Chapter 127: Overrated
Okay, so prom ended up a total waste of time.
Dinner was a joke, for one. All the girls ignored me, and it seemed like they purposely separated Alison and I so I'd have absolutely no one to talk to. I was stuck at the end of our table with one of the jocks across from me and he spent the entire dinner either stuffing his face or tearing off blobs of his roll and throwing them at exposed cleavage.
His aim was pretty good by the end of it.
I didn't eat much. My dress was too tight anyway, despite the rumbling in my stomach. Didn't stop Brad from cleaning his plate and mine. At least the food didn't go to waste. Though as I watched him stuff what amounted to about half a potato into his mouth at once before laughing and spitting most of it out on the table, I quickly lost my appetite.
So classy. Why had I not noticed this about him before? The way he slurped his drink, how he grated his knife across the plate when he bothered to cut anything at all? Not to mention the way he ignored me, instead leaning over to put his arm around one of the other girls. His eyes stayed glued to the front of her dress and he cheered when a blob of roll soared toward her and found its target
I couldn't stand to watch when he offered to retrieve it. From the giggling I heard as I sipped my ice water in an attempt to cool my temper, she wasn't protesting nearly enough.
I'd spent the last two years thinking Quaid was the jerk. Now I was beginning to wonder.
Dinner didn't last long. I smiled sympathetically at the waitress as we abandoned our table. I slid her an extra fifty as a tip, knowing how much work she had ahead of her. It was just money, my family had lots of that. And empathy, thank goodness.
Oh right. The silver purse. Nothing embarrassing, as it turned out. Just lipstick and gloss, some spare bobby pins and a roll of money. I flipped through the bills when I settled in the limo for the second time, keeping my count private. I'm not sure what Erica was expecting, but I could fly to South America and back on that bankroll.
The drive to the school was short, blissfully short. I think if I heard one more horrible rendition of the latest pop song the girls made the driver play over and over I would explode. Brad was the first out, already waving to another group piling out of their own limo. Aside from the odd one in the summer, I'd never seen so many of the stretched out black cars. Wilding Springs didn't exactly warrant daily trips in the lap of luxury.
I tripped over the hem of my dress as I climbed out, naturally. And where was Brad? Yeah, Brad. Had his back to me, didn't he? Wolf whistling at some girl in a skanky outfit it took me a moment to realize was Page. Gone was the fallen angel I'd first met. And from what I could tell, also gone was the sweet but needy cheerleader who just wanted to fit in. Ever since Suzanne left town, moving after the whole possession fiasco left her stripped of her confidence and cruelty, things had been actually nice at school.
I guess Page saw the opportunity. The last week or so she'd been raising some dust, gathering a posse. Bullying. I frowned on it, but I wasn't exactly in a position to really care all that much. I was too busy feeling sorry for myself.
She waved, teetering on her own heels, skintight red dress plunging so low I was sure her belly button would pop out at any second. And that wasn't the only thing threatening to pop out. Page caught my eye and smiled. There was nothing nice about it.
Whatever. There was less than a week of school left anyway. What could she do?
Feeling possessive and more than a little miffed, I grabbed Brad's arm. He looked down at me as if he'd forgotten I was there.
"Cool, right?" He grinned, exposing the sliver of lettuce stuck in his perfect front teeth. Does it make me a bad person I didn't say anything about it?
A giant and very tacky archway, covered in gold, green and white balloons, stood outside the side entrance to the local hall. This town was just so full of class I could barely stand it. Or the chattering, swaying line of overdressed grads and dates waiting to have their pictures taken under the fluttering, bloated entry. Every once in a while one of the balloons popped and, without fail, all the girls screamed and giggled. I felt like a block of ice. I'd been through far too much to jump over anything so stupid.
Jaded, that's me. And totally out of place.
The worst was the incessant, "Smile!" from the kids on the yearbook committee pressed into service to take the pictures. Finally it was our turn. My feet ached so much I wanted to hurl them across the parking lot, my mood rapidly deteriorating as the wait continued. I'm sure I was a scowling mess by the time we positioned ourselves under the arch.
I flinched when I saw Beth behind the camera. I waved at her a little and she waved back with much more enthusiasm.
"You look gorgeous!" She sighed, her eyes huge and admiring as she tipped her head to the side with a dreamy expression.
I stuck my tongue out at her. Just as the too-perky voice of the photographer said, "Smile!"
Um, yeah. Oops. Whatever.
