No one will shut up about prom. I don’t understand the hype.
It’s a school dance. We’ve had them since middle school, and every single one has sucked, but people are convinced this one will be better because we have to dress up.
Aiden storms over to my locker, red-faced. Dude definitely just got rejected. He’s been stressed out all week, planning how to ask Luna McKay. I guess she said no.
“What’s up?” I ask.
“Not good, man. Not good,” he huffs.
Not what I asked, but all right. “What’s—”
“You leaving?” he asks.
I swing my locker shut. “I’m driving Isla home and coming back for practice.”
“Oh.” He grimaces but quickly straightens his face. My friends know to keep their opinions about Isla to themselves around me. “Can she wait five minutes?”
Isla already texted me that she’s waiting by my car, so no. “Nah, just tell me now.”
“Luna said no because I didn’t do a prom-posal,” he grumbles.
I snort. “A what?”
“A prom-posal. Like proposing to prom. I’m serious.”
That’s the dumbest thing I’ve ever heard in my life. I’m literally going to ask Isla if she wants to come with me in the car. Plain and simple.
“They all expect it. I’m serious, man. Noelle said no to Chase because he didn’t get her flowers or make a sign,” Aiden continues, kicking at a recycling bin in frustration.
I can’t help it. I snort again. “She wanted a sign?” I burst out.
“Yeah. He’s making one right now.”
I roll my eyes as we push through the doors out of the school. “Tell me you aren’t making Luna a sign,” I groan, still laughing.
Aiden glares at me. “Yeah, man. I have to. You gotta make one too if you want to ask Delaney.”
“Not gonna happen,” I scoff. I’m a sixteen-year-old man. I don’t do arts and crafts.
“You aren’t asking Delaney?”
“Nah.” Delaney Cruz and I have hung out a couple of times, but I’m not that into her. If I have to attend a dumb school dance, I’m going with Isla. She’ll hate it as much as I will.
“She thinks you’re gonna ask her.”
Sounds like a Delaney problem. “I never said I was going to,” I defend myself.
He shrugs. “Who are you asking?”
“Isla.”
“Isla won’t say yes unless you do a prom-posal either,” he scoffs.
“Whatever, man. See ya.”
I leave Aiden at his car and power walk toward mine, where Isla’s leaning against the passenger door, hugging a bag of books to her chest.
Since everyone started freaking out about prom last week, I’ve rehearsed the question for her in my head a couple of times.
Never did I imagine her saying no or demanding a prom-posal. That would be painfully awkward. I guess I could wait another day and buy some flowers just to play it safe.
“Hey, PJ,” she says softly.
PJ. My initials, Parker Jace. No one calls me that anymore, not even my parents. No one but Isla.
“What’s up, Isla?” I reply, unlocking my Jeep door.
“Mrs. Foley gave me a ton of books the library was going to recycle,” she shares excitedly.
I can’t help but chuckle at her. She likes reading so much that she sits in the library during lunch half the time. The librarian, Mrs. Foley, loves her.
“Any good ones?” I ask. I’m only asking for Isla’s sake. I hate reading.
I end up talking about books the entire ten-minute drive home from school anyway.
Isla had better say yes. I had to sneak the stupid flowers into school in my old gym bag. All day, I’ve been blocking the view into my locker with my body.
I’m not in the mood for questions about the bouquet, especially not after last night, when my parents nonstop grilled me about asking Isla. They’re more exhausting than baseball practice, I swear.
Eager to get these stupid things off my hands before Aiden learns I’m following his dumb advice, I texted Isla to stop by my locker before lunch.
She said she’d be a minute five minutes ago, and now the hallway is swarmed with kids and teachers. I should have made a sign. I can hide a poster. Floral arrangements, not so much.
She bites her lip and flashes those fuck-me eyes. “Who are those for?” she asks huskily.
Delaney is so hot. Tanned skin, long blonde hair, amazing curves, the list goes on. Her lips are pouty, proof that she’s a good kisser.
Delaney is good at a lot of stuff. A real Renaissance woman, James calls her.
“Aw, Parker, no need to be nervous,” she giggles. “Of course I’ll go to prom with you.”
Wait. What?
Delaney throws herself into my arms for a hug. I pat her back gently, trying to figure out how to let her down easy. I’ll have to take her aside or something before she tells anyone.
