by Sandy Hall
As one song moved into the next, Lizzie heard a crack and a whoosh from somewhere at the perimeter of the dance floor. She tried to stand on her tiptoes to see over the heads of the people around her, but it was no use.
Someone screamed, which seemed odd to Lizzie, that whatever was happening hadn’t made more people scream. Lizzie spun in a quick circle but couldn’t locate where the sound was coming from.
But then she saw it. There was water gushing from every direction in multiple places along one wall. It was like geysers had spouted from behind the wall and ceiling, and it was raining on one half of the room.
Lizzie ran to their table where she’d left the clutch her mom had lent her with her precious phone inside. It could not drown; that would be one more terrible thing in a night of terrible things.
Madison ran after her, skidding and slipping on the wide legs of her jumpsuit and nearly pulling them both down in a heap. Lizzie grabbed her clutch from the table. It had only gotten dripped on by that point, and she shoved it down the front of her dress just as another geyser broke above her.
This time she did slip, and she and Madison both ended up in a heap on the soaked carpet.
“Did you get your phone?” Madison asked, almost having to yell over the sound of rushing water.
“Yes!” Lizzie said, pointing at her boobs. “Did you?”
Madison shook her head. “It’s under the table! I’m gonna crawl over.”
Lizzie gave her friend a thumbs-up and watched as Madison crawled over to the table and carefully extracted her purse from underneath. She stood quickly and nearly fell again as she stumbled back to dry land.
Lizzie grabbed Madison’s hand and ran for the door with the rest of the crowd, unable to stop laughing even though they were both soaking wet.
After avoiding her phone for hours, Lizzie finally checked it again as she and Madison were being evacuated from the hotel.
She had a missed text from Jacinta.
Lizzie stared at the phone.
The text was from over an hour ago.
What on earth kind of surprise could Jacinta have for Lizzie? What was going on?
Lizzie prayed that Jacinta would check her texts sooner than Lizzie had.
The three little dots that indicated someone was writing a message popped up and then went away, popped up and went away.
And then nothing. Jacinta didn’t say anything else.
Lizzie showed Madison the texts, and they started looking for Jacinta in the parking lot. They were going to find her.
“Ugh, couldn’t she drop a pin or something?” Madison asked. But it was hard to see among the crowd of people being evacuated from the hotel.
And then, to make everything a little more dramatic, the power went out.
“We should split up,” Lizzie said, flicking on the flashlight on her phone.
“Yeah, I should probably try to find Otis and Luke, too,” Madison said, squinting into the semidarkness around them and walking toward the evacuating crowd.
Lizzie looked back toward the hotel entrance and followed the instructions that Jacinta had texted, walking a perfectly straight line through the parking lot.
Headlights flashed up ahead.
And in front of them stood a boy in perfect silhouette.
Cameron
Cameron stood in front of Jacinta’s car and watched the mass of people pour from every set of doors of the hotel. They came from emergency exits, side entrances, and the revolving door at the front of the hotel. There was no way to know which direction Laptop Girl would come from.
“Do you see her?” Cameron asked Jacinta.
She shook her head.
“Can you text her and ask which direction she’s coming from?”
If only he could text her himself. If only he could walk into the crowd and find her, but Jacinta had this whole grand reveal planned.
“I did. She didn’t respond. It’s probably better to stay in one place rather than all of us getting lost in the crowd,” she said, as if able to read his thoughts.
Jacinta slipped off her shoes and shimmied onto the roof of her car to get a better look.
“You probably shouldn’t stand up there,” Cameron said. “You might dent it. And I don’t mean that as a dig. Car roofs should not be stood on.”
“Excellent point,” she said, and then the power went out in the hotel and the parking lot around them.
The streetlight above them flipped off, making it all the more difficult to find anyone, or anything. Jacinta slipped her keys into the ignition and put her headlights on, but all that did was make Cameron feel completely blind.
