How I Found the Perfect Dress

by Maryrose Wood

  Mike smiled. “The thing is, I don’t want to just go through the motions with someone I’m not crazy about.”

  “That’s how I feel too,” I said. No! Disagree with him! Be unpleasant! What are you, on automatic boy pilot?

  “See? We have something in common already.” He wiped his wet hands on his jeans. “Bottom line, I’m kind of freaked out by the whole prom-date phenomenon. The junior prom was always kind of a joke, you know? But this year it’s so serious, with the tuxes and the dresses and everything. . . .”

  Mrs. Blainsvoort, I thought grimly. This is all her fault.

  Mike was looking at me with those warm, chocolate-brown eyes. “The fact that you’re the only girl at school who’s not making a huge deal out of this just makes me feel really comfortable asking you.” The melting ice water was dripping down my forearm, but I couldn’t bring myself to move.

  “Plus you’re cool,” Mike went on, “and it would be fun to dance and hang out with you and all our pals. So why don’t we go together, as friends, and have a good time? No pressure. Okay?”

  No pressure, right. But I could imagine it: Supercute Mike would look so handsome in a tux, and I would be feeling like pretty hot stuff myself in that knockout dress, and there would be couples, couples, couples everywhere, slow dancing under the soft lights and stealing kisses when the chaperones weren’t looking. . . .

  Wouldn’t it be the absolute definition of pathetic to sit there saying, No no no, we’re just friends all night long? Wouldn’t it be far better, or at least easier, to sit home on my birthday, missing Colin and eating junk food and watching movies with Tammy, and pretend the junior prom was not happening at all?

  There was no sign of ice in my hand anymore, just a cold puddle that was starting to overflow. I dashed to the sink and spread the fingers of my cupped hand, letting the water trickle down the drain.

  “I’ll think about it,” I said.

  “Great.” Then he kissed me on the cheek, just casually, and left, and I thought, No no no.

  Do not start to glimmer, Mike Fitch. Do not even go there.

  But maybe it was already too late.

  sixteen

  thanks to the sportshoe shop and a dip into mЧ saved allowance, I had a nice new pair of Converse high tops to trade Colin for his old Nikes.

  But when to make the swap? Saturday was the day of the robot competition, and Sunday—too soon!—Colin was heading back to Ireland. Friday after school I had to bring the gnome sisters for a trial double date with Jolly Dan and the elf. I planned to deliver Colin’s old sneakers to Jolly Dan then too, assuming, of course, that the date worked out and Jolly Dan held up his end of the bargain. Leprechauns were known to be tricky about stuff like that.

  So today, Thursday, was not only the best but the only day to nab Colin’s shoes. Mom was working as usual, and since my dad finally had a job interview, I was stuck babysit-ting Tammy after school.

  Perfect, I thought. Tammy would be my secret, irresistible, Colin-attracting weapon.

  “Here,” I said to her, as I dialed his number. “Tell him you need an emergency soccer coaching for your big game tomorrow.”

  Tammy had all her second-grade homework worksheets scattered on the couch around her, to conceal the fact that her eyes were glued to the television. “I don’t feel like playing soccer,” she said, staring at the cartoon. “I feel like watching SpongeBob.”

  I stood directly in front of the TV, blocking her view. “Get him over here. Cry if you have to,” I said, handing her the phone. “You can do it, Tam. You know how to whine and beg and get what you want better than anyone I know.”

  “Wow, thank you, Morgan!” Tammy was so pleased by the compliment she didn’t even protest about missing her show. “You’re good at stuff too!”

  She put the phone to her ear and waited for him to answer. “Hello, Colin!” she said, in her most adorable little girl voice. “This is your friend Tammy Rawlinson speaking. . . .”

  Colin showed Up an hour later, frazzled and pale, but putty in the hands of a cute, manipulative kid. Just as I’d hoped, he kicked off his Nikes and put on his soccer cleats before heading out into the yard. Reluctantly Tammy changed into her soccer clothes too and went outside, where she promptly starting chasing imaginary fireflies.

