Prom Night in Purgatory(34)

“Oh come on, Irene!” Lizzie said, mimicking Irene’s stance. “You know you aren’t going to wear the red dress. You’ll feel silly in it. Cathy and Shirley are both wearing pastels, right?” Cathy bobbed her head in agreement and added that she was wearing “mint” and Shirley was wearing “blush.” Maggie almost snorted and pinched her nose to keep the giggle from escaping.

Lizzie continued her campaign. “You look marvelous in the peach dress, sissy! Did she show you, girls?” Lizzie looked at the sisters who shook their head in unison. “Irene! You have to show them! My sister is the most beautiful girl in the world.” Irene’s eyes softened, and her folded arms dropped to her sides. She smiled and dropped a kiss on Lizzie’s head. One minute flat, and Lizzie had Irene right where she wanted her.

“Come on! Let’s go!” Irene clapped her hands excitedly and spun toward her room, her friends following close behind. Lizzie closed the door and sighed gustily, making her bangs rise and fall on her forehead.

“Whew! I thought we were goners, for sure. Stay here! I have to make sure she doesn’t change her mind. Just in case, take off that dress! My robe is hanging on my closet door. It’s too long for me, so it should do until Irene leaves and we can find you something in her closet.” With that, Lizzie was gone, shutting her bedroom door firmly behind her.

Without wasting a second, Maggie struggled out of the red dress and dropped it to the floor with a sigh. She had on a pair of pink bikini panties and that was all. Somehow she had slipped through the layers of time and found herself with nothing more than a pair of undies and borrowed formal wear, and a lot of good that did her! The red shoes and the dress belonged to Irene, the young Irene! She shook the frightening thoughts from her head. Dwelling on her predicament would only cause her to close her eyes, curl up in the fetal position, and scream hysterically.

She found Lizzie’s robe and pulled it on, thankfully belting the soft flowered cotton around herself. It was too short, and the sleeves hung several inches above her wrists. But her pink panties and bare chest were covered, and for now that was enough. She wished she could sneak down the hall to the bathroom, but didn’t dare. She would just have to hope Lizzie made short work of Irene and her friends. She picked up the red formal she’d stepped out of and shook it briskly. Luckily, it didn’t seem all the worse for wear. The skirt was gauzy, and the creases weren’t very noticeable. She hung it in Lizzie’s brimming closet, hoping that Irene wouldn’t discover it there and accuse Lizzie of theft. She worked it into the back of the closet; these girls seemed to have plenty of pretty things. Irene’s declaration that her daddy had spoiled her seemed to be true of Lizzie as well.

Lizzie’s room was exactly as she remembered it from her coma “dream.” Maggie was now convinced it hadn’t been a dream at all. She had actually been here, at least in spirit. Lizzie remembered her, too. Maggie shuddered to think what would have happened if she hadn’t.

After a while, she heard voices in the hallway and dove behind the bed, squeezing her eyes shut as if that would help to disguise her. But the voices went past, and she heard the clippety cloppety sound of feet bounding down stairs. A moment later it was silent, and Maggie rose tentatively from the floor.

The door shot open, and Lizzie flew in, her eyes bright with victory. “Maggie?” Her eyes found Maggie immediately, and she launched into an explanation of all that had transpired since she left the room.

“....so the Russel twins invited Irene to sleep over, and they’re all going to help each other get ready for the prom at their house tomorrow. Daddy is out of town, so it’s just me, you, and Nana! Nana believes everything I say. I’ll just tell her you’re a cousin. You can sleep in Irene’s room if you want or the guest room upstairs...or Daddy’s room!” Lizzie laughed as if sleeping in her father’s room was the most outrageous thing she had ever heard. It would be pretty weird.

“Wait...wouldn’t your Nana know that I’m not family? I mean, if she’s your grandmother...” Maggie’s voice trailed off at Lizzie’s confused expression.

“She’s not my grandmother! She was hired to be my nanny when Momma died. I started calling her Nana. Now she’s kind of a housekeeper too. She lives here with us. Her room is downstairs. She might wonder about you, but she’d never say you couldn’t stay, and you look enough like us that she won’t question it. Plus...you’ll eventually go back to where you came from, right? Last time you only stayed for twenty minutes or so. Can you try to stay longer this time? I’m bored.” Lizzie flopped on her bed, illustrating her claim.

“Elizabeth Honeycutt...you are something else.” Maggie smiled down at the precocious child and shook her head in wonder.

“Yeah, yeah, yeah.” Lizzie waved the compliment away, but Maggie noticed her cheeks pinked with both pleasure and maybe a little embarrassment. “The Russell twins said they could only handle me in small doses, which is why they all decided to sleep at their place. I was trying to be obnoxious, just to get rid of them.”

Maggie laughed and plopped down beside her new friend. “You’re talking about Shirley and Cathy, right? They’re twins?”

“Nah, not twins. Just sisters. Cathy’s older. She was born in September and Shirley came along nine months later, in June. So they’re in the same year at school and everything. I think they prefer to be called twins. It seems to embarrass them that they’re not. Shirley said once that her parents reproduce like rabbits. I asked her if they had any new baby bunnies for sale, but then Irene made me leave her room,” Lizzie remembered with a forlorn expression. “Anyway, they’re Irene’s best friends.”