Thwonk

by Joan Bauer

  I took a deep breath.

  Peter stammered that I was beautiful.

  Mom admired her handiwork.

  I did a little twirl and grinned.

  Peter looked fabulous—it’s amazing what a tux can do for a bozo. He was holding a red-and-white rose corsage that was, without a doubt, the most gorgeous corsage I’d ever seen. He tried to pin it on me and nicked my skin. He acted as though he’d bludgeoned me, he was so upset, and Mom and Dad looked at each other strangely when he kept repeating that he would never, ever do anything to hurt me…

  I whispered, “Don’t talk,” got the corsage in place, and pricked my finger.

  Dad had his camera and was taking pictures of us. It was good to see him with it again—he hadn’t held a camera in ages. I really hate having my picture taken, most photographers do, but it was important to Dad, who was in heavy combat against the phantoms of the past, so I played along and posed like I was the happiest person on the planet. Mom leaned against the grandfather clock in the hall, taking it all in. I could tell she didn’t buy it. Dad put his camera down and looked at me nervously, like all fathers do when their teenage daughters are dressed to kill and can pass for twenty-five-year-old women.

  “Boy, those nails of yours sure are red,” he muttered.

  Mom tucked her arm in his to keep him still.

  Peter promised my parents that he would take excellent care of me, he would never leave my side, not for a minute. When you’ve found the girl of your dreams, he said, the girl who fulfills your every hope and desire, you’re sure not going to be a jerk and let her out of your sight. Mom and Dad listened, their smiles growing thin. Peter said he had written a poem about me and would everyone like to hear it?

  I said, “Gee, this has been nice,” and yanked him out the door into the waiting white stretch limo and the frozen tundra of high-school memories.

  CHAPTER FOURTEEN

  The limo pulled up to the front of Ben Franklin High and came to a leisurely stop to make sure everyone drinking beer in the parking lot was paying attention. A limo had never been seen at the King of Hearts Dance to my knowledge—limos were reserved for proms—but when you are impending royalty, you do these things as a matter of course.

  The driver opened the door as a dutiful coachman and Peter bounded out to help me. Getting out of a car gracefully has never been my strong suit, especially in heels, and I scooted closer to the door so I wouldn’t have to lunge, swung my legs around, and tottered up to victory. Peter said “Thank you, my good man” to the driver, which was really lame, but not as lame as what he did next—picking me up, that is—carrying me over an ice puddle so I wouldn’t get my shoes wet. I was flailing my arms to break free when I heard Lisa Shooty ask Al Costanzo how come he never carried her over puddles? I saw Heidi Morganthaller glare at Jeff Dintsman, who apparently didn’t carry her either. I told Peter he could put me down and smiled like a southern belle who had just lost the family estate and planned to keep the news to herself.

  He lowered me gently like I was a rare, delicate thing. I squared my sexy shoulders, took Peter’s hand, and swept inside the Student Center doors, redefining majestic.

  I sucked in my breath at the sight: the Student Center had been transformed into unparalleled Valentine splendor.

  Hundreds of hearts twinkled, iridescent lights shone from tables, walls, and chairs. Sparkling students floated among crepe paper and lace. Scads of red, pink, and white helium balloons decorated the stage. Giant King of Hearts playing cards surrounded the dance floor. A spiral white staircase rose directly to the left of the sainted statue of Big Ben himself, who was clad in a makeshift equivalent of Valentine boxer shorts. The banner above the stage read, WHEN TWO HEARTS BEAT AS ONE…Everyone looked supreme. There were more girls wearing red dresses than anything, but my dress was the reddest.

  Peter took my arm and led me through the WHEN TWO HEARTS BEAT AS ONE archway that was shaped like the inside of a real heart and made lub-dub noises when Roger Dexter, president of the Electronics Club, pushed the control button and kicked the side. Peter had to duck down to get through the heart, but I didn’t. It was just my size. Everything tonight was just for me!

  We paraded down the royal-red carpet and stepped onto the dance floor, bathed in low, earthy light. I threw back my shoulders and tossed out my hair.

  Ta da!

