Twenty-Six
“What do you think?” I spin in a circle, as if seeing all the angles is required to make a judgment call.
“I think it’s so nice for you to make an appearance at the winter formal after coming straight from a funeral.” Odette chews on the end of a braid, and her face is not one of rapturous wonder like I’d hoped.
“Odette!” I twirl the black A-line dress again, and the sad cotton skirt briefly curls up like a half-hearted salute before slumping limply at my knees. “It’s black. It’s the only black dress I have. I was trying to make a point to Ash.”
“Did you hear that, Pops? She’s trying to tell Ash something.”
“Did Ash ask you to join his monochromatic lifestyle?” Poppy sits cross-legged on my bed, sewing a fabric cabbage rose to a dress already riddled with sequins and ribbons.
“Of course not.”
“Then let’s see if we can do a little better than this.” Odette yanks open my closet, riffling through sweaters and church clothes.
“You’re wearing black,” I snap, not annoyed that she, of course, looks perfect in her black satin jumpsuit, but that I am hopeless and not equipped for grand gestures.
“Yes, and it’s working for me,” she says, her upper body deep into the section of closet that has evolved into a shrine to my poor middle school choices. “Did you know that you own very few things that are not pants?”
“I have no idea why you’re announcing that like it’s a surprise.”
A soft knock on the door jangles my last nerve, and Momma sticks her head in. “How’s it going, girls?” She whistles low at Odette’s jumpsuit and gives Poppy a few more suggestions on where she can stick more cabbage roses without toppling over. Then she floats into my orbit. When she raises an eyebrow, I deflate soufflé style.
“Why didn’t you ignore me when I said I liked jeans, and buy me a closet full of party dresses?”
She smiles. “Come with me.”
I trail after her. “Wait, is there really a party-dress closet?”
She ignores me as we go through her bedroom to the master closet. She walks in and pulls out a garment bag wedged at the back.
“This is old,” she says, half apology, half warning. “But it’s from once upon a time when I had your figure and your hair color.”
I unzip the yellowed plastic and pull out a sage-green tulle dress. It has a corset-style bust, puffed short sleeves, and an Empire waist that would make the dress flare out and hit just above my knees.
“I’ve never seen this before.” I trace the smooth cotton lining and send up several prayers and bless-yous to whoever made it.
“I wore it to my first homecoming in college,” she says, voice clogged with nostalgia. “It was the night your father asked me out for the first time.”
I look up, my fingers tangled in the skirt.
“I want you to have it.”
I pull her into a hug, crushing the dress between us. She helps me pull off the black, and zips me into folds of a green that makes my brain feel like I’m walking through a forest at dusk. Cool and calm and—
“It’s perfect.” Her eyes are misty, but she’s right.
It feels perfect. I feel perfect. Even if tonight doesn’t end up like I hope, I’ll still be standing in a Dress (with a capital D), surrounded by my best friends, and tomorrow I’ll wake up and find a different path.
I walk back into my room to squeals and claps, and I do no less than four slow-motion twirls.
I don’t attempt Ash’s eyeliner tutorial, but I do leave my hair loose and cascading down my back and shoulders like a ginger kudzu. We load into Odette’s jeep, and we’re almost at the school when Poppy asks, “Do you plan to corner Ash tonight and confess your love to him?”
Never Mind the Monster’s newfound popularity has secured them a gig at the formal tonight, and getting to see them perform live again has me straining to speed up the car through sheer force of will.
“I don’t have a plan, per se. I just want him to be clear on how I feel,” I say, face hot. “And nobody said anything about love.”
“Even better, one always appreciates a passionate declaration of friendship.”
We pull into the gym parking lot, the night already in full swing. Our school isn’t like some of those impressive places in Atlanta or New York with marble floors, mobile coffee carts, or even a paved student parking lot. Our decorating budget allows for fake birch trees and twinkle lights for winter formal, and a prom theme that alternates between Night in Paris and Magic Garden.
So, when I say they have done the most with so little, I mean it. Swaths of white tulle, like snowbanks in moonlight, drape across the ceiling. The birch trees create a little forest that guides us through the entrance, past a photo station, and then opens up onto the dance floor, complete with refreshment tables and a makeshift stage.
