The Gay Girl's Guide to Ruining Prom

by Siera Maley

  “Do you think I’m an idiot? Of course I remember,” I bit back.

  “Then obviously if she spills anything about me, you should share,” she huffed. “What did she say?”

  “It wasn’t important, anyway,” I said. “I’m pretty sure she saw your brother at the party. She complained about spotting someone who knows her ex and then said she hoped that ex wasn’t at the party. That’s it.”

  “You had an in like that and you didn’t take it?” asked Skylar, dumbfounded.

  I sighed at her. “Look, did you want me to seduce her or did you want me to spend our first conversation grilling her about how she feels about her ex?”

  She rolled her eyes but eased off a little. “Okay, you’re right. But next time it comes up, you’ll tell me?”

  “I’ll tell you,” I promised, “if it even comes up again. We don’t exactly talk about stuff like that.”

  “You should try to get answers eventually, if you can,” she said. She looked shy. “It would help, I mean.”

  “I’ll try,” I promised, and meant it. I truly wanted Skylar to have closure more than anything else at all. How she got it—this Prom plan—was all Skylar. I was still only on board with it if Chelsea was evil. Which she definitely was.

  My phone buzzed again with a reply from Chelsea. “Awesome! My parents will be gone but I told my friends no alcohol. Who knows if they’ll listen, though. Can’t wait to see you there!” She’d also sent me her address (in case I’d forgotten where her house was, she added) and more info about the party. It started at 8 pm.

  Skylar was reading over my shoulder, so I humored her with my reply. “Can’t wait to see you, too.” She laughed next to me and then put her chin in her hands, shooting me a devilish grin.

  “Think I should let her kiss me this time?” I asked with too much bravado and a quick wink in Skylar’s direction, and it felt like the fakest I’d been with anyone since this whole thing had started.

  During dinner on Thursday night, my parents asked me if I had plans for this weekend.

  “I got invited to a birthday party on Saturday night,” I told them, “so I was planning on going to that.” The unspoken if that’s okay with you guys was still there. As much as I enjoyed my freedom, most days I just wanted them to be real parents. I just also wanted them to still love me. I didn’t understand why they believed those had to be mutually exclusive right now. Nothing about me had changed when I’d come out, unless they’d counted the sudden flurry of girls I’d dated, or kissed, or in three cases including Alex, slept with, and I knew that they didn’t because Alex was the only one they’d known about.

  “Whose birthday party?” asked my dad. I could see him thinking hard to try to figure it out. Skylar and Devon’s shared birthday had been a month ago, and the party had been a family barbecue that they’d been invited to and had declined to attend, so I knew that they remembered it. Chelsea had said she was sick and hadn’t shown up either, which in hindsight was probably a huge red flag.

  “Do you remember Chelsea McDaniel? From middle school? I went to her thirteenth birthday party in seventh grade.”

  They exchanged a look, eyebrows furrowed. My mom seemed to remember first. “Oh, that’s right! Hugh, they had that pretty house near the park.”

  Then Dad perked up too. “You’re right.” He looked at me. “I didn’t know you two still kept in touch.”

  “We don’t. She goes to Brooks,” I explained. “But I ran into her two weeks ago and we started catching up.”

  “And she’s invited you to her party again this year?” asked Mom. “That’s very sweet of her.”

  “So you don’t care if I go? She said it’d be something small, with just a few people. Nothing crazy. She doesn’t want alcohol there.”

  “You can do whatever you feel like, sweetie.” Mom patted me on the arm as my dad nodded in agreement.

  “But do you want me to go?” I pressed, annoyed.

  They seemed to hesitate. This was a new one for them. Usually I just took their approval—false or otherwise—and ran with it.

  For a moment, they stared at each other, and then Mom made some sort of head tilt that I understood to mean, “You take this one,” and then Dad cleared his throat and smiled at me.

  “It sounds like a great idea to me. Just let us know if you’re staying the night.”

  I stared back at him, trying to read if it was his real answer. Everything about his open expression seemed to suggest that it was. That made sense. They’d only met Chelsea once, and from what I remembered about her, it was likely that she’d made a good impression. They didn’t know she liked girls.

