The whole room erupted. A senior in a pink tux yelled out, “Are you seriously breaking up with a guy with cancer?” The crowd agreed. I even heard someone shout “bitch.”
“It’s fine!” Steve said as he coasted to a stop on the edge of the stage. “Really! I’m not sad!” How could he say that? This was Kaia. If Kaia had just rejected me, I’d be devastated. Crushed. Spiraling into a black void of oblivion. But Steve merely shrugged. “Honestly, having cancer is a lot. I’m not sure I have the emotional bandwidth for a relationship right now,” he told everyone. “And anyway, we really don’t have anything in common.”
But no one was listening. The boos were getting louder. Kaia stared at the crowd. She looked like she was staring into her own black void of oblivion. Steve attempted to swing himself in front of her to protect her from the outrage. But she pushed him aside and stepped toward the edge of the stage.
“Are you booing me?” In answer, the crowd redoubled their efforts. She blinked and stepped forward. “You’re seriously booing me?” Her body quivered and her face flushed. “Yearbook, really?” And then she caught another offender. “Student council! AND prom committee!” Her eyes darted from group to group, her rage building. And then something in her snapped. “Motherfuckers . . . ,” she growled under her breath. She brushed by me as she stalked toward the steps leading off the stage, and I swear I felt heat radiating off her.
Kaia stepped onto the dance floor, waving her arms. “Stop booing, assholes!”
“Language!” Mr. Holmes, our principal, chided, but Kaia gave him a death stare and he shrank.
Out of shock, the booing petered off. “I’m so sick of all of you!” She walked right up to the yearbook table. “What? You want me to do this for you, too?” She jerked her head at them, taunting. “Huh?” They scuttled back, scared. She spun around and carved through the stunned crowd as she addressed them. “Is that it? Date a guy I don’t really like?” Promgoers parted in her path. “I was going to break up with him! And then he promposaled me and I tricked myself into thinking I was actually in love with him because I was too embarrassed to say no in front of all of you. Sure, I was pissed that he cheated, but I was also fucking relieved. But okay, let me keep dating a guy I have nothing in common with because he rode in on a swing and has cancer and that makes you feel all swoony! How long do I need to do it? Just for tonight? A few weeks? Forever?” She got in the face of the pink tux kid. “How long will make you happy?” Furious, she slammed her hand on a table, causing the plates to shudder.
Everyone was stone-cold frozen.
“Maybe I should marry him? Why the hell not? I already do everything else for you assholes!” She circled back toward the stage as she counted off, “Student council! Debate! Prom! Feminists for fucking knitting! You think I like doing all that?! Getting texts at midnight?” She switched to a whiny, singsongy voice. “Oh, we need poster board for tomorrow, Kaia. Can you get some for us?” She dropped it and barked, “Fucking get it yourselves!!! Papier-mâché your own damn mermaids! I. Am. Done!” She screamed and thrust all her rage at the life-sized mermaid, toppling it over.
Kids by the stage screamed and scattered. “Go ahead, hate me all you want!” Kaia walked to the other side of the stage. “Guess what?” She kicked the second mermaid in the fin. “I no longer care what a bunch of mediocre high school kids think of me.” She punched a hole in its face. “I am through.” And then she ripped off its head and threw it at the crowd.
“Fuuuuucccckkk alllll ooooof yoooooouuuuu!” she finished, and stomped out of the room.
In the new silence, we all absorbed what we’d just seen.
Holy shit, that was hot.
Beside me, I heard Steve laugh, his bare feet still hovering a foot above the stage. “Ahh, Cambone.”
I blushed.
I hadn’t realized I’d said it out loud.
Steve and I walked out onto the ballroom’s wide orange tiled balcony that looked over the ocean below. We’d eventually managed to untangle Steve from the harness with the help of Cardi’s people. For our own safety we figured we’d look for Kaia together. We found her on the far side of the balcony, her elbows propped on the ledge, her dress fluttering around her in the night breeze, and scowling at the water like it had something to do with what happened.
“Well, that’s a prom to remember,” Steve said as we crossed to her. Kaia turned and sniffed, wiping her nose on the back of her hand.
