Just Like the Movies (6 page)

I. Am. So. LAME.

Groaning aloud, I turn the corner toward my journalism class. Immediately, I'm assaulted by dozens of balloons.

“What the hell?” I say, batting the ribbon tails away from my face.

A glance around shows me a handful of other bewildered students are doing the same thing. Then I see Sam Peterson standing at one end of the hall and his new girlfriend, Layla, at the other. Layla's mouth has dropped open and I can't really blame her; her boyfriend is standing fifty feet away from her wearing a full suit of armor. I don't know where someone even
gets
one of those.

I watch along with everyone else as Sam clomps toward Layla, clumsily maneuvering around the balloons. Some of their tails catch on his chain mail. As he gets closer, I see a red rose in one of his metal-clad hands. In the other, he's holding a shield with the words, I'LL BE YOUR KNIGHT IN SHINING ARMOR IF YOU GO TO PROM WITH ME.

Aw,
hell
. I should have known. Prom proposals are easily the best
and
worst part of a girl's senior year.

I don't know when the prom proposals started. What happened to guys and girls just
asking each other
to dances? In the past few years, though, no one is satisfied with a
simple phone call. Now, all the guys are expected to make a grand gesture. Hence the suit of armor and balloons.

Although, as I watch Layla nod at her boyfriend before throwing her arms awkwardly around him, I feel an unwelcome twinge of envy. When I think about that kind of chutzpah, the guts it takes for a guy to announce his intentions in the middle of the school day . . . well, it's pretty admirable. Even a cynic like me can admit that.

Sam struggles to remove his helmet, and I turn away when Layla launches herself at his face. I don't know what it is about kissing—whether it's my mom and one of her many dud-dudes or two classmates or even strangers, there is little that makes me feel more wistful than a true, honest, no-holds-barred kiss. I can't think of anything I'd rather have or anything that feels more impossible to get.

All right, Lily. Buck up. Get past the balloons and the bluster and you've got a jackass wearing the contents of a recycling bin.

As I walk into journalism, I see Tricia Michaels, the editor in chief, leaning over a mock-up of next week's paper. She glances up at me, then rolls her eyes.

“You see that out there?” she sort of sneers, jerking her head at the doorway. I nod.

“Yeah.”

“Whatever. I mean, I had Donavan take pictures of it and stuff. But I mean, talk about lame prom proposals. My boyfriend better think of something
way
more creative.”

I don't say anything as I walk to my desk. Tricia is not exactly my favorite person—she's super-judgmental and says nasty things about the rest of the newspaper staff when they aren't around—but she's on SGA with me and heads up the National Honors Society. So she's not someone I want to piss off before graduation—not if I want to graduate with one of those NHS cords draped over my gown. And let's face it, of course I want that.

I start rummaging through the stacks of paper on my desk. This spring, I'm in charge of the Senior Sections—it's a tradition that the seniors get a special feature in each edition until graduation. We've done Superlatives and Sports Spotlights already. Now I'm working on the Senior Wills, and that means I've got about three hundred submissions to sort through. Not every senior participates in every section—but Senior Wills? No one misses out on that one. We do a double issue just to fit everyone in, and each application has a word limit.

“I bequeath my soccer ball to the girls on JV, my jersey to Coach Bruin, and my cleats to my girl, Josie. You girls are gonna rock next season,” says Missy Gunner, the girls' soccer captain and all-around jock.

“To my boyfriend, Hanson, I leave all our letters, the rose petals I've saved, the pictures from the photo booth, and a thousand kisses. I will always love you, boo-bear!” says Heidi Ponce, who's been dating her boyfriend, Hanson, for, oh, maybe a month. I have a feeling Senior Wills
are kind of like tattoos—easy ways to doom relationships. But who am I to judge? I haven't even written one yet. Not that I even know what I'd say . . .

I bequeath my undying love and affection to Joe Lombardi, who knocks me off my feet in the stairwell and in life. Let's “motor” our way to the future. Vroom-vroom, baby.

Ugh. Yeah, I might skip out on this altogether.

“Hey Lily?” Gina Holt walks toward me holding a folder and wearing a determined expression. “I need you to take over this story for me.”

I want to sigh in relief.
Anything
to take me away from the Senior Will purgatory I'm in.

“Sure,” I say, reaching for the folder. “What's it about?”

“Prom proposals,” she says before turning around. “You have to summarize the ones that have happened so far and rate them on a romance meter.”

“Rate them on a
what
?”

“A romance meter,” she says over her shoulder. “One kiss for ‘just friends,' two for ‘fun and flirty,' etc. It goes up to five—‘hot 'n' heavy' or something like that.”

This
is what I get for complaining about Senior Wills—a prom proposal exposé complete with a rating system?

I force myself not to gag. Here it is—hard-hitting journalism at its best, folks. I'm sure my Pulitzer is already on its way.

All week long, the big story at school is Sam's prom proposal. It's probably the most dramatic one that's happened so far this year. By Friday, though, I'm kind of sick of hearing about it. Sick . . . and jealous, I guess. Still no prom proposal in my world—at least not yet.