  I pranced past Robbie Oldsberg, Connecticut’s premier rodent, and his mousy date. I looked Julia Hart straight in her baby-blue eyes and she looked away first. I shouted hi to Trish as she hurried by in pink silk with Tucker, her face flushed with love. Tucker looked like he would rather be having brain surgery than be at a school dance. Trish said hi back flatly so I’d know she was still ripped.

  “You look great,” I muttered as she rounded the buffet table.

  “You look great,” Peter whispered to me.

  A spotlight illuminated the stage. Popularity surged through my veins. Gary Quark, resplendent in a lime-green tux, announced Heather and the Heartbeats, who danced out in glittering dresses and mile-high hair. Heather asked everyone if we were ready to have a really good time.

  “Yes!” we shouted.

  Were we ready to celebrate Valentine’s Day like no school had ever celebrated it before?

  “Yes!” we hollered.

  Were we ready—Heather checked the banner—to have our hearts beat as one?

  “Yes!” we answered unequivocally.

  I could feel the magic tingling in my toes. I could feel the silk of my killer red dress hugging me in all the right places. I could feel Peter’s glazed eyes staring at me.

  “I don’t think I can keep my feelings inside,” he protested.

  “Swallow them!”

  He gulped.

  Heather shouted, “Let’s do it!” as the big, glittering Valentine heart above the dance floor began to twirl. The band broke into pure, unadulterated rock and roll, and the boogying began.

  Most guys are rotten dancers, but not Peter. We sensed each other’s moves, twisted at the same pace. My skirt was twirling, my hair was flying, and most importantly, Peter wasn’t talking. Rays of stardom bounced off the sequins on my killer red shoes, announcing to the world that A. J. McCreary had finally arrived!

  We danced three fast dances without a break, and I wasn’t even breathing hard when Heather crooned a syrupy ballad and we fell into our partner’s arms, shuffling and swaying down to slow dancing. Peter draped himself around me like a hormone-drenched gorilla and I tried to look appropriately lost in the moment. All around us love-soaked couples clutched each other in massive emoting. I wanted to be emoting too, but when you’re Queen of the Hop you can’t have everything.

  Peter was nuzzling very close, making breathing difficult. He was about to whisper something grimly devoted when Heather called for a line dance. Everyone made room for Peter and me to lead. Up to the front we ran, raising our hands, shimmying down. Kids jumped in behind us unafraid, kids I’d never figured would join a line dance, but everyone was a hoofer tonight, except for Trish and Tucker. It makes you appreciate the depth of the teenage soul. It makes you realize how we’re all so much more than we appear in the cafeteria. I wanted to shout that as their leader, I would not fail them. I knew what it was like to be a shadow in the Student Center and I wouldn’t forget from whence I had come. I twirled the line into a unified circle symbolizing the depth of the hormonal experience that we all shared. We were churning on the downbeat, the chaperons were clapping from the sidelines, everything twirled round and round in a great rush of Valentine splendor. The line broke left and we faced the stage, clapping and shouting as the Heartbeats sang “oo wa oo” on the backup with profound meaning. Jody Barnabo was taking photographs; it was strange to be in the center of the action instead of on the sidelines photographing it. I jumped left, right, and gave her all my best expressions. That’s when Peter stopped dead in his tracks, grinned at me maniacally, and shouted to the air like a supreme loon:

  “Isn’t sh
e great?”

  I can’t describe the horror.

  “I mean,” he continued to the dancing crowd representing, and I’m estimating here, every person I’ve ever met in my bleak life, “look at her, will you all?”

  Everyone looked.

  And you know how it is when everyone’s looking at you—you imagine all sorts of things. I checked my nose to make sure nothing was hanging out of it and tried to make the best of the worst moment of my life.

  I mumbled that I wasn’t that great.

  “Oh, yes, you are!” Peter cried, picking me up against my personal will and twirling me in public.

  “Oh, no, I’m not!” I said, snarling, digging my manicured nails into his neck.

  Heather and the Heartbeats, capping the moment, broke into “Your Love Is Lifting Me Higher,” and Peter followed suit, lifting me higher still, as the crowd cheered and I burned with humiliation, finally wriggling myself into position to let loose a debilitating kick to his shin.

  He put me down.

