When Candace comes back to the car, she’s with some guy. He’s totally cute, average height but nicely built, with cropped ginger hair and a killer smile. He’s also super well dressed, in a tailored gray suit jacket over a white shirt with the top couple of buttons undone, dark pants and electric-blue Chuck Taylors.
They climb into the backseat, and the new dude smiles at us.
“Everyone,” says Candace, “this is Sean. Sean, this is everyone.”
I wonder if he’s her not-quite boyfriend or what, but then he leans into the front seat and holds his hand out to me. “Hey,” he says. “You must be Roemi.”
“Yes,” I say. “I must be.”
There’s an awkward moment in which it dawns on me that Sean is some kind of blind date. I twist my head around to look at Candace.
“Hey, man,” she says. “You’re the one who wanted to be the first gay prom couple in Granite Ridge.”
“So you grabbed the first gay person you could find and just assumed that would work?” I ask her.
“Hey,” she says. “Sean’s a friend of mine, and I happen to think you guys might hit it off.”
I turn to Sean. “You’re sure you’re cool with this?” I ask him. “You don’t mind leaving your own prom to come with us?”
“No way,” he says. “It’s pretty dead in there.”
“I wouldn’t get my hopes up,” I tell him, looking out the window at the crowd outside the school. “This is probably like an all-night rave on Ibiza compared to ours.”
“No worries,” he says. “At least I have a date now.”
He smiles at me, and I feel like I’m going to melt into the upholstery.
“Okay, Paul,” I say. “We have less than an hour of prom left. Let’s gun it.”
“If you insist,” says Paul, revving the engine and pulling away from the curb.
We make it back to Granite Ridge in record time. Paul parks on the far side of the sports field behind the school. We get out of the car and stand, facing the building. From across the field, we can hear the faint thump of heavy bass coming from the gymnasium.
“I guess this is it,” says Andrea.
“You sure you don’t want to come with us?” I ask Paul. “There’s still time to salvage Lannie’s prom.”
“I don’t think I’ll be salvaging anything if I show up at the end of the night in jeans and a ballcap,” he says. “You guys go ahead. I’ll stick around and drive everyone home after the dance.”
“You’ll be here?” I ask Candace.
“Where else would I go?” she asks.
“All right then.” I turn to Andrea and Sean. “What are we waiting for?”
The three of us step onto the field and start walking toward the school.
“How do you know Candace?” Andrea asks Sean.
“We have some of the same friends,” he says. “Or used to anyway. Nobody’s seen much of Candace over the last year or so. I was surprised when she came looking for me tonight, actually.”
“I’m glad she did,” I say, feeling embarrassed the minute the words are out of my mouth. It takes a lot to make me blush, but I can feel color rising in my cheeks.
Sean doesn’t seem to notice. “Me too,” he says. “Totally glad.”
From the corner of my eye, I see Andrea grin.
When we reach the far side of the field, we stand on the edge of the parking lot and look at the school. The music is a lot louder now, and I can make out a Beyoncé song through the heavy walls of the gym.
“Maybe this isn’t such a great idea,” says Andrea. “We’ll never get in.”
“Leave it to me,” I say. She and Sean follow me to the side of the school, and we creep up to the corner and peek around it. Through the glass walls of the school foyer, we can see a bunch of teachers milling around inside, up past their bedtimes.
“We aren’t going to make it in that way,” I tell them.
Andrea opens her mouth to say something, but I hold my finger up. “Hush,” I say. “Just follow me.”
We walk around to the back of the building, trying doors as we go. Everything is locked.
Then I look up and see an open window that’s hinged inward. The only problem is that it’s five feet off the ground.
“I think that’s the bio lab,” Andrea says. “I don’t know—that opening is really small.”
“Come on, Andrea,” I say. “We’ve made it this far. Just think about the great story this will make!”
“I wish we still had that stupid ladder,” she mutters.
It takes a bit of maneuvering, but Sean and I manage to hoist her up to the window.
“Can you see anything?” Sean asks.
“It’s dark,” she says. “Give me a second.”
“Well, hurry—you aren’t as featherlight as you look!” I say.
“Okay,” she says. “There’s a counter here, just below the window. I’m going to try to climb in.”
I give her one last shove, and then she’s hanging half in and half out of the window. With a little yelp, she falls into the building. We hear a crash, then some cursing, and a moment later she sticks her head out the window. “I’m okay,” she says. “I just knocked a bunch of papers and stuff onto the floor. It’s clear. There’s nobody around.”
I turn to Sean, who has been taking everything in stride.