“Maybe if you would tell me who she is, I’d have a better chance of actually finding her.”
“I told her where we were. I’m sure she’s coming.”
Couples, groups, and families continued to pour from the hotel exits.
“She’ll never find us,” Cameron muttered.
“Not with that attitude. I’ll try to text better instructions.”
Before Jacinta could text again, a girl was standing there in her dripping wet prom dress, her shoes in her hands, and her hair falling in her face. She had a lime green ribbon around her neck.
Cameron smiled because he didn’t know what else to do. He wasn’t even sure she could see him in the brightness of the headlights.
The girl held a hand up to her face. “Jacinta, could you turn off the headlights?”
“Oh god, yeah,” Jacinta said, pulling her key from the ignition. “Sorry about that.”
“Hey, Cameron,” Lizzie said, a smile lighting up her face even in the dark parking lot.
“Hey, Lizzie.” Cameron felt shyer than he would have expected. But she knew who he was and didn’t run away screaming. That could only bode well for him.
Lizzie stepped up to Cameron. “So, you’re Mystery Boy.”
“If that’s what you call me.” His face was growing warm for no particular reason. “I called you Laptop Girl.”
“We’re, like, generic dollar-store superheroes.”
Cameron laughed, a little maniacally thanks to his nerves.
“Like what the heck would Laptop Girl’s powers even be? I can leap over laptops in a single bound?”
Cameron shrugged. “Apparently I solve mysteries.” He swallowed and tried to ignore the way his heart was thumping in his chest.
“That’s cooler than jumping over laptops.” She looked at him from head to toe. “I like your lime green shirt.”
He looked down at it. “The guy at the tuxedo place called it chartreuse.”
“Yeah, that’s the same thing.”
“I like your, um, thing,” he said, reaching up to touch the ribbon at her neck, then pulling his hand away quickly, still unsure of himself.
“Thanks,” she said, grinning and touching the same spot he had.
“Why are you so wet?” he asked at the same time she said, “Why didn’t you come into the dance?”
“I’m going for a walk,” Jacinta said, taking off in the direction that Lizzie just came from. She locked the doors to her car with a surprising honk that made both Lizzie and Cameron jump.
“I didn’t go into the dance because I ran late at work and Jacinta happened to come in and she yelled at me and drove me here and said we should wait for you out in the parking lot so, now we’re here.”
“Like every pipe in the entire ballroom burst, and I had to rush into the water to get my purse and my phone,” she said, pulling a small black bag out of the top of her dress.
“Wow, that was like magic,” he said. “Are you okay? From the harrowing experience?”
“Yeah.” She narrowed her eyes at him. “I think I’ll recover.”
“So,” he said.
“What do we do now?” Lizzie asked.
“Um. Well. As it turns out”—he stumbled over his words and then cleared his throat—“Jacinta actually made plans for us. If you’re interested.”
“I think I am,” Li
zzie said, a smile spreading across her face.
He smiled back. Maybe this would work out after all.
Chapter 32
Otis
Ms. Huang and Ms. Bishop were quickly ushering the students into the corner of the parking lot. There was still technically another hour and a half left of the dance, but that didn’t seem particularly important at the moment. Especially now that the power had gone out, it seemed like the prom was effectively over.
As the students stood in the parking lot, Ms. Huang tried to take a head count.
“Why?” Madison asked, coming from the other direction. “In case someone is drowning in there? Wouldn’t you notice something like that?”
Madison, Otis, and Luke stood in a group, unsure what to do.
“Where’s Lizzie?” Otis asked, but before Madison could answer a firefighter walked past and Luke got his attention.
“Sir, excuse me, I’m sorry to interrupt your work, but my boyfriend and I smelled gas or something right before the pipe burst.”
“Yeah,” Otis chimed in, not having anything to add but wanting to support Luke’s assertion.
The firefighter nodded. “Thanks for the information.”
