A Prom to Remember(70)

“I’m sorry. Did you hear that I deal drugs behind the pizza place?”

“No, I did not hear that,” she said. “Who said that?”

“Somebody heard it somewhere, I guess,” he said.

“I never heard it.”

“Okay, cool. Good. I feel better.” He wiped his hands on his pants.

“This was really awesome of Jacinta’s parents to let everyone come here like this.”

“Yeah, it’s super awesome of them. We should send them flowers or an Edible Arrangement or something.”

“Me and you?” she asked, clarifying.

“Me and you,” he said, taking her hand and squeezing.

Jacinta

Jacinta felt like the belle of the ball. Everyone kept coming up to her and thanking her for putting together such a great last-minute party.

Otis’s friend Tag approached. She wasn’t sure she’d ever actually spoken to Tag before, but he hooked his arm around her neck.

“Bro,” he said. “Thank you so much for this. I had like zero after-prom plans, and when the walls exploded I figured my night was over. Which is just so dumb, you know?”

“Totally.” She pulled away because damn, his arm was heavy.

“Turned out you had my back,” he said, holding his fist up.

She bumped it with hers, feeling awkward. “Uh, you’re welcome.”

“I grabbed the box of plastic cups from the hotel,” he said.

“I don’t know what that means,” Jacinta said.

“You know, the prom-to-remember cups.”

“Oh, the keepsakes.”

“Yeah, I rescued them. So you could give them out here. ’Cause, dude, it was definitely a prom to remember, right?”

“Totally,” Jacinta said, the irony not lost on her that she was going to get stuck with hundreds of champagne flute keepsakes for a prom she didn’t even attend. Maybe she’d return them to school on Monday, or maybe she’d make them disappear so one less class would have to use the aging theme.

He pulled an airplane bottle of vodka out of his pocket. “A gift for the hostess.”

“Oh, no thanks. My parents are actually home, and they will be super pissed if they find out we were drinking. So you should probably put that away.”

He raised his eyebrows and shoved it back in his pocket. As he turned away, he held a finger to his lips, a silent promise that he wouldn’t tell anyone about his own liquor, she assumed.

After that bizarre exchange, Jacinta couldn’t stop smiling. For once she was the main character in her own life; she’d finally found a leading role that she felt good about.

Kelsey and Landon walked in around eleven with their dates after having gone home to change and grab their bathing suits. When they heard about Jacinta’s party, they had decided not to go to the city.

Kelsey walked right up to Jacinta. “Thank you, again, for doing this. And I’m so sorry about the prom.”

“You don’t have to be sorry. I didn’t want to go.”

“No, I totally understand. I kind of forgot that you might not have fun at the dance. And holy crap! I can’t believe you helped with the surprise for Landon! How could you keep that a secret from me?”

As if on cue, Landon popped up in the middle of their conversation. He hugged Jacinta hard.

“Thank you so much,” Landon said. “Emma told me that you made sure she’d be able to go to the prom with me, and I totally appreciate it. It wouldn’t have been the same without her.”

Jacinta worked hard to keep her nostrils from flaring. Even though she felt totally over the Emma issue, apparently she couldn’t stop involuntary physical reactions. Her nostrils might flare at the mention of the name Emma, any Emma, for the rest of her life.

“You’re so welcome.”

But it was hard to hold on to whatever was left of her hurt feelings when Emma swooped in and hugged her just as tight as Landon had. Jacinta had done a good thing, no matter how much it annoyed her. She had helped people and made them happy.

And that’s what a good supporting character is supposed to do, but sometimes you need to be the one in the spotlight. For once, Jacinta had chosen herself, and it was good to know that things didn’t fall apart just because she didn’t go with the flow. It was better than good, it was relieving, it meant that maybe she’d be able to do this again in the future, to leave her comfort zone and say no to events that didn’t interest her.

Landon, Mike, and Emma wandered away to find some drinks.

“This is a really good party,” Kelsey said.

“I know, right?” Jacinta said. “Kind of shocking. Sucks that it took me until senior year of high school to realize I’m kind of good at planning stuff. Maybe I would have spoken up more during prom committee.”

Jacinta’s conversation with Kelsey was followed by what felt like a million more. Madison, Paisley, Margie Showalter, Cora, Josie, and Teagan. The sheer number of people who’d shown up at her house shocked Jacinta.

The highest echelon of popular kids seemed to have opted out. Amelia Vaughn and her lackeys weren’t there, for example, and neither were many of the guys from the football team.

But aside from that, it seemed like everyone had decided to go to Jacinta’s.

She hadn’t just saved prom for herself, she’d saved it for her graduating class.