In the spring of my senior year, Mom smiled a hopeful smile when I asked if she and Dad would be chaperones for the high school prom.
“I was voted princess,” I said.
“Your dad will be tickled you asked.” Her smile went bigger. “It’ll be fun.” As though we were that kind of family, the kind that shared everything.
On the night before prom, I left the pink satin dress I’d made in home ec hanging on the coat closet door. The pattern was sexy, like an old-fashioned movie star. It showed off my strong shoulders, my slim waist. Mom said it was pretty but to leave it downstairs so she could iron it.
The next morning Mom pointed at the dress, neatly ironed of all creases. “I got to looking at your sewing on that. The seams were a little loose.” She’d stayed up late resewing every seam. “I was worried it would come apart when you dance.”
I felt ashamed. I felt angry. My poor work, her need to point it out, her need to fix it.
I’m sure I didn’t thank her.
My date and I wandered into the prom over an hour late, steps fluid with alcohol, eyes wide on speed. The pink satin dress was creased and the hem dirty with mud from the back road we’d been on, drinking and making out.
The crowning ceremony was over. Another girl was the queen.
Mom and Dad stood at the back of the room with the other chaperones. Arms folded, eyes narrow. I pretended I didn’t see they were mad, took my date’s hand, and went over to them. Like I could make up for it, the way I was embarrassing them in front of the other parents, the teachers, their own hope that I was a better girl. I said, “Oh, sorry. We lost track of time.” And I laughed.
Their tight faces, their mouths in straight lines holding words they wouldn’t say because this was public and they wouldn’t embarrass themselves any more than I already had.
I nudged Mom toward my date. “C’mon Mom, dance with him and I’ll dance with Dad.”
Mom pulled at my arm. “Where were you?”
Dad ran his hand over his face and said to Mom, “Jeanie, we’ll talk about this later.” He was completely sober. “We don’t want to dance,” he said.
My date and I moved away, and I stayed on the far side of the room, pretending prom was fun, not looking their way, not wanting to see my reflection in them, how thoughtless I was.
Dawn light made shadows in the family room when I came in the front door. Prom was long over.
“You’re late.” The silhouette of Dad in his chair.
I stayed by the door, my hand on the knob.
“I know.”
That sexy satiny dress had done its job and held together. Now it was wadded up in the back seat where I’d fallen asleep with my date. I wore the old jeans and a T-shirt I kept for backup.
“Come here,” Dad said.
His disappointment was like something I could touch. It made his eyes soft and pressed his shoulders down. It filled the air as I moved toward him. I thought I might cry. He took my hand and pulled me down onto his lap. I hadn’t been in his lap since I was a little girl. Faint memory of cupping my hands over the stubble on his chin, my head against his chest, my feet barely reaching his knees.
Now I kept my body stiff and upright and awkward. My legs next to his, feet on the floor, his hand around my shoulder. Would he smell the sex on me, the cigarettes?
“You’ve gotten so grown-up,” he said. He put his arms around me, and I relaxed a little. I leaned into him. For one sweet moment I was his brown-eyed girl again. It had been so long since either he or Mom had touched me or held me. And for that moment, I felt his love and his loss and mine.
The old mantel clock ticked, the shadows in the room faded.
And then it felt awkward and false, a thing whose time had passed. I sat up, and Dad eased his hold. He touched my chin, turning it so that our eyes met. “You embarrassed your mother tonight,” he said. “I’m disappointed in you.”
Some things are easier to know, without the words. Hearing them out loud came with a weight. His disappointment. All those nights I’d waited for him to come home. I could have felt glad for him to know what it was like. Him drunk, me waiting. But he was the father. I was the daughter.
“Get your car keys,” he said. “You’re not driving that car for a week.”
I almost laughed at the smallness of it, after what I’d done, after all I’d been doing. I stood up, stiff-backed, went to my purse and found the keys to the Nova, and gave them to him. He nodded and put them in his pocket. “One week,” he said.
I never had to ask Mom or Dad for a ride. I never had to take the school bus. I never said I was sorry. My friends or one of those boys came to pick me up before school and dropped me off after. The shame I felt at disappointing my parents faded in the dust of those cars coming up our gravel road, and I kept on with my wild ways.