Otis nearly swooned. There was something about firefighters.
As the firefighter walked away, Jacinta approached their little group.
“Hey, I don’t know if you guys heard, but I’m having a party,” she said. “Bring whoever. Everyone’s invited.”
“Your mom’s cool with having so many people over?” Otis asked.
“Well, I was having a couple people anyway. And then I called her after the whole flood thing to see if I could have more people over.” Jacinta shrugged. “I don’t know if she realizes just how many I mean this time. But anyway. Bring whoever. I’m going to go see who else is looking for somewhere to go.”
After she walked away, Luke turned to Otis.
This was the moment. The deciding moment, where Otis took door number one, a hotel room, or door number two, being a disappointing boyfriend.
He’d felt closer to Luke at the prom than he ever had, nearly saying I love you and being so physically close on the dance floor.
Maybe he could explain to Luke when they were alone what all his worries were about. Luke would listen. Luke loved him.
Before Otis could say anything, Luke took the reins.
“Do you maybe want to…” He paused, clearing his throat.
“If you still do,” Otis said before he could finish, feeling more confident in this decision by the second.
“We kind of have a hotel room,” Luke said, taking Otis’s hand and turning to Madison.
“Ohhh, right. I remember hearing something about that. I also remember being invited. But I’ll allow you to go alone together. If that’s what you want,” Madison said.
Otis raised an eyebrow at Luke and shook his head in faux exasperation.
“I can’t believe you invited Madison to our post-prom hotel room!” Maybe this wasn’t the intimate situation that Otis had been envisioning and worrying about all these weeks.
“Only when it seemed like you weren’t going to make it to prom! It was too late to cancel the room.”
“Well,” Otis said. “Sure you can still come if you want to. Obviously.”
“Guys!” Madison yelled. “I’m joking. I’m going to Jacinta’s. You need some alone time. Have fun, boys. Be careful. Don’t do anything I wouldn’t do. All that jizz. I mean jazz!”
Otis’s eyes went wide and he shook his head at Madison.
She cleared her throat and stifled a laugh. “But you just have to wait a hot second before running off. Because Lizzie and I both have stuff in your car.”
Madison followed them over to grab her and Lizzie’s things.
“Do you want us to wait until you find her?” Luke asked.
“Definitely not,” Madison said. “There’s literally a hundred people here who could drive me to Jacinta’s. I’m not even a little worried.”
Otis and Luke looked at each other.
“Go!” Madison insisted.
And who were they to disagree?
Paisley
Playing video games back at Henry’s house was much more Paisley’s speed. Though there was a feeling that she couldn’t quite shake, like she should have socialized more at the prom.
Being home was definitely more Henry’s speed, too. He’d calmed way down after the whole bathroom thing, but it took until he was out of his tuxedo for him to shake off that last edge of anxiety.
“This is so much more comfortable than my dress,” Paisley said, gesturing at her T-shirt. She’d changed into one of her It’s not you, it’s prom T-shirts as soon as they’d gotten to Henry’s.
Before Henry could respond, his mom came in the room holding her phone. “Did you hear about what happened at the prom?”
Henry and Paisley looked at each other and shook their heads.
Henry’s mom gave them the brief version and then continued. “Jacinta’s mom called to tell me what happened and to say that she hoped you were okay. I said you’ve been home for an hour. She said you should come over and join the party.”
“Um, no,” Henry said. “No thanks.”
“Suit yourself,” Henry’s mom said with a shrug as she turned and left the room.
“Dude,” Paisley said. “What is your problem?”
“We can’t go. That’s a pity invite from Jacinta’s mom to my mom. It has nothing to do with Jacinta or me or you. They do this all the time. Jacinta and I have this unspoken agreement to not let our moms interfere.”
Paisley looked at him.
“Don’t give me that look,” he said.
That just made her look at him harder.
“What?”
“We have to go,” she said. “Come on. Turn this crap off. We have things to do.”