  “Never,” I hissed, “do that again!”

  Peter was rubbing his leg. “I’m sorry, baby, I—”

  I grabbed the lapels of his tux. “I’m almost five nine, buster! I’m not anybody’s baby!”

  I stormed from the dance floor, found the closest folding chair, and crumpled into a heartrending heap. Lisa Shooty dashed to my side. “How did you get him to do that, A.J.?”

  I searched her perfect face for signs of sarcasm. She was serious.

  I looked at the crowd of my peers who were smiling at Peter and smiling at me and if they thought anything was cosmic, they sure weren’t saying it. Peter could do anything because he was popular. It was the Emperor’s New Clothes all over again. I shuddered at the power of high-school hunks. I cringed as Peter floated up to me and reached out his stupid hand. I looked away. The music swelled, my stomach churned. He pulled me up from the folding chair and onto the dance floor, pressed me toward him, and flattened my corsage. The metaphor was too dim to ponder.

  I was standing with Peter at the buffet table. He was close to drooling. Heather and the Heartbeats had taken a break to pull themselves together and spray their hair with liquid asphalt. I really prayed they’d be done spraying soon because break time was not good for Peter. It meant we had to talk.

  I was moving him around the table so we wouldn’t get stuck in any one place and have to have a meaningful conversation. He was still limping a bit from my kick in the shin, but nobody said love was easy. Everyone wanted to chat with us. I worked the crowd like a politician, saying nothing of substance, tossing pithy comments to my admirers while dragging Peter behind me. I tried to make eye contact with Trish, but she was huddled in the corner with Tucker, lost in love. She didn’t care about me. I focused my thoughts on the waiting gold King of Hearts crown, which sat on a red velvet pillow at the base of Big Ben’s sainted foot. I tried to picture it on Peter’s head and what an honor it would be to be his date. I practiced smiling benevolently like females do from floats and things when they are in the public eye and are expected to be everyone’s ideal.

  I smiled until my smile muscles hurt.

  A lone kazoo blurted through the tumult. I turned with everyone else to see the King of Hearts Dance Committee parade down the dance floor in full regalia, holding a red velvet pillow upon which sat a large, leering papier-mâché cupid.

  I froze in time.

  It had dark mocking eyes, its head was bigger than its body. Its wings were made of pink crepe paper, its bow and arrow formed with Reynolds Wrap. My larynx closed, my heart gave up. Gary Quark put the cupid on a waiting string and hoisted it over the dance floor, where it twirled like an ominous storm cloud. Becca Loadstrom said, “Oh, it’s cute.”

  “Are you mad?” I shrieked. “That is a cupid!”

  Everyone took a step back and said yep, it sure was.

  The cupid twirled above my head. Peter reached out to me. Deep inside, the truth hit my soul like a Scud missile.

  I was a fake!

  It rang in my ears, it sizzled in my brain.

  Fake! Fake!

  I looked at all the glittering girls who hadn’t gotten here by cheating. I tried to remember that all’s fair in love and war. But the cupid just hung there, leering at me, reminding me of what I’d done.

  Gary Quark said we’d start lining up for the King of Hearts announcement in a few minutes. Peter started toward the empty mike on the stage like he had something wildly important to say that needed amplification. I blocked his path.

  “I have to say it, A.J.,” he protested, “I—”

  I shoved my hand over his mouth like the little Dutch boy who stuck his finger in the leaking dike to save his town from the rising flood waters. It was going to be a really long evening, as they say in Holland.

  Leaks were bursting out everywhere. I was hurling sand-bags along the riverbank to push back the rampaging tides. Peter tried to read me the poem he’d written, the poem that began:

  I think that I shall never say

  A name as lovely as A.J.

  I emitted a scream and ripped the poem into minuscule threads that could never be reconnected. I stormed to the buffet table, where I ate myself into oblivion in a last-minute attempt to hit all major cholesterol groups before I had my nervous breakdown. I stared at the papier-mâché cupid.

  I had to contact him.

  I wrote pithy emergency phrases on pink napkins (GO GET JONATHAN and HELP ME, I’M LOSING IT) and held them up subtly to the papier-mâché cupid, but he hung there, unfeeling, unmoved.