Done with our pose for posterity, Brad swept us inside, found us a table, seated me at it and left me there to get us drinks.
And pretty much never came back.
At least Alison's date did the same. Come to mention it, all the girls we were with turned up dateless within a few minutes of arriving. I made sure to save a seat for my best friend which she fell into with a huge smile on her face.
"You look, oh my god, so stunning." She giggled and ran one hand over the fabric of my skirt. "I'm jealous."
I shrugged and tried not to breathe too deeply while my feet groaned in pleasure at having my weight off of them.
"You too," I said and meant it. Her dress was the palest pink, a sheath that fit her so well it looked like a painting. Her hair was down, corkscrew curls just soft enough she didn't look too young.
"Thanks," she said. "I just borrowed this from Mom. Not like it's our prom or anything."
True. I looked around me and sighed. If this was all there was to it, I wasn't impressed.
What was my problem? Why had I wanted so badly to be normal? Normal was boring. Normal was watching your date from across the darkened and badly decorated hall built sometime before my grandmother was a baby, making a fool of himself with his buddies. Normal was this horrible, dull feeling, of being muffled and wrapped in cotton, where everything was so quiet and empty all I could hear was the echo of my own regret.
Normal sucked.
No wonder latents like Brad felt such a connection to witches. Even a taste of what life could really be like must have been a real addiction. But I didn't even have that. According to Mom, my witch power was still there and she called me a latent, but whatever was trying to protect me had me so tied up and smothered I might as well have been just plain old human.
I spotted Brad slipping something from his pocket and handing it to his buddy. Great. Alcohol. At least now if I wanted to drink I could. Any kind of booze does weird things to those with power. I'd never tasted the stuff for that reason. But it didn't matter anymore.
Didn't change my mind about wanting to drink, though. I'd seen Brad drunk. It turned him into a jerk. Okay, more of a jerk. And in the mood I was it, it was likely I wouldn't be much better under the influence.
The guys finally returned to our table, loaded down with punch. One sniff of mine and I understood the purpose of the bottle. I shoved it aside. Alison took it with a wink while Brad and his crew wandered off again.
Why was I here again?
"Having fun yet?" Alison leaned in, having to yell to be heard over the pounding music coming from the DJ booth. I glanced over the dance floor and the handful of lackluster participants gyrating their way to the beat while a sparkling disco ball showered them with points of light.
So. Tacky.
"I guess." I leaned away from her strong breath.
"Yeah, me too." She giggled. "I was here last year, too. Same old." She downed the last of her drink then started on mine. "I only said yes this year because you were coming too." She hugged my arm with one of hers.
"Thanks." I watched Brad and the boys hovering around a group of dancers. I knew them at least on nodding terms. Simon would fit in with them if he'd chosen to. I could hear deep laughter even over the sound of the music as several of the football boys made their presence known. Not that Brad participated in the bullying, but I knew now he was drinking and didn't have the best empathy when he was diluting his blood with who knew what.
There was a time when he wouldn't have left my side. I guessed those days were over.
We endured the dance for about an hour. Brad and the other guys finally did their duty, coming to collect the girls when a slow song started playing. I hated to stand up again, my poor swollen feet inventing curse words at me when I did, but cuddling close to him while we danced was at least fun. He smelled fantastic and I loved the way his arms curved around me.
But not how his feet tended to catch the tips of my shoes.
Dance over, at least for the cool crowd it seemed, the group piled out of the hall and back into the parking lot. Our limo was gone, but I spotted Brad's truck in a space nearby.
But Brad had been drinking. I stopped him as the others staggered toward their waiting cars, Alison waving at me as she slid into the back seat of a convertible.
"Should you be driving?" Cars tooted at us as they pulled away, tires squealing. The couple coming with us waited impatiently beside the truck.
"I'm fine," he said. "Are you coming or not?"
I hesitated. This was stupid. I knew he was drinking. What was he thinking?
Before I had a chance to do anything, say anything, he pulled me into his arms and kissed me.
He tasted like alcohol and garlic and he pressed so hard it hurt. When he tried to jam his tongue into my mouth, I jerked away from him. He made a frustrated sound and stepped back. When Brad met my eyes, his were distant.
"Syd," he said. "Look, I didn't want to do this tonight. I wanted to wait. You know. Until after." He ran his hand through his hair, shuffled his feet. "It's just... I don't think we should see each other anymore."
Oh. My. God. He was dumping me. At prom.