“Nah, not really,” Henry said.
“Come on, Henry.”
“I thought you hate everyone.”
Paisley shrugged. “Turns out I made some snap judgments. Turns out I might miss people. Maybe they’re all not terrible.”
“Oh. You mean like Amelia?”
“No, she’s terrible.”
“I mean that you talked to her about me.”
“Oh right, right. I did that. But she yelled at me to never tell you. I can’t believe she brought it up. That’s a little bit two-faced, come to think of it.”
“See? People are the worst. You’re right to be wary of them.”
Paisley thought about that for a second. “They are. They can be. But I bet Amelia will not be at Jacinta’s house, and I think we should go. And maybe prom wasn’t as terrible as I thought, and I kind of want to have one last hurrah with a bunch of crazy, maybe slightly drunk, soaking-wet people who I might not ever see again after graduation.”
Paisley looked at her friend and did her best to read his mind. But then she looked away. Maybe she didn’t really want to go too deep into the mind of an eighteen-year-old boy. Even if that boy was Henry.
“Fine,” he said without any further prodding. “But this feels pathetic. Going to a party thrown by someone only because their mom invited us.”
“You’re not pathetic. You’re with me.”
Henry rolled his eyes. “My mom will force us to take something with us, like soda or Rice Krispies Treats, and we’ll look dumb.”
“I won’t look dumb. I never look dumb. And I love Rice Krispies Treats.”
He crossed his arms.
“This is pretty much our last chance to hang out with everyone like this. Let’s not skip it.”
“Yeah, but there’s still the problem that her mom invited me through my mom. Jacinta didn’t invite us.”
His phone pinged at that moment. He looked at it.
“It’s a text from Jacinta.”
“Oh, that’s weird.”
“Kind of feels like a sign,” Henry said.
“Well, don’t just sit there staring at it
, read the message.”
He unlocked his phone. He was taking for-freaking-ever, so Paisley lunged at him and grabbed it.
“Hey, what are you up to?” Paisley read, leaning away from Henry as he ineffectively tried to grab his phone back. “Everyone is coming over to my house. You should, too. I think we might go swimming if it’s not too cold. Bring Paisley, too!”
Paisley swatted Henry’s hand away. “Totally. Can’t wait,” she texted back, saying the words out loud. “And send.”
Henry buried his face in his hands. “This is the worst!”
“It’s not. I promise it’s not. This is the best.”
“Do I really have to go?”
“Well, no. You don’t. I just think it’s good to push your boundaries sometimes. And that you might have fun. Jacinta’s house shouldn’t be too far out of your comfort zone. And I’ll be there.”
“It’s still the worst,” Henry said.
“It really isn’t. Now stop being dramatic, go get your bathing suit, take me home to get mine, and let’s get our asses over to Jacinta’s house.”
“Fine,” Henry grumbled. He pretty much grumbled the entire way there.
“This is going to be fun. I promise,” Paisley said, patting him on the back while also dragging him in the direction of the Ramoses’ backyard. She had super strength when she needed it. It came in handy when she had to force Henry to do things he didn’t want to do.
The yard was already pretty crowded. At least half their class was there. Paisley was impressed.
“Cam’s here,” he said, surprised.
“You should talk to him.”
“Maybe.”
“Well, talk to someone,” Paisley said. “Besides me. That’s your assignment for the evening.”
“Okay. I will talk to Cam. And I will talk to…” He paused, looking around the yard. “Jacinta, obviously. And then I’m allowed to leave.”
“That’s entirely fair.” Paisley extended her hand to shake on it, and Henry took it, giving one firm pump.
And with that, she left him to fend for himself. Though she did check on him a few times. He seemed to actually be having a good time.
Paisley talked to everyone at the party, one by one. People that she hadn’t talked to in years. People she hadn’t even wanted to talk to in years. She got an unexpected number of compliments on her It’s not you, it’s prom shirt.
