” Knowing Tessa was spoken for would’ve saved us a whole lot of time, money, and heartbreak.
Anna is ashen, and I immediately regret not watching my tone. “Because I didn’t understand what was going on!” she replies, throwing her hands up in the air. “One second, I couldn’t stand her, and the next she was all I could think about. I told myself I wouldn’t get in deep if she didn’t feel the same way—not after what went down before—but things are different this time around. She can date now, for one, and her dad isn’t as much of a hard-ass as he used to be. But by the time we figured that out, you were getting ready to tell Joaquin how you felt, and I thought everything would just fix itself. We’d both end up with the right people.”
While I still have questions, my last—and only—conversation with Tessa cuts the line to the forefront of my mind. “She said she already has a date,” I say quickly. “She was at my last detention, and I tried to convince her to give Joaquin another shot, but she said she’d already found someone.”
A smirk tugs at the corners of Anna’s lips, the twinkle in her eyes giving her secret away.
“She was talking aboutyou!” I whack her arm. She’s beenTessa’s prom date for days, and I had no idea. Either they’re phenomenal actresses, or I need to be a more attentive friend.