At lunch, the saga of Sam and Layla is replaced with my friend Jocelyn's story about how her boyfriend, Owen, asked her to the prom last night too. Owen's a pretty private guy, so I think we're all surprised by his renting advertising space on a movie theater screen. When Jocelyn sits down to see the most recent
Paranormal
movie, up pops a picture of Owen holding a set of cue cards and a shy smile. She shows us a picture on her iPhone where he's holding one that says, WILL YOU GO TO PROM WITH ME?

“It was so incredibly romantic,” she says breathlessly.
“And the best part is that it's over now. I mean, I was dying to find out the way Owen would ask me. But now that it's done, I can focus on my dress and my hair and all the fun parts of prom. Not the stressful parts.”

A couple of the other girls are nodding—most of my teammates have already been asked. Beth glances over at me and raises an eyebrow.

“Nothing from Tommy yet, I gather?”

I shrug and try to look unfazed.

“Not yet. But Tommy's a planner—I'm sure he's got something killer up his sleeve and he is waiting for the perfect moment.”

The movie theater idea is pretty genius—and since Tommy's taking me to the old revival theater this afternoon, I wonder if a prom proposal is what he has planned. The fact that we're even going there is a romantic gesture—there's a showing of one of my favorite movies,
Titanic
, playing for one night only.

So that's what I'm thinking about when I meet him at the General Qi after school. He's already waiting, leaning up against the passenger-side door with his muscular arms crossed over the chest of his black T-shirt. God, he looks scrumptious. Once again, I feel that flit of hesitation, of self-consciousness—like,
Why is he with me?
I may be confident on the track, but I'm anything but when it comes to Tommy. I'm not a cheerleader or model thin or movie-star
gorgeous. I'm just a girl who runs fast and loves him. But maybe, just maybe, that's enough.

“Hey baby.”

He wraps his arms around me and smooths a hand down my back, then kisses my cheek.

“Ready to go?”

“Sure.” I smile up at him as he opens my door and I slide inside. The smell of leather seats and vanilla air freshener hits me immediately, and I settle into my seat.

“So, did you hear about how Owen asked Jocelyn to the prom?”

Tommy frowns a little, then shakes his head.

“No, I don't think so. Definitely heard about Peterson's proposal on Monday, though. Man, he's got it bad for Layla—what self-respecting guy would rent a suit of armor and fill a hallway with helium balloons?”

“I think it's sweet,” I say, pouting a little. Tommy grins at me.

“That's because you're a born romantic.”

“Well,” I say, giving him a pointed look, “at least Layla
has
a date for the prom . . .”

He sighs. “You know, I don't know who the hell came up with this whole prom proposal thing anyway. Whatever happened to simply asking, ‘Hey, wanna go to prom? Sure, sounds good.' Seriously, why is it necessary to roll out the red carpet for a sure thing?”

I stare at him. “So that's what I am to you? A sure thing?”

Tommy glances over at me. “That's not what I meant.”

“That's what you
said
.”

“Come on, Mare, you know what I mean. We've been together long enough that prom should be a given, right?”

“Well, that doesn't mean a girl doesn't want a romantic proposal to get her there. Prom's less than a month away.”

“Whatever. Let's just drop this. I don't want to fight with you.”

We run by my house so I can feed the dog and write my parents a note. No one's home when Tommy pulls into the driveway. He pauses, shifting the car into park.

“Want me to come in with you?” he asks, looking over at me.

I swallow. There are dueling Marijkes again, just like when I start a race. One Marijke says, “Absolutely I want you to come in—I want you to do a lot more than that!” The other Marijke says, “No ‘I love you' means no hanky-panky. Period.”

“Do you want to come in?” I ask, meeting his gaze. His lips spread into a sexy smile.

“Well, I figured I could come inside for a little while and remind you just how romantic I can be . . .”

He cocks an eyebrow, and I feel my resolve starting to thaw around me.

“Okay,” I say slowly. “But we're only staying for a minute.”

We're hardly in the door before Tommy has his hands
on me. I drop my bag on the living room couch just as he pulls me against him.

“Tommy,” I protest as he begins to nibble at my neck.

“I thought you wanted me to be romantic?” His voice is a little gruff in my ear and a shiver passes over me.

“I just don't think we should start something we can't finish. And the movie starts in less than an hour. This is important to me.”

“Okay, okay.” He brushes a barely there kiss over my lips. “Then let's get out of here so I won't be tempted.”

I scribble a note and leave it on the counter. When I glance over at the kitchen table, I can't help but notice the stack of papers at my place that seems to be growing every day. I've been accepted to three different universities, but I haven't officially made a decision yet. North Carolina State is my top choice and I should have mailed in my acceptance last week, but I'd been so caught up with practicing that I couldn't even stop to breathe. Now is the perfect time to catch up, but let's face it: I'm so caught up with Tommy that I haven't had the time or desire to start filling out boring paperwork.

So I leave it for another day. Again.

Instead, I focus on
right now
—on making Tommy understand how I feel about him and putting him in the position to ask me to prom. Like Jack and Rose in
Titanic,
we're meant to be together. I just know it.

As I leave school, I pull out my phone and hit the voice mail icon. I don't know if Mom felt bad about going out almost every night this week or if she just wants to try and reconnect, but when she woke up this morning she was determined that we have a Girls' Night In. Mac has soccer practice for most of the evening, so she promised to hit Redbox on the way home from work.