You Should See Me in a Crown(14)
A group of freshmen in matching denim jackets stand near the park attendants’ station, posing in front of one anothers’ phones and adjusting their portable ring lights to make sure everything is ready to go. The Prom Projectioners also act as a sort of unofficial documentary team. We have one every year. A group of freshmen, usually girls, filming every step of the process for Campbell Confidential Live, because nothing—and I do mean absolutely nothing—about this race goes unnoticed.
“Last name’s Lighty.” I offer a smile to the bored college-aged park attendant once we reach the booth, my first since leaving school today. “Here for the—”
“Prom thing. Yeah, I figured. When your time is up, you’ll come back here, and I’ll sign off on your sheets. Capisce?”
Jordan reaches through the window and grabs the stuff. “Capisce, man.”
I can hear the smirk in his voice without even turning to look at him.
“Who does he think he is? Al Capone?” he offers once we’re out of earshot. “I swear everybody in this town that gets to be a part of prom stuff thinks they’re the leader of the most powerful mob outfit in Prohibition-era Chicago.”
I snort, before I think better of myself. I try to get stoic again really quickly though. I’m not going to give him the satisfaction of making me smile.
“How’s Robbie? Haven’t seen that kid in ages. He still some sort of mad genius when it comes to playing NBA 2K?” Jordan has never been great about periods of silence that last more than a few minutes at a time. I grab a stray Pepsi bottle from the grass in front of us and drop it into the bag without answering him. Maybe if I act like he’s not saying anything, he’ll get the hint.
“Soooo, are we ignoring each other, or are we going to at least pretend to like each other while doing this?” His voice has more bite to it than usual as he drops a Honey Bun wrapper into the trash bag. “Just let me know so I can adjust my expectations accordingly.”
My answer comes quickly. “I don’t think we should pretend to be friends just because we got stuck working together. You’ve been pretty good at ignoring my existence for a while now.”
“Wow.” He laughs with no humor. “That’s rich.”
My head snaps up. “What’s that supposed to mean?”
“It means exactly what it sounds like. I’m not the one who—” He stops himself suddenly and takes a deep breath.
I know what he stopped himself from saying: I’m not the one who couldn’t just grow up and act like everybody else.
He runs a gloved hand forward on his head. “Whatever, Lighty. Look. You’re right. We don’t have to be buddies or whatever. But maybe we could, I don’t know, at least acknowledge each other’s presence?”
I look away and mumble, “Fine.”
“Yeah, fine,” he scoffs. “It’s actually perfect.”
Perfect. There’s nothing perfect about it, but that’s how it goes sometimes. That’s how it goes most of the time, I guess.
Something in his tone makes me clench my jaw to bite back a response. Jordan and his perfection. I almost want to ask him how things are going with his perfect girlfriend, Emme, and the perfect couple they used to be before she went AWOL. There have been so many rumors about where she’s gone and why she left that are anything but perfect—I know it must be eating at him. But I can’t bring myself to be that petty. Outside of what happened with me and him, it’s not fair to Emme for me to pry.
It’s hard to believe that we were ever close. But I remember it all, and standing near him makes it even more impossible to forget.
The summer before freshman year, Jordan spent two months at some football intensive camp for the first time ever. He wasn’t returning to band in the fall, we both knew that. But that wasn’t going to change much for us. He’d always played football, and now he was just going to play it a little more seriously, like his dad had been pushing him to.
It was the longest we’d gone without speaking to each other in three years, but it wasn’t unbearable. I spent the summer watching TV with Robbie and lounging around the Marinos’ pool. Me and G read old issues from her mom’s Vogue collection and spent hours on Tumblr reading about our favorite K-pop bands.
But by the time school started again, I missed my friend. I missed laughing with him and cracking stupid jokes in rehearsals and dancing down the hallways like no one was watching, even if they were.
On the first day of high school, I saw him standing by his locker, surrounded by guys I didn’t recognize. They were smiling and joking, all their skin darker from a summer playing football for hours a day. Jordan looked older, his curly hair completely gone, replaced with a close-cropped haircut that made his ears stick out a little. He didn’t have on mismatched socks and a ratty old T-shirt like he had on the first day of eighth grade. All of a sudden he was wearing new J’s, crisp jeans, and a black Nike T-shirt. It looked normal on the guys around him but strange on Jordan.
I ran up to him as excited as we always were to see each other.
My hair was in its full form, big and curly, and fell into my face as I threw my arms around his neck. I knew something was wrong when he didn’t hug me back.
“Jordan! You missed everything this summer. Gabi got poison ivy, and we made up a new dance for this year’s talent show—she says she’s actually going to do it this time. And—”