“Are you okay?” I asked.
“Yeah. I still want to murder someone. But, yeah.” Her eyes flicked to Steve’s and back down again. “I’m sorry.”
Steve raised his hands. “Uh, don’t be. All I want is for people to treat me exactly like they would if I didn’t have cancer. And if that includes dumping my ass publicly, that’s fine with me. In fact, it’s a bit of a relief. You kind of scare me.”
Kaia laughed. “Thanks.”
Steve leaned close to me and whispered in my ear. “But there are some people who get off on unhinged displays of rage.” He nudged me in the ribs. I widened my eyes and gave a tiny shake of my head. What the hell was he thinking? He couldn’t be—“Kaia, can we get you something to soothe those ravaged vocal cords? Some punch, perhaps?” Steve asked smoothly, taking my elbow. I tried to yank it back.
“Sure,” Kaia agreed, and turned back to the ocean.
Steve pulled me over to a table that had a half-filled punch bowl and some compostable plastic cups (Kaia) and slopped some sticky pink liquid into a glass. “Dude, this is your chance.”
“Are you insane?” I yell-whispered. “I can’t ask her out now. She just broke up with you!”
Steve grabbed another glass and filled it. “Cam. Camarindo. Cam-my-man. She kissed you. Twice. That angry one was super hot. And she spent all that time with you. Even while we were dating, she talked about you nonstop. That dance you did. I mean, she would not shut up about it. And, honestly, I didn’t want to tell you this that night at mini golf, but . . . you were right. You are better for her.”
I stared at Steve, really, really wanting to believe him.
“It doesn’t matter. I can’t ask her out now. She knows everything I did and she just said she wants to murder someone. You saw what she did to those mermaids!”
“So? You spent months trying to engineer the perfect moment. Look what happened.” I wilted a bit. Damn. He was right. Steve gave me a little shake. “Besides, if the shark didn’t take you out, you really think this will?” With that, Steve handed me two glasses of punch and gave me a shove.
I walked back toward Kaia, carefully clutching the cups, the pink liquid nearly spilling over with each step, waiting for all the horrible feelings to start boiling up. But there was nothing. No stomach clenching. No legs bracing. No chest collapsing and stealing my breath. Why not?
I reached Kaia. She must have visited the snack table because she’d found a piece of cake and was angrily stabbing it. I tried not to take that as a sign.
“Here.” I offered her the cup.
“Thanks.” Kaia grabbed the glass from me and set it on the ledge.
I stared at the ocean, nervous. But just a little. It was different from every other time I’d been about to ask her. Before, all I could think of was some endless black void. Complete annihilation. But now . . .
I turned to look over my shoulder. Steve was on the other side of the balcony, feeding bits of cake to a seagull.
And maybe that was the difference.
Steve.
I turned back to Kaia. “Just so we’re clear, I fully recognize this is the worst time to do this.”
Kaia didn’t even look up from her cake. “What?”
“So, you heard everything I said onstage earlier . . .”
“Yep.” She stabbed the fork into the cake and ground the crumbs into the plate.
“On a scale of one to ten, how mad are you at me right now?”
“Eleven.” A tine broke off the fork as she pressed down.
Okay, actually
, maybe I should wait an hour or two. The image of the decapitated mermaid flashed through my mind. “Yeah. I think maybe I didn’t make it clear before, but I am super, insanely sorry for everything. Like infinity. And, uh, I’m just gonna—”
“But I’ll get over it,” she said, and I froze. Kaia put the mutilated cake on the ledge of the balcony. “Even though your motivations were . . . less than pure, you did raise, like, thirty thousand dollars for Steve. And, I don’t know, we were a pretty good team for a while, right? I mean, you never made me go on midnight runs for poster board.” She sighed and turned to me. “I guess what I’m saying is, there are more sharks to save.” Her eyes widened. “Oh my god! Did you hear about the shark? Crazy, right?”
“Oh. Um.” I looked over my shoulder to Steve again. He had a flock of seagulls around him now. He looked a little worried about it. “Yeah. Crazy.”