And there he is. Ash is wearing a black suit that hugs every inch of his long limbs, and a snowy white shirt unbuttoned a little too liberally to be socially acceptable in River Haven. Unless you also have studded jewelry and long black hair, and currently have a guitar strapped to your front.
“Hot,” Odette says with a sigh.
“Hazel?” I ask, nodding at her girlfriend stacking amps.
“Whichever,” she says, leaning into me.
“Tell me,” I begin, “would I be super cringe if I tell a guy how I feel about him in a very public way?”
She doesn’t answer right away, and my armpits get sticky. “Odette?”
“I’m thinking,” she says, without apology. “Are you planning to rush the stage? Stand on the refreshment table and yell about how you want to date the crap out of him? Why does it have to be public?”
I have no plan. I don’t know why, but it needs to be more.
It’s hard to explain. I thought about showing up at his house. Just marching up those stairs and spelling it all out for him with only his guitar amps as a witness. It would be a tidier resolution for sure. Get in, confess big feelings, smoldering kisses, and back home in time to catch a few episodes of my favorite baking show.
“Because he’s a big deal to me,” I say instead. “And he makes me want to make my feelings about him a big deal to everyone else. Because he’s never anyone’s first pick. Not with his parents who are gone more than they’re not, and before I got to know him and myself better, not even for me. But I see him now. I know him. I want him, and I want there to be no doubt in his mind or anybody else’s.”
“Again, I’m going to have to say, hot.”
Poppy holds up her phone. “Can you say that into the microphone again, please?”
I blush. “I’m serious.”
The crowd parts, and I see Josh walk in with that sophomore on his arm. I’m perfectly aware of her name, and that none of this is her fault, but it gives me a small wave of nausea to realize that it probably takes someone as young (and gullible) as I was two years ago to not see right through him.
I leave all that in the dust, and we drift over to the stage. Ash is looming over us, his personality almost too big to contain on that stage or in his body. I can’t believe I ever thought of him as quiet, or moody. Well, he is moody, but he’s also electric.
Heavy silver rings wrap around his knuckles, and he grabs the microphone the way he once threaded his fingers through my hair while overcaffeinated middle schoolers with laser tag guns swarmed us. When he leans forward, the deep shadow of his voice plays over every word, every vowel, and I feel my knees go a little weak. Honest to Jesus, like an old-timey Victorian lady about to have a real need for a fainting couch.
Lights slide over all his sharp angles, and I know he can’t see me, but it still feels like every song is for me. I move, although I have no idea how to dance to this. No idea how to dance in general, but the three of us knock together—all elbows and laughter—like a trio of loose bottles from my aunt Birdie’s wine bag.
“Hot,” I agree, sighing.
“Soon, baby,” Odette says, twirling and dipping me until my back creaks. My hair is damp against my neck, and my limbs are loose and heavy with music.
The crowd moves closer, and my glasses fog until my world shrinks to nothing but Ash’s voice in my ears. They hit that last note and I wake as if from hypnosis.
I don’t know how long has passed—five songs? Eight? Three years?
The principal, Mr. Weaver, climbs the steps, and I realize we’ve danced straight through to the announcement of winter court.
“I know you all have been waiting for this!” Mr. Weaver waves a sealed envelope in the air, and the band starts to pack up.
“Maybe I can ask him to dance later,” I say, fumbling. “How have I read all these books, and I still don’t know how to make a romantic gesture—”
“Can I have everyone’s attention, please?”
My head snaps up, as Ash’s voice fills the auditorium.
“Ash, we’re announcing winter court—”
“This will only take a minute, Mr. Weaver.” He cradles the mic, and he’s looking right at me.
“Marlowe.” He says my name in a way that leaves no confusion to what this speech is going to contain. He pulls out a piece of paper, and my knees wobble.
“I haven’t been able to stop thinking about you. Not since I first saw a beautiful, red-haired girl wearing a math pun T-shirt in the hallway on my first day of school last year.”
He pauses, looking up from his letter, and the meaning of his words hits me all at once. Odette squeals softly next to me.
“Then when I got a chance to actually spend time with you, I knew I would never recover.”
I flush at the murmurs that race through the student body, my face and my brain on fire.