  I could tell this soccer practice was not going to last long, so I didn’t waste any time. As soon as Colin was distracted I made the switch, putting out the new Cons I’d bought and hiding his Nikes in the back of my closet. Note to self, I thought. Buy Febreze and spray closet liberally.

  “What’s up with Baby Beckham?” Colin wheezed, after ten minutes of trying to get Tammy to play. “I thought she was keen to learn how to blast through the goalkeeper’s defenses.”

  “She is,” I assured him. “She’ll focus in a minute. She’s been in school all day; she needs to unwind.”

  He shrugged and turned back to Tammy, now digging for worms in a garden bed. “Rawlinson,” he said sternly, the soccer ball tucked under his arm, “this is yer coach speakin’. I’ve got to get back to HQ, there’s a half-painted thingamabub in the lab, waiting for its final conversion into the bionic supergnome that’ll win fame and fortune for yours truly. So let’s play some football and call it a night, eh?”

  “Not now,” Tammy said, poking around in the mud with a stick. “I almost got a worm.”

  Colin dropped the ball on the ground. “What about the big game tomorrow?”

  “Oh, you know,” Tammy said dreamily. She dropped the stick and started to skip in circles on the grass. “It’s just a game.”

  Meanwhile, I occupied myself by looking in on the gnomes. The card-playing gnomes were still playing, and the ale-swilling gnomes were still swilling, though I could swear the mugs were only half as full as the last time I’d checked.

  Then I took a peek at Tux and Taffy, beneath the raspberry bush. Taffy was facing the shrub, with her back turned toward Tux.

  “Try to be friendly, now,” I said, turning her around. She didn’t answer, which was a good thing because just then Colin came running up to me. He looked very unhappy.

  “Where are me trainers?” He held the new high tops in one hand.

  “Surprise!” I said weakly. “I got you new ones.”

  “But I don’t want new trainers.” I’d hardly ever seen Colin get angry before. “I want me old Nikes.”

  “In this country we call them sneakers,” I tried to joke. “And you needed new ones. They were all worn out.”

  “Morgan,” he said slowly. “The motherly gesture is much appreciated, but those are me lucky trainers, and between now and Sunday I need all the luck I can get. If I win this competition it’ll partly make up for all the—well, whatever it is that’s going on with me. So if I could just have me old shoes back? Please?”

  “Oh, no!” I lied, feeling sick. “I threw them out already.”

  As if to assist me in my fib, a Town of East Norwich sanitation truck drove down the street, hungrily munching its contents into pulp.

  Colin looked ready to punch something, or cry, but instead he walked over to where Tammy had left the soccer ball and gave it a furious kick. It sailed into the neighbor’s yard.

  “Sorry,” he muttered. “I’m so tired I can’t think straight. I’d better get back to school, then.” He wiped his forehead with the hem of his T-shirt. “Luck being no substitute for effort, as me grandpap would say.”

  “I’m sorry,” I blurted. “Sorry about Tammy. Sorry about the shoes.”

  “Forget it.” He sounded so weary. “That bit about the math project, that was all bollocks, then?”

  “Half bollocks. I did have math homework. I’m sorry about that too.” Now I was the one who was ready to cry. “I wanted to surprise you.”

  “I’m sick of surprises, and that’s the bloody truth.” He took a small square envelope out of his pocket and held it out to me. “Here’s the latest, by the way. I’m not opening them anymore.”

  I took the envel
ope. “Don’t you want to know what it says?”

  “At the moment, all I want is an explanation. And me lucky trainers back. And a good night’s sleep.” Colin looked away. “And to go home, frankly.”

  By home, of course, he meant Ireland, a wide ocean away from me, my crazy family, my unwelcome gifts and my annoying half-truths.

  I shoved the envelope in my pocket, too upset to even care what it said. Just wait, I wanted to call after him as he strode off in the direction of the bus stop. Those old sneakers are about to bring you the best luck you’ve ever had. But he was already gone.

  the first offiCial Warning from the lawn police arrived that evening.

  “Look at this,” my mom said, the letter from the block association clutched in her hand. “It says if you don’t get rid of those things we are going to be fined, and that’s the last thing we need right now.”