“And . . . I . . . I did some stupid shit, too.” I turned back to Kaia. She was picking at a rhinestone on her dress. “Not as stupid as your shit. But I shouldn’t have kissed you to get back at Steve. That wasn’t great.”
“Oh, um, well, it was kinda great for me.”
She looked away, out toward the ocean, and bit her lip.
This was the moment.
“Kaia, I should have asked you this a long time ago, but I didn’t and I just . . .” My voice was all squeaky. Why? I tried to lower it. “I want to know.” No, that was worse.
“What?”
I cleared my throat. “After prom, maybe tomorrow, or next week, or, you know, whenever . . . will you go out with me? Not as friends. Or to save anything, but . . . like on a date. A normal date?”
Holy shit. I’d said it. For a moment I didn’t know where I was. I was just somewhere in a world where I’d finally said the words and I was flying. And then I realized Kaia was looking at me, a few loose curls brushing her face as the ocean breeze whipped them around, the moonlight making a perfect silver highlight on her shoulder, her eyes soft and warm. She sighed, close enough to me that I felt her breath on my neck. This was better than any dream I’d ever had. This was—
“No.”
Behind me, I heard Steve drop his cake plate. “Oh, fuck! Sorry, dude.” He rushed over, sending seagulls flapping in every direction. “My fault. I totally misread the sitch.”
Kaia was still talking, her eyes wide and earnest, but I couldn’t hear anything she said.
The worst had happened.
Kaia Gonzales had rejected me. Just like I’d always been afraid she would.
I waited for the darkness.
The void.
It was coming . . .
21
But then . . . nothing.
No void.
No annihilation. Just Kaia. Still talking. “I mean, Cam, if you had asked me before all this happened, I probably would have said yes, but for the wrong reasons.” Where was the darkness? “I would have said yes because I didn’t want to hurt your feelings.” Where was the destruction? “That’s my problem. I’ve been so worried about everyone’s feelings that I didn’t think about my own. But I have to stop being everything for everyone else, even if they hate me.” Why wasn’t I broken into a thousand pieces? “Cam, thank you for asking me out. But I just want to be friends.” She looked confused when I didn’t react. “Cam?”
“Give him a minute,” I heard Steve say. “You just destroyed him.”
“I’m not destroyed,” I said, more to myself than anyone else. “I’m fine.” And this time I actually was.
“I know that wasn’t what you wanted to hear,” Kaia said.
“No. It wasn’t,” I admitted. That was an understatement of epic proportions. But I was still glad I’d asked. Not just glad. Relieved. And realistically, I would need at least a week of nonstop moping and a couple of boxes of Strawberry Pop-Tarts to piece myself back together. But still, I held out my hand. “Friends?”
Kaia relaxed, the tension leaving her body. She gave me a small smile and I returned it.
She took my hand. “Good friends.”
Steve stuck his hand in and laid it on top of ours. “Friends with benefits?”
We jerked our hands away and shouted “No!” at the same time. Steve threw his head back and laughed.
Then, through the open doors to the ballroom, the DJ announced, “And now what you’ve all been waiting for! Cardi BBBBBBBBBB!” A huge cheer erupted from inside as bass thumped loud enough to shake the windows.
Steve gestured to the open doors. “They’re playing our song.”
I made a skeptical noise. “I think it’s really your song.”
Steve threw his arms over Kaia’s and my shoulders and pulled us close. “Our song,” he insisted.
“Your song.”
“Ours.”
“Nope.” A smile tugged at my lips.
“Whatever,” Kaia groaned. “Can we dance now?”
We walked through the doors and into the bright, flashing lights of the ballroom.
“You’re a legend,” a kid I didn’t know said to me as he left the ballroom. The last few hours had been like a crazed super train. The three of us jumping around onstage. Cardi challenging me to a dance-off. Steve taking over the mic to duet on “Drip.” And finally, the quinceañera crashing the prom. It was total madness.