  I felt a little more at ease, having received genuine permission for the first time in as long as I could remember, and said, “She didn’t mention anyone staying over, but I’ll ask to make sure.”

  “Is Skylar going too?” asked Mom.

  The answer they wanted was the one I could give them. “No, just me.”

  I couldn’t recall the last time we’d all been on the same page, even if it was only because they didn’t have the full story, and I was surprised at how good it made me feel to have their approval. But Dad’s next question froze the warmth that’d slowly been blooming in my chest.

  “So will there be boys at this party? Does Chelsea have a boyfriend?”

  Several answers came to the tip of my tongue in what might’ve been half a second, and I panicked. The question was loaded. I’d rid myself of Alex months ago. Now I was leaving Skylar behind to go to a party for a girl I hadn’t seen since middle school. Since back when I was “normal.” I could see the picture they were painting for themselves already: that things were beginning to turn around at last.

  I made a mistake.

  “Yeah!” The word squeaked out of me and I coughed and cleared my throat like it was at fault. Then I ate instead of saying more.

  “Good for her,” was all Mom said. My dad gave me one quick pat on the shoulder. And it was enough for me to know that the damage had been done.

  I didn’t tell Skylar that I’d screwed up with my parents. I didn’t tell Chelsea, either, because we hadn’t ever spoken about our parents before and I wasn’t sure how she’d respond to my issues with mine. Maybe she thought girls with homophobic parents weren’t worth the trouble. Then again, it wasn’t like she’d ever really gotten to know Skylar’s parents, from what I’d heard, so maybe my parents didn’t matter to her at all.

  Still, I knew she wouldn’t appreciate me trying to pass her off as straight just to see my parents genuinely happy that I was spending time with her. I wasn’t sure why I’d done it, either. Now was a really inconvenient time for me to suddenly care so much about what they thought, given how many other things I had to focus on. Like Chelsea, and Skylar, and graduation looming ahead. Not to mention Alex, who still hated me and took every opportunity to stare daggers at me when we happened to catch each other’s eye in class or in the halls.

  She was there when Skylar and I went shopping for clothes on Friday. She was alone, for once, without Wes trailing behind her with arms full of shopping bags like I half-expected. I saw her browsing tops near the changing rooms as Skylar and I made our way there with several items for me to try on, and I immediately yanked Skylar behind a rack of jeans and then pulled her down into a crouch alongside me.

  “What are you doing?” she hissed, trying to free herself of my hand, which gripped her shoulder so tightly that my fingertips had gone white.

  “Alex is here!” I whispered, gesturing in the appropriate direction. She tried to move to peek out at her, but I pulled her back into me. “Don’t look!”

  “She doesn’t hate me,” she reminded me. Alex was frustrated with Skylar for still being friends with me, I knew, but Skylar had justified it to her by saying that she only hung out with me because she felt sorry for me. Sometimes I wondered if that was the truth, but I didn’t like to think about it too much.

  I let Skylar go with a sigh and she stood. I watche
d her as she located Alex, then glanced down at me, her face scrunched up with displeasure. I knew what she said next wasn’t going to be good news. “She’s headed to the changing rooms.”

  “Let’s wait her out,” I proposed immediately.

  “Oh, come on.” She reached down to try to pull me to my feet, and when I resisted, she clarified, “She’s gone now. And she’ll just be in one of the rooms, anyway. It’ll be fine. You won’t even see each other.”

  We rushed to the changing rooms from there—or I rushed and Skylar hurried to keep up—and when we arrived and there was no sign of Alex, I ducked into the furthest room on the left, hoping I’d put some distance between myself and whatever room Alex had chosen, and then pulled Skylar in behind me and closed and locked the door.

  “What are you doing?” she asked, confused, and I pressed a finger to my lips.

  “Shh! Do you want her to hear us?” I hissed. Then I moved to hang up the tops and shorts we’d selected.