  “The interview went well.” It was after dinner. Dad had removed his tie but he was still wearing his dress shirt and suit trousers. I guess he was so glad to have an excuse to put on work clothes he didn’t want to take them off. “Stop worrying about money! I’ll have a new job before you know it.”

  “That has nothing to do with this, Daniel,” Mom said, waving the letter around. “This is about you and your weird collection of eyesores—”

  “You are overstressed,” my dad announced, “because you’re working too much. That’s why you’re overreacting.”

  “I’m working too much?” Mom’s face went nearly white. “You’ve been out of work for four months—”

  “It’s not four—”

  “Exactly four months,” she went on, “and then you dare criticize me for working too much? Are you jealous? Is that what this is about? Are you trying to sabotage the business that I’ve built up so diligently, which by the way is the only thing paying our bills at the moment?”

  “Sabotage?” my dad exclaimed. “Where the hell—excuse me—where the heck is that coming from?”

  “I’m a professional declutterer!” Mom wailed in a way that was positively Tammy-like. “I get rid of people’s junk and organize what’s left! What does it do to my credibility to have these horrible, horrible tchotchkes all over my own lawn?”

  “What’s ‘tchotchkes’?” asked Tammy, in a frightened voice. “Is it a bad word?”

  “Yes! Yes!” Mom sputtered. “It’s the worst word in the universe! It’s what your daddy loves better than me!”

  Then Mom started to cry.

  Not. Good.

  it took me a long time to Convince tammЧ that Dad wasn’t having an affair with a Miss Tchotchkes, though the idea of such a person—I imagined a busty secretary whose desk was buried in Precious Moments figurines and plastic souvenir snow globes—would have been pretty funny on a happier day. My parents, without even asking if I would babysit for the evening after I’d already watched Tammy all afternoon, had grabbed their coats, climbed into Dad’s car and driven off. Whether it was to an all-night lawyer’s office to file for divorce or a roadside motel to kiss and make up, I had no idea.

  For once, Tammy didn’t freak out under stress—I guess she figured Mom and Dad had that covered—so I spent the rest of the evening listening to her jabber about the stunt Marcus pulled during independent reading while the teacher wasn’t looking (it involved boogers, naturally) and some silly Saint Patrick’s Day project her class would be doing over the weekend.

  “I tried to tell Miss Wallace that leprechauns are controversial,” Tammy said, as I tucked her in bed. “But she doesn’t listen to me.”

  “She’ll figure it out someday. Sweet dreams, brat.” Tammy stuck out her tongue at me and waggled it, just like Gene Simmons from Kiss, and promptly rolled over to sleep.

  With Tammy in bed and my parents in parts unknown, I finally worked up the nerve to open the envelope Colin had given me. My hands were shaking as I tore the flap—not because I was worried about what was inside; I knew it was probably just more faery mischief—but at the memory of how truly pissed off at me Colin had been. I wondered if things could ever be the way they used to be between us. At the moment, I doubted it.

  Still, I thought, I have to do what it takes to save him. Even if it means he never speaks to me again.

  Inside the envelope was a printed invitation, which I quickly scanned. The first words I saw were “East Norwich Country Club.”

  It felt like my heart was trying to twist itself into a pretzel. Had I been a complete idiot? Had Colin planned to ask me to the junior prom all along? Had he changed his return ticket to Ireland, just to surprise me? And then I’d stupidly blown it by stealing his shoes and not telling him the truth about what was really going on, until now he hated me forever?

  I calmed myself down and looked more closely at the invitation. I knew that the real junior prom tickets were black ink on thin cardboard, in keeping with Mrs. Blainsvoort’s tightfisted budget. But this was a foil-stamped invitation in gold ink on heavy green card stock, and the edges were trimmed with matching velvet ribbon. It read:YOU ARE CORDIALLY INVITED TO

  The Spring Faery Ball

  Incredibly festive attire, please!

  Thursday, March 20th,

  Beginning at seven o’clock

  and ending maybe never!

  at

  the East Norwich Country Club

  On that big road with all the cars

  (enter by the lobby fountain)

  Thursday night at the East Norwich Country Club? That was the same time, same place as the East Norwich High School junior prom.