  I shut my eyes and heard the somber bleat of the kazoo signaling to the world that It Was Time.

  I was slumped on the spiral staircase with Peter and the rest of the court awaiting the drum roll and Gary Quark’s ultimate announcement of the Winner. The staircase seemed shaky, particularly the center section, where Peter and I had been placed. Popular people know how to stand on a questionable staircase unafraid. When you’re a fake, you feel every wobble. I listed to the left and gripped the rail, figuring I could crash down the steps between Al Costanzo and Mike Griswald in case tragedy struck. Nowhere is it written that you have to go down with the ship if you are only dating the captain.

  Everyone below was looking at all of us above. Most of the Court took this in stride, because they were used to fawning adoration, except for Barry Lund, who everybody liked but who wouldn’t win because he was not hunk material—he was token nice-guy material. I wanted to take my vote back and give it to Barry, but when you are a public persona, you have to ride your stupid, life-destroying mistakes full-speed across the finish line with everybody watching. I said we were all going to die, as the staircase wobbled and everyone else kept smiling except me.

  Finally, the moment was upon us. Gary Quark sidled up to the microphone really slow to draw out the anticipation.

  Silence enveloped the Student Center.

  Gary blew a final, soulful squawk on his kazoo and motioned for a drum roll. He held up the hermetically sealed envelope that had been kept under lock and key in his father’s disaster-proof safe since Thursday. Deenie Valassis inched toward the staircase holding the Crown and yanking up her dress strap.

  “The winner…” Gary announced loudly, ripping the envelope open.

  “…and this year’s King of Hearts…”

  Deenie waited…

  “Peter Terris!”

  Shouts and applause rose from the dance floor as Deenie crowned Peter, who lowered his head like he’d expected it all along. I tried to shake his hand in congratulations, but he scooped me up and hugged me with undying affection. The other members of the Court and their dates turned to shake his hand, smiles frozen in place, although in reality they all wanted to trip him. I grinned extra hard at Lisa Shooty, whose fake smile was melting. Peter was beaming and waving and leading me down the staircase carefully to avoid early death. We promenaded before the whole glittering school, the Correct Couple of the Century, as the papier-mâché cupid twirl
ed above in mythological harassment. Red, white, and pink helium balloons were released to the ceiling, several of them getting stuck in the rafters to test Ned the janitor’s patience Monday morning.

  Peter kept saying he couldn’t believe it as people tore toward us. Everyone said they had voted for him; everyone shouted congratulations to me.

  I haven’t done anything, I wanted to cry. I’m just dating royalty!

  Gary motioned Peter and me onto the dance floor. I tried to feel the magic, tried to rekindle a paltry flame, I tried to get into it for the glory of the Crown, but my sin was ever before me.

  Gary said, “Ladies and gentlemen, I present to you your King of Hearts!”

  “And this,” Peter shouted to his subjects near and far, “is my queen!”

  It was simply too bleak. I lowered my head and considered abdication, but when you’re stuck with a half-crazed monarch, the only thing you can hope for is peasant revolt, and these peasants were ecstatic.

  The applause rose greater. Peter looked at me with blind love. Penitence thundered through my soul—I’d destroyed a life! I wanted to tell him how very, very sorry I was, but Heather and the Heartbeats started singing and Peter and I had to dance. I fought back tears; the weightiness of forever crashed over me. I looked up at the papier-mâché cupid who leered down from the ceiling.

  “I love you!” Peter cried.

  “No, you don’t!” I shouted. “You’re confused!”

  “I’m not confused,” he said, twirling me.

  “Yes, you are! You just think you love me, Peter! You don’t! You don’t care anything about my photography, you don’t care about my hopes and dreams!”

  “I love you!” he shouted blindly.

  “I don’t want this!” I wailed.

  “And what, my friend,” said a familiar voice, “do you want?”

  I jolted erect. It couldn’t be…

  The flutter of dinky wings filled my ears.

  But it was!

  I gazed in consummate wonder as Jonathan flitted down from the rotating Valentine heart and swept past the papier-mâché cupid, casually eating a grape like it was no big deal. He fixed me with a steely glare.