“Maybe you can help me up next,” I say.
“Sure thing,” he says. “This is super fun.”
“You mean it?” I ask him.
“Definitely,” he says.
Sean makes a step out of his hands, and I grab on to his shoulders. Our faces are suddenly very close, and we stay like that, staring at each other, for a split second. Then we both burst out laughing, and he boosts me up to the window. Once I’m inside, Andrea and I reach down and grab on to his arms to pull him up.
The room is dark. I hop off the counter and go over to the door; I peer through the window into the dimly lit hallway.
“The coast is clear,” I whisper to them. “Let’s clean this mess up and get the hell out of here.”
We begin picking up papers from the floor and trying to rearrange them as neatly as possible. I’m about to climb back onto the counter and shut the window when the door is thrown open and the light snaps on.
It’s Mr. Parrins, and he doesn’t look happy.
“What the hell are you guys doing in here?” he asks. None of us answer, and he walks into the room. He looks at the window, which is open twice as wide as it should be, and then the counter, which is in total disarray despite our best efforts.
“All right,” says Mr. Parrins. “You kids are coming with me.”
“Mr. Parrins,” I say. “You can’t do this to us!”
“Do what?” he asks, obviously impatient.
“You can’t ruin tonight for us, and if you had any idea the trouble we went through to get here, you wouldn’t try!”
“Roemi, there are rules,” he says. “One of the rules is that the doors to the dance are closed and locked at ten thirty. An even more important rule is not to break into the school. Or any building, for that matter.”
“Don’t you see what’s going on here?” I ask him. “This is my date, Sean. Do you get what I’m saying here? Do you realize that if you let us into the dance we’ll be the first gay couple to ever attend prom at Granite Ridge High School?”
“Actually,” says Mr. Parrins, “you won’t be. Allison Jackson and her girlfriend were the first. About five years ago. The paper did a really nice write-up about it.”
Five years ago?
“Excuse me?” I say. “You mean we aren’t the first gay couple to come to the prom?”
“That’s what I said,” he says. “Although technically, as far as I know, you’d be the first gay male couple to attend prom.”
“Technically,” I repeat.
“Anyway, it doesn’t matter,” says Mr. Parrins. “Gay, straight, whatever. You’ve broken into the school—don’t you understand how serious that is? You guys need to come with me to the office now, so I can call your parents.”
“Mr. Parrins,” says Andrea. “What exactly have we done that’s so serious? It’s not like we broke windows, or showed up drunk. We just did what we needed to do to get here. To be with our friends.”
I feel her reach out and grab my hand. A second later, Sean grabs my other hand. We have become, potentially, the most pitiful human chain in history. At least we’re well dressed.
“Please,” says Andrea. “Please give us a break. Just this once.”
Mr. Parrins glares at us but doesn’t say anything. It’s all I can do to not start singing “Born This Way.”
“Oh for crying out loud,” he says finally. “Fine. I’ll pretend I didn’t see anything. But you still shouldn’t be back here. Come with me.”
“That was some Jedi mind shit, Andrea,” I whisper as we follow Mr. Parrins through a series of empty corridors. He stops at a set of double doors that lead into the gym and uses one of the keys hanging around his neck to unlock it.
“Give me a couple of minutes to get back around to the front,” he says. “And don’t let me catch you three up to anything shifty once you’re in there.”
“You won’t,” says Andrea. “Thanks a million, Mr. Parrins.” He’s already halfway down the hallway, shaking his head.
I reach for the door handle, but Andrea grabs me by the arm.
“What’s wrong?” I ask her.
“Do you think I look stupid?” she asks us.
“You look awesome,” I tell her. “Andrea is after a guy,” I explain to Sean.
“I can’t imagine a straight guy on earth who wouldn’t fall for you,” he tells her. I swoon internally.
“I just don’t think I look like me,” she says. “I look like a poser or something.”
I put my hand on her shoulder. “Andrea, you look great. It’s prom night—everyone is dressed up and partying and dancing. People are too preoccupied with themselves to think anything, except that you look amazing. Tonight is supposed to be fun. Now can we please go in there before I turn into a pumpkin?”
“Thanks, Roemi.”Andrea abruptly steps forward and hugs me. Then she turns and hugs Sean.
“Justin won’t be able to take his eyes off you,” I tell her. “Now let’s go. There’s less than a half hour left before the lights come on again.”
I look at Sean and he looks at me and we both smile.
“Do you feel like dancing?” he asks me.
“What do you think?” I ask, grabbing him by the hand and pulling him through the doors into the gym.