I’d feel like a dick, but I don’t want to go to prom with Delaney. She lives for shit like prom.
I’d rather go with someone who wants to laugh at everyone, and Isla’s always down to laugh at people with me.
I lift my eyes, and I see them. James, brows furrowed in confusion, next to Isla, smiling weakly. Her face is pale, her knuckles white.
She whispers something to James, half-waves at me, spins on her heel, and books it down the hallway.
I’m a logical person. I know that people like PJ don’t go to prom with people like me.
But last night, when he texted me asking about my favorite type of flower, I really thought he was planning one of those dumb prom-posals everyone keeps talking about.
I guess he just needed advice to buy Delaney Cruz the best bunch.
I wish he’d included that in the text. I would have lied. Now, orchids are forever ruined.
“Can you tell PJ to text whatever he had to tell me?” I whisper to James.
He nods, barely making eye contact with me. He’s just watching his brother hug Delaney with disgust on his face.
I don’t know why. Delaney’s sweet and beautiful. Not the brightest bulb, but she’s so nice that no one minds that she’s kind of dumb.
Maybe it’s pity, and James feels bad for me. That’s probably it.
Parker, James, and I grew up together. In elementary school, it was easy. The three of us were inseparable. We had other friends, but we were closest.
I mean, I practically lived at the Flahertys’ house for years. James is like the brother I never had and PJ… PJ has always been my best friend. My other half.
Then, middle school happened, and the horizontal social hierarchy turned into a pyramid overnight.
My association with the Flaherty boys wasn’t enough to keep me in everyone’s good graces. Suddenly, I was invisible.
I tried tagging along with PJ and James, only for their friends to ignore my existence. They were never mean, but they made it obvious that they had no interest in spending time with me.
I might be socially stunted, but I know how to take a hint, so I took it. I stopped hanging around them at school.
The issue was that PJ and James were the only people I fit in with.
I had nothing in common with the so-called weird kids, but they were the only ones who didn’t wrinkle their noses when they looked at me, so I started hanging out with them during school hours.
Sixth grade was the worst year of my life. I had no friends to hang out with at school. It’s not that I thought I was too good to hang out with the weird kids. We just had nothing in common.
They played card games and caused scenes at lunch, while I just wanted to keep my head down.
The only girl in that group I considered an actual friend started making fun of me for being quiet, and soon, I was the group’s target.
I was too weird for the weird kids.
No matter how many times PJ and James asked me to eat with them at lunch, I knew I couldn’t. Social standards are stronger than friendship in middle school.
For the last three months of sixth grade, I ate lunch in a bathroom stall and did partner projects by myself.
Luckily, the next year, James fell in with a group of overachievers who didn’t mind my company, so I started hanging out with them.
Five years later, they’re still the only group I fit with, and I barely fit.
James and his friends are outgoing and talkative, always raising their hands in class or chatting with teachers and other smart kids.
I’m quiet, shy, and not involved with half a dozen after-school clubs or sports like the rest of them. Everyone’s nice to me, but I’m well aware that they only tolerate me because of James.
I’d give my life savings to press a magic fast-forward button and skip the next year and a half until college. There, I won’t be trapped in a social box. No one will know about the teasing and laughter.
My college friends won’t know that Francine Price made a fake Instagram account in my name and posted nothing but photos of dessert.
They won’t know that Todd Damon yelled at me to speak up when I had to give a presentation in class. They won’t know that everyone, even the teacher, laughed at his prompting.
But here, everyone knows that, and that’s why believing that PJ would ever want me as a prom date was foolish.
PJ might not be embarrassed by me—he’s so popular that he can hang out with a weirdo without my presence damaging his social esteem—but taking me to prom is a hazard.
He’d have to stay by my side the entire night because his friends hate me. He couldn’t bring his date to an after-prom party because hosts refuse entry to losers.
I should have known better than to have gotten my hopes up.
Stifling tears, I rush down the hallway, nearly crashing into Kevin Bernard.
“Hello, Isla!” he calls after me in an exaggerated greeting.
His friends’ laughter follows me around the corner and echoes in my ears when I reach my favorite bathroom stall, the one with a barrier that reaches the floor, allowing me to hide myself completely.
Inside, I cry.
I’m alone, and it hurts so much.
