Saturday came faster than I expected it to, and I was shocked when I woke up on the morning of prom, completely excited for my first real high school interaction. I got my hair done that morning at a salon, where they pulled it up and twisted it back into an elegant knot on the back of my head. I had decided to stay blonde for prom since I hadn’t really decided on a hair color I liked just for myself yet. David told me he didn’t have a preference either way, and I was glad he wasn’t one of those boys who thought any girl, no matter how dumb or how unattractive, was instantly “hot” because she was blonde.
By the time David picked me up that evening, I was feeling the butterflies that I was sure were customary for these types of situations. My mom had stuck around long enough to take pictures of David and me together before leaving to wherever it was she went.
“You look amazing,” David said, giving me a smile that could melt butter.
“You don’t look too bad yourself,” I replied as I beamed at him. We hadn’t bothered matching his tie to my dress since I didn’t know the color of my dress until a few days before prom. Instead he wore a nice black suit with a black skinny tie. The old fashioned look suited him perfectly.
“I have something for you,” he said suddenly before we walked out the door. I raised an eyebrow at him inquiringly and he pulled out a little velvet box. “Remember how I told you my mom makes jewelry?” I nodded, urging him to continue. “Well, I asked her for some lessons and I… I made you a bracelet. It’s not as amazing as the stuff she makes, but I thought you might like it.”
Feeling overcome with the love I felt for this boy, I opened the box he had handed to me to find a small pink gold bracelet covered in champagne-colored stones. “It’s amazing,” I said honestly as he secured it around my wrist.
“I thought following tradition has never really been our style, so instead of a corsage, this would do nicely.” Entwining my hand with his, I gave him one long kiss that was interrupted by a knock on the door. David and I exchanged confused looks, but I answered the door since there really wasn’t much other choice, unless we wanted to spend prom night locked in my house… but we wouldn’t get into that possibility at the moment.
As the door swung open, I saw Nate standing on my front porch. He was wearing a suit much like the one David had on and looked as if he’d been crying for hours. His rosy cheeks were especially red today and they matched his bloodshot eyes.
“Nate, what’s wrong?” I asked urgently. David was by my side.
“I finally got Karen’s mom to really talk to me,” he said, between sharp intakes of breath, “I guess she’s really not doing so well.” I had never seen a boy cry-which was saying something since I was in the breakup business-and the scene before me truly broke my heart.
“What did she say exactly?” I urged, hoping to get more information out of him to help me assess the situation.
“I told her that I was on my way to pick Karen up for the prom whether she wanted me to or not, and she told me that Karen was too weak to even get out of bed. Her mom’s really worried about her.” A few tears ran down Nate’s rosy cheeks, and I looked at David for a moment as we silently exchanged an understanding between us.
“Nate, can you take us to Karen’s house?” I asked. David and I were both perfectly healthy at the moment, and I knew Nate would never compromise Karen’s health, so there didn’t seem to be too much harm in our visiting her. “If she can’t go to the prom, we’ll just have to take the prom to her,” I said resolutely.
Nate brightened slightly at this suggestion, and he jumped into his green car, with David and I close behind, and drove to Karen’s house.
It took some convincing to get Karen’s mom to let us in to see her, but in the end I think she was happy that her daughter wouldn’t be left out of the festivities of the evening. As the night wore on and the four of us began to talk about our plans for the future, plans Karen might not ever get to live out, I wondered if maybe we all just wanted to belong somehow. Maybe the reason I had been so scared of sinking to the level of everyone else my whole life was because somewhere, in the back of my mind, I feared that I wouldn’t measure up. Maybe I worried that the experiences I thought I should have in high school wouldn’t measure up to my own expectations.
Though it should have been a sad occasion to see Karen lying in her bed, looking pale and weak as we talked about the trip we would all take this summer, just because we could, it was a happy moment. Karen laughed feebly as Nate held her hand, and I was immensely grateful for all of the things I had always taken for granted-the future I had always assumed everyone was entitled to.
In the end, I had come to terms with myself and what my life was. It wasn’t particularly bad or good. And as my mom tried to say, even with her poor communication skills, the individual journey of our lives doesn’t really label us bad or good. Life was whatever I chose to make of it.
And though I traded in what I thought was an important high school experience, almost pivotal to my feeling that human connection, what I gained was so much more than I could have ever imagined. Something much richer.
I discovered love.