  “I’m not staying in here with you,” said Skylar, half-heartedly trying to keep her voice down for my benefit. She reached for the sliding lock on the door. “I’ll be outside. Just come out and model them for me.”

  “She’ll see me!” I pointed out in a whisper.

  “Not if you’re quick,” replied Skylar. She ducked outside, but not before turning and whispering back to me, “And some of those tops don’t need bras. I’d rather her see you than me see you topless.”

  “I have excellent boobs!” I hissed at her back as she closed the door. “Everyone says so!” I heard her let out a snort on the other side of the door and pictured her rolling her eyes to accompany it as I locked the door behind her.

  I changed into the first top and a pair of shorts I picked at random, then twisted and turned as I examined myself in the mirror. It was hard to tell if either suited me because they seemed to clash with each other.

  I left the room anyway after making sure the coast was clear for Alex. A few other women were milling about, entering and exiting changing rooms or modeling clothes for their waiting friends or mothers or sisters. Skylar was sitting on a bench nearby and was ready for me. Upon sight of me, she immediately shook her head and gave me a thumbs down.

  “Top or bottom?” I asked her.

  “Neither.”

  And back into the changing room I went. This went on for a few more minutes, with Skylar judging everything with comments like “definitely not,” “okay,” “meh,” or “good but not good enough,” until at last I came out in a navy blue top and a pair of black shorts, both of which she seemed to like.

  “Give me a spin,” she demanded, and when I glared at her, she gestured with a finger and added, “We have to be thorough.”

  “Is Chelsea gonna take one look at my ass in these jeans and tell me she never wants to see me again?” I wondered sarcastically, but I turned around for her anyway.

  “I’m just trying to make sure everything’s perfect,” she insisted. When I finished my spin, she nodded her approval. I raised an eyebrow at her expectantly, and she groaned and said, “Fine. Your ass looks good.”

  “So, this is the outfit? You’re sure? Final answer?” I pressed, just to ensure we wouldn’t be turning around near the store exit as soon as Skylar spotted something else she thought would look good on me. But before Skylar could answer, a changing room door opened near the other end of the hallway and out came Alex, back in the outfit she’d been wearing when we’d spotted her earlier. She left a few articles of clothing hanging on a rack in the hallway and kept a couple more in her hands, and then she turned to walk down the hall and her eyes fell directly to Skylar and me.

  “Alex!” Skylar called out brightly, giving her an enthusiastic wave. “Hey!”

  Alex glanced back and forth between us and paused by the exit. She seemed unsure how to address Skylar with me right next to her. “Hey, Skylar,” she finally said, but there wasn’t much tone to her voice.

  “What’d you get?” Skylar asked, gesturing to the clothes in her arms. Alex hesitated, and then took hold of the hangers attached to what turned out to be two tops. She held one out with each hand for us—or Skylar, I guess—to see. “Pretty,” Skylar complimented. “The red will look great on you.” Then Skylar looked to me, much to my horror, and asked, “Don’t you think, Zoey?”

  “I don’t—” Alex started to say, but I interrupted hastily, willing this conversation to end as fast as it could.

  “Yeah.”

  Alex paused again, studying me like she wasn’t sure how to take the compliment, as minimal as it had been. Then she said, “Whatever,” and started to leave.

  But Skylar wasn’t finished. “What do you think of Zoey’s outfit?” she asked. “I think it looks great.”

  Alex froze in place again while I silently cursed Skylar. I tried to keep my expression blank, and Alex’s was too as she glanced over at me, and then back to Skylar. “It’s fine,” she said at last. It sounded like the words pained her to say.

  Skylar turned back to me. “See? Told you you looked good.” Before I could glare at her, she was facing Alex again. “See you in Calc on Monday?”

  “Yeah.” Alex sounded a little angry at her now, though. “Bye, Skylar.”

  When she’d gone, I leaned over and punched Skylar in the arm.

  “Ow!”

  “Why would you do that?” I asked her, fuming.

  “What are you talking about?” she replied, nursing her bicep. “I was trying to help! Isn’t that what you wanted?”