“My point is,” he says carefully, slowly. Giving my brain time to catch up. “I want every moment with you. The quiet ones where I’m watching you work on homework, and I can barely keep up with how you process information so quickly. When you’re explaining mushrooms and nouns to me in a way that sounds like music. All the loud moments too, where I’m trying to drag out our time together on a stupid hayride, because that’s the closest I’d been able to get to you and your smile makes me feel drunk.”
I feel like I’m in a sauna, and it’s almost unbearable. I race for the stairs, and I’m on the stage in front of him before my brain can catch up. Then it’s just the two of us, the spotlight washing everything else away.
“I like it. I like you,” he says. The whisper of more hangs in the air, unspoken, but I can still feel it. “And I know that every moment with you feels more important than the one before. I want them all. Every laugh, every chaotic thought that runs through your brain, and every facial expression you have—even the one you make where you try to pretend I’m not hilarious. They all just make me want you more.”
I’m breathless, like I’ve finally run the mile that Coach Grubbs swears I’m going to need to be able to graduate.
“That’s it,” he says, clearing his throat, and shoving the worn paper back in his pocket. “That’s all I have to say.” I close my eyes as every feeling rolls into a massive, tearful, overwhelming wave, and I feel filled to the brim with everything that is Ashton Hayes. I pray to Jesus that after a lifetime of Sunday school, respecting my elders, and leading grace about twenty percent of the time—the least He can do for me right now is not let me faint in this blinding spotlight.
In answer, He sends a cloud across the sun, as Ash moves in front of me. Cool air slides over my face and I let out a small sigh.
His fingers slide through my heavy hair, and the cool kiss of metal rings brings me back to life.
“I thought you deserved your own letter,” Ash murmurs.
“I was going to do my own grand gesture.” I open my eyes and he’s blotting out everything else. It’s just us, and he’s touching me, and I’m wearing a pretty dress, and the slide of his hand against my waist is so gentle I could cry. “I wanted to make sure you know how I feel about you.”
“So, tell me,” he says, the words washing over me as all the space and air evaporates.
My brain shuts off when I’m reminded of his taste and the feeling of being in his arms and—
“What the hell is going on?”
I snap away from Ash as Mr. Weaver’s face swings into focus.
“Marlowe Meadows, I am trying to just announce these damn winners so I can wrap up this evening and go home to my cat.”
“I’m sorry, I—”
“Do you think I get paid enough for this?”
“No, I’m sure—”
“Well, I don’t. Can I please get on with it?”
“We’re gone,” Ash says, cradling my hand in his and getting us off the stage so fast I almost feel like I dreamed the whole thing.
Mr. Weaver announces the winter court, and it’s not me and Ash (because this isn’t a teen movie, y’all). This moment is real and it’s mine, but not even Ash could have gotten me back up there.
Poppy and Odette tear through the crowd as Josh and Tiffany go up to receive their crowns. Music pumps in from overhead, and Ash leans in and asks, “Want to get out of here?”
I smile up at him, a thousand watts at least, but I shake my head. I came with Poppy and Odette, and there’s still a little bit of dance floor that hasn’t seen our moves yet. They pull me back into the crowd, and we’re jerky movements, instinct, and laughter bubbling up so hard my chest hurts. Hazel joins, and Ash is spinning me and dipping Poppy, and everything is… right.
Every coefficient is right. Every variable makes sense. And the answer? It’s perfect.
“We’re really doing this?” I ask, always needing the box to put things in.
His answer is a soft kiss at the corner of my mouth. “We’re going to have to start calling our fieldwork dates.”
I grin. “Since you mentioned that, I’ve been reading a lot of holiday romances, and I think a Christmas-tree farm sounds like an ideal excursion.” My brain blanks for a moment at the smile that spreads across his face. “Or ice skating? Or hot chocolate while ice skating? Or hot chocolate while ice skating around a Christmas-tree farm?”
Long, elegant fingers skim along my jaw. “I can’t wait.”
I step closer. “Maybe this was my big plan all along. Step one: convince Ashton Hayes to be my romance tutor.”
He leans closer until his breath mingles with mine.
I wrap my hand around the back of his neck. “Step two: flood him with mushroom facts and romance tropes until I get him to fall for me.” The space shrinks between us even more, and I can feel the smile as he presses his lips against mine.
“Mastermind,” he murmurs against my skin. “Lady Jessica would be so proud.”