The Best Laid Plans(83)

“Drew, put your arm around her,” my dad says. “What are you scared of?”

“Look how grown up you both are,” Andrew’s mom says, her voice going misty.

“You’re both so beautiful,” my mom says.

It’s weird to me how our parents have no idea what’s going on between us. Once, they knew everything about our lives, and now there’s so much right under the surface they’ll never understand. My dad is so clueless he can casually tell Andrew to put his arm around me, not realizing Andrew’s arm around me is both the best and the worst thing in the entire world.

Andrew looks at me and then back at our parents and then dutifully obeys, placing his arm gently around my waist, his hand just barely resting against the fabric on my hip. I think of how many times he’s slung his arm over my shoulder in the past, leaning on me at parties, pulling me tightly against him like it’s no big deal. I think of the hammock in his backyard, all the times we lay there together, letting gravity pull us practically on top of each other. Touching him now shouldn’t matter, shouldn’t be a problem, but his hand on my hip is hot and heavy and it’s all I can think about.

Our parents take about a million photos, and then we pull away as fast as possible so we’re not touching. I wonder for a heartbreaking moment if we’ll ever touch again. I can’t be around him, not if it’s going to feel like this.

I glance toward the parking lot. Danielle is here now, with Ava, and she looks like someone you’d want to paint, her gown the color of red wine with a slit practically up to her neck. Ryder is behind them, not very discreetly drinking out of a flask. Even though he and Ava are here together, they’re Not Together as dates; Ava wanted to go stag. Chase walks up to them then, his arm around Cecilia.

When your school is small, in the end it’s all just one big game of spin the bottle.

I start to move toward the group, but Andrew holds out a hand to stop me.

“Wait,” he says. “Before we . . . I mean.” He lowers his voice so our parents can’t hear, but they’re not paying much attention anyway, too busy looking through the pictures in the digital camera. “About last night,” he says. “I didn’t mean to . . . I mean, I did mean to, I wanted to, I just . . .”

“Don’t worry about it,” I say. “I was about eighty percent made of tequila by that point, so—”

“I know,” he says. His voice is so quiet, and he’s leaning close to me so our parents can’t hear, and it hurts because his lips are only about three inches away from mine. It’s funny how something can be so close but actually so far away. “I shouldn’t have kissed you.”

“I kissed you back,” I say, my voice catching.

“But you were drunk.”

“So were you.” It’s like we’re talking in circles. “Let’s just forget it happened, okay? All of it.” And then I walk away from him and over to the parking lot. When I turn around, I’m surprised to see he hasn’t followed. He’s just standing there, scuffing one of his nice shoes into the grass. Then he nods and moves past me right to Danielle. She smiles when she sees him and wraps her arms around his neck, pulling him into her body so they’re plastered together. It feels a bit like someone is stabbing me repeatedly with a blunt knife.

There’s the rumbling of an engine and then a motorcycle peels into the parking lot, and thank God, it’s Dean. He looks good—better than good. It’s like he’s straight out of an action movie in his black tuxedo. He’s not James Dean anymore. He’s James Bond.

I make my way over to him just as he’s stepping off the bike, and I can feel his eyes sizing me up, his gaze slowly traveling down the length of my body, lingering in all the places that are a bit more exposed than usual.

“You clean up nice, Prom Date.” He tries to reach for me, to kiss me in front of everyone, but I back away from him because I know my parents are watching.

“Thanks for coming,” I say, relieved.

“I wouldn’t miss my first prom,” he says, and then he takes my hand, lacing his fingers through mine. I wait for the usual fluttering in my stomach, the shortness of breath that always accompanies his touch, but it’s not there. I don’t feel anything at all.

I realize then that my crush is gone, surely and completely. The feelings I had for him feel silly all of a sudden—how could I have been so into Dean when Andrew was right in front of me the whole time?

My parents come over and introduce themselves, and Dean is charming as always. I should have known he would be. Somehow, he calms them down about the motorcycle, promises my mom he would never let me ride it, even manages to make her laugh. Once they’re not looking, he leans into me, whispering into my ear.

“That’s a nice dress. I can’t wait to take it off you.”

I turn and slap him playfully on the chest, but inside I feel like I’m about to split into a million different pieces.

Hannah’s Jeep pulls into the parking lot then, and I feel a pang of guilt that I’m not with her, that I was too proud, too stubborn to admit she was right. Hannah didn’t have a date, and now she’s coming here alone. I’m the worst friend.

But then the doors open and I feel my stomach clench, because she isn’t alone. She’s with Charlie.