  “I wanted you to keep putting in a good word for me, not force us to interact with each other,” I grumbled.

  “I didn’t force you to interact. She only spoke to me.”

  “You know what I mean.” I rolled my eyes and moved to reenter the changing room.

  “At least you know how good you look, now,” Skylar pointed out. “‘It’s fine’ in Alex-speak probably means you look hot as hell.”

  “That’s not what she meant,” I warned her.

  “I’m not saying it was. I’m just saying, with as much as she hates you, you know you must look good if even she can admit it.”

  “Can we change the subject?” I huffed, locking the door behind myself.

  Next, Skylar dragged me to another store to look for a present for Chelsea, as nothing in the last one seemed fitting. We spent an hour perusing more clothes, and then a few books that looked interesting, and finally, at my behest, found ourselves in the sports section, staring at a half-deflated soccer ball perched on a shelf.

  “She mentioned she likes soccer,” I explained.

  Skylar stood motionless next to me, staring. “We’re not buying her a flat soccer ball.” I opened my mouth. “Or a functioning one. You’re terrible at this.”

  “I don’t normally bribe girls for their affection,” I pointed out. “I just try to be passably attractive and then talk to them until they want to kiss me. It’s part of my charm.”

  “It’s a birthday gift; not a bribe!” Skylar shook her head. “We just need to think. It has to be something she’d like, it has to be at least a little personal, or like, intimate, and it can’t say ‘we’d make great friends.’”

  “So don’t get her a BFFs forever necklace. Got it.”

  Skylar’s eyes widened and she turned and grasped my shoulders. “That’s it! Jewelry!”

  I wrinkled my nose as she hurried away, then reluctantly followed her. “Does she even like jewelry?” I struggled to remember what Chelsea’d been wearing at the party. Had there been earrings? I could remember a conversation we’d had in middle school where we’d bonded briefly over never having had our ears pierced. Mine were pierced now. Were hers?

  We reached an aisle that housed relatively cheap earrings, necklaces, and bracelets, and Skylar browsed them all while I stared at a pair of rings that looked designed for two women. When I examined them closer, I saw that the words “sisters for life” were engraved in the metal.

  “Hey Skylar, I found somet
hing,” I declared, and she abandoned the bracelets to hurry over to me.

  “Those are pretty,” she said, “but I’m pretty sure you’d be coming on too strong.” She leaned in close to get a better look, saw the engraving, and then pulled back and gave me a tired look. “You’re not helping.”

  “Hey, lighten up,” I called after her as she went back to the bracelets. Then, feeling guilty and wanting to be helpful, I added, “Let’s not get earrings. Just in case her ears aren’t pierced.”

  “Who doesn’t have pierced ears?” Skylar asked, as though the idea was absurd.

  “I didn’t used to. Remember? I got them done sophomore year.”

  “Yeah, but I’m pretty sure Chelsea’s are pierced.”

  “One-hundred percent sure?”

  She sighed. “Alright. Fine. I like this anyway.” She lifted a box that looked like it might contain a wedding ring, but when she opened it, there was a silver charm bracelet inside. It was priced at thirty dollars.

  “Thirty dollars for a girl I’ve known two weeks?” I asked. “Should I get down on one knee to offer it to her, too?”

  “It’s pretty! Besides, we’ll split the cost. You can manage fifteen dollars, right?”

  “Yeah…” I eyed the bracelet uncertainly. “You think she’ll like it, though?”

  “I think she’ll love it.” Skylar closed the box and moved to leave the aisle, and that was that. I sighed but didn’t say anything else, and then followed her to the cash register.

  5

  Skylar didn’t come over Saturday night before the party. Instead, she had me regularly sending her pictures to make sure I was wearing the right outfit and that my makeup and hair looked good, and, strangely, it was my mom who offered to help me get ready instead.

  Back in middle school she did my hair before school when I requested it. I almost felt a little nostalgic as I sat on a stool in my bathroom while she circled me with a hair straightener.

  “Has Chelsea given you any idea of who might be at this party?” Mom wondered aloud. “Is her boyfriend coming?”