  Good thing I bought a dress, I thought. Because if everything works out with Jolly Dan, I’ll be dancing with Colin on prom night after all.

  seventeen

  When i Woke Up fridaЧ morning, the gnomes Were gone.

  I discovered this when I stepped outside to do a weather check before making my final outfit decision for the day. Kind of like the groundhog, I guess.

  I stood on the front steps, barefoot in pajamas, and there they were—or weren’t. No gnomes. Just a nice, well-groomed, tchotchke-free suburban lawn. Something the neighbors could be proud of. You could practically feel the property values rising.

  Or maybe that was terror I felt rising, crawling up my spine like a million ants in search of a picnic.

  I ran all over the yard, looking behind shrubs and under bushes. No gnomes.

  “Glendryn? Drenwyn?” Nothing.

  I checked the garage, my bare feet leaving wet prints on the concrete floor. There were no fekkin’ gnomes, anywhere.

  No wonder I hadn’t heard any yelling when my parents got up this morning. Maybe I should have been glad that my dad had caved in and my parents’ marriage was saved, but those two gnome girls had a double date with destiny, and if they didn’t show up my whole plan was ruined. All I could think of was the rats . . . rats forced to endure prolonged sleep deprivation exhibited disoriented behavior, weight loss and eventually death. . . .

  Despite my hysteria, Dad refused to answer a single question until he and I were alone in the car, on the way to school. Even then he was evasive.

  “The one-mile rule,” he muttered. “Wait until we’re a mile from the house.”

  “Dad, please,” I begged. “I just want to know where they are. You didn’t”—I could barely say it—“you didn’t bring them to the dump, did you?”

  My dad’s eyes darted around like the lying weasel he apparently was. He watched the odometer, and I held my breath. “That’s what I told your mother,” he said, as the mile clicked over. “But I didn’t. I couldn’t.”

  “Oh thank God!” I let myself start breathing again. “Where are they?”

  He drove another half-mile before he spoke. “Fine,” he said, through a clenched jaw. “But you have to swear you won’t tell your mother, Morgan! I’m so serious. If you rat me out I will not pay for your college education, not one penny. Got it?”

  “Got it.”

  “Or your wedding.”

  Like I could
ever get married. If I couldn’t deliver those gnome girls to their date with Jolly Dan, I’d have to join a convent or something.

  “I swear, Dad! Just tell me!”

  “You know the ministorage place, near the train station?”

  “Yes.”

  “They open at five a.m.” His voice was a grim monotone, like a character in a spy movie. “I brought the gnomes there this morning. I begged the guy to let me pay cash for the room so your mother wouldn’t see it on the AmEx bill.”

  Colin’s old sneakers were in a shoebox wrapped in a plastic, stink-proof bag inside my backpack. I knew what I had to do.

  “Dad, I need the key.”

  “What key?”

  “To the ministorage. Please. I just need it today and then I’ll give it back.”

  “Why do you need the key?”

  “I can’t tell you,” I said, with the conviction that comes from speaking the pure truth in a moment of total desperation. “Because it’s a secret, the kind of secret I can never tell, and I never will—”

  “Morgan, what are you talking about—”

  “—just the same way I will never break the promise I just made to you about not telling Mom that you lied to her about trashing the gnomes. Never. I swear.”

  Whew. Dad and I were deeply into mutual-blackmail territory now. But we seemed to understand each other.

  “It’s room one-one-one-four.” He reached into his shirt pocket and tossed me the key. “We won’t speak of this again.” And then he stared straight ahead and drove me to school like nothing had happened.

  mЧ locker door wouldn’t Close after i Crammed in the shoebox with Colin’s Nikes, so I stood there trying to rearrange all my textbooks and gym clothes before the home-room bell rang. Sarah’s locker was two down from mine, and she watched me struggle. “I heard you got an invitation,” she said.

  My heart skipped a beat—how does she know about the Spring Faery Ball?—but then I realized she was talking about Mike.