"It's not you," he lied in haste. "It's totally me. I thought about what you said last year. About focusing on college. Football. And I think you're right." He tried a smile while his friends called for him to hurry up. "I really just want to enjoy my last summer. You know?"
I refused to cry. Not that I really wanted to spend the rest of my life with Brad. I knew now I didn't. That fact was crystal clear. But there was something desperately pathetic about being dumped at prom that just put the last sprinkles on the crappiness that was my life.
"Sure," I said. "I get it."
He exhaled in a rush and laughed a little. "You're the best, Syd." He turned toward the truck, keys jingling in his hand. He paused as he hit the unlock button, the loud beep lost in the chatter of his friends as they climbed in. "Are you coming?"
I couldn't bear to go to the party now. Not like I wanted to anyway.
"It's okay," I said, hugging myself. "I'll call my Mom. Have fun."
It was the last time he looked back. His big truck rumbled off leaving me alone in the dark.
Nice.
No, damn it. Not nice. Not nice at all.
Instead of calling Mom, I started to walk. Which was stupid, considering my shoes. Those ended up dangling by their thin straps from my fingers after about half a block of cursing and hobbling like an idiot. My other hand hitched up my skirt so I wouldn't walk on it while balancing the silver bag.
The stupid flower corsage ended up in the ditch a block later, tossed there with a fury that surprised me. Followed rapidly by tears I couldn't contain.
Lucky for me, Erica included some tissues in the purse and the coating of hairspray hopefully kept me from making too big of a mess of myself.
The tears ran out about two blocks later. All that remained was the numbness.
I hated it.
Home was all the way on the other side of town. It really wasn't that far, if I had been in sneakers and shorts. But dragging my body weight in satin and chiffon, not to mention my badly abused ego, all that way was almost too much for me to consider. I'd made it about half way when I stopped and sat on a bench near a park and tried to decide if the shoes should go in the small pond or if they would somehow poison the ducks.
I ignored the odd car driving by. Especially those that honked at me, catcalls coming from the passengers. Jerks. Like I gave a crap. Page's shout was the nastiest of all.
"What's the matter, loser?" The car slowed down just long enough for her to finish. "Lose someone?"
She and her so-called friends laughed as they sped off. Loser, huh? Her opinion. So what. I was left behind, my boyfriend dumped me and here I was stuck in the middle of town in my prom dress and bare feet.
Maybe she was right after all.
My life could not suck any worse. Seriously.
At first I didn't believe it when I heard a familiar engine rumbled up. I kept my eyes locked on the dirty pavement, the black of it staining my toes. I refused to see Quaid drive by in his black leather pants astride his shiny motorcycle. Refused to see the contempt in his face for the mess I'd gotten myself into, the judgment, the cynicism. Because, you know, that would suck more.
Much more. And I'd probably have to throw myself in the pond if I gave him that power over me.
Poor ducks.
It wasn't until the motor stopped in front of me I realized he wasn't going away. I drew a deep breath, held it. Searched for my anger and found a thread of it. I was Sydlynn Hayle, damn it. Maybe I wasn't a witch anymore, but no one made me feel crappy about my choices except me.
It was enough to rouse my nerve. I looked up. And into Quaid's eyes.
"Nice dress," he said.
I couldn't talk, could barely breathe. Gone was my indignation, the line to my fury snapped clean. I wanted to hug him, to have him hug me back, kiss me and tell me everything was okay. But he'd made his choice, hadn't he? And that forced me to make my own.
Regret added another crappy layer to the black pit of despair.
I was sure he had prepared a scathing speech, a classic Quaid snark that could flay me to the quick with the careless rumble of his voice. Instead, he made me wait for it. Quaid stared at me for a long moment, his chocolate gaze unreadable. I must have looked pathetic and unable to take what he had to dish out, because he reached down beside him and retrieved his spare helmet.
"Need a ride, princess?"
Any other time, that smirk and remark would have won him a scowl and me stomping off on my own, furious. Not to mention the way he'd been ignoring me for weeks. But I couldn't manage it. He was right. I was an idiot who thought she could survive in the real world only to find out my dreams were nothing but a horrible mess.
I swallowed my pride. If he had something to say to me, fine. But at least I'd be away from here and the humiliation sinking into the very ground beneath me. I stood up, took the helmet. Crammed it over my perfect hair. The bobby pins jabbed me in a million places but I didn't care. I gathered the hem of my enormous dress and jumped on the back of his bike.
"My hero," I said as he hit the gas and sped away.
***