And now I was one of the last ones here. I never dreamed I would shut down prom. But I couldn’t stand to see the night end. I watched Cardi’s people pack up her gear. The ballroom staff cleaned up the disaster that the fifteen-year-olds and promgoers had left. Steve was still here in one corner, having a balloon-popping contest with a couple of his bro buds. After his cancer speech, they had actually been pretty cool to him. I guess that was progress.
A few of the prom committee members packed up the reusable items. Earlier I was glad to see Kaia ditch them without offering to help. But in her rush, she had forgotten to say goodbye to me. I couldn’t say I wasn’t disappointed, but after all the shit that she had gone through tonight, it was fine. She probably needed to just get to sleep.
My mom texted me: Did you fix everything?
It sounded ridiculous now. But I guess everything was fixed. Just not the way I had imagined. I texted her a thumbs-up and a party favor explosion and that I’d be home soon. When I looked up, Steve was gone. He must have left with his old friends.
I took one last look at the ballroom. If I was honest, I was a little bummed to be leaving alone. But I didn’t feel sorry for myself. I was still a legend, apparently.
Suddenly I was grabbed from behind. “What the—?”
I turned to find Kaia with a big, mischievous grin on her face.
“Where’s Steve?” she asked.
“I thought you’d left—”
“Where’s Steve?” she demanded.
“I . . . I don’t know. He was just here.”
“Come on,” she said, and grabbed my hand. Holding her dress up, she pulled me through the hallway, yelling, “Steve! Steve!”
Her excitement was infectious. I called out with her, “Steve!” even though I had no idea why.
A couple of busboys were pushing a cart and Kaia slowed to ask them, “Have you seen Steve?”
“Steve who?”
“Never mind,” she said, and we raced on.
In the lobby, she questioned the woozy prom stragglers. They either hadn’t seen him or were too drunk to follow the question. But then one of Steve’s balloon-popping bro buds heard us. “You guys looking for Steve?”
“What gave it away?” Kaia snarked. She was flushed and happy in a way I’d never seen.
“Some guy who worked for Cardi told Steve she wanted to give him something. I think he went to her trailer.”
“To the trailer!” Kaia ordered, and pointed out to the parking lot.
“What are we doing, Kaia?”
“Just wait.”
We ran through the automatic sliding doors and headed to the parking lot. Luckily, Cardi’s trailer was parked curbside. Just as
we skidded up to the door, it popped open and out stumbled Steve. He was wearing a gold Cardi B hat that she had signed, had a lipstick kiss on his cheek and a big old goofy smile on his face.
“She’s soooooo nice!” he gushed. “Cancer was worth it!” He high-fived me and then leaned close. “You should get cancer, Cam.”
“I’ll pass,” I laughed.
Kaia rolled her eyes. “I can’t believe I dated you.”
“Don’t you have some poster board to get?” he teased.
She smacked him on the arm and then smiled. “We have some important business to attend to, gentlemen. To the beach!”
“The beach?” I asked.
But she didn’t wait to answer and took off toward it. I looked at Steve, confused. He just shrugged and repeated, “To the beach!” And he ran off after her.
To the beach.
We passed Kaia’s shoes, which she had apparently flung off even before we got to the sand. Reaching the beach, I kicked mine off, while shoeless Steve ran ahead. Chuffing after her, I could see her silhouette running with wild abandon toward the crashing waves. Maybe it had something to do with the shark? The sudden release might have shocked his system. But she was too happy for him to be washed up dead onshore. Was he leaping out of the ocean like a dolphin and blowing whalelike spurts? Anything seemed possible tonight.
Kaia finally reached the edge of the soft sand and fell to her knees. Steve plopped down on her right and I took the left. Kaia pulled her bag to her lap and unzipped it.
“Tell me you got some of that Purple Kush!” Steve’s eyes lit up.
“Better.” Kaia smiled and pulled a jar from her bag.
“What could be—”
“One hundred percent pure grade Acacia Farms Orange Blossom Honey,” she exclaimed, and held the jar up like the Holy Grail.
Steve bolted upright. “No way!”
“Where’d you get that?”
“They had it in the lobby store. You guys creamed your jeans so much over it, I had to try it.”
Save Steve Page 23
