She stood there wearing a brand new dress made just for her. She made sure she took her time with her hair and her dad even let her put a little makeup on. She was so nervous. Tonight was going to be the night, the night he was going to ask her to dance. She was sure of it. He had been very flirty with her all week, smiled every time he saw her and even told her that he couldn't wait to see her later tonight. Of course he was going to ask her to dance.
I got ready at home, by myself. I didn't want the sounds of my friends in my ears right now. I needed to concentrate on looking the best I could. I know my friends would have been very supportive, I just needed to be alone. My family had my dress made for me and it was perfect. Beautiful shiny candy apple red with black polka dots. It was tight on top, showed off my boobs (I had finally got some and yes was going to show as much as possible) and the bottom flared out like a fan. So when every time I spun around, it would spin with me. No tights, white socks with lace tips and the prettiest black shoes I had ever seen. I couldn't do much about my crazy curls, but try to tame them as much as I could. I thought about putting my hair up, but it had taken me so long to grow it, I wanted to show it off. Thankfully, I found some one my aunt's hair junk in the bottom cabinet under the sink. I copied the way she would use it on myself, and when I flipped my head back over to check it out, it looked pretty good to me. My dad called out that is was time to go. He was going to drop me off at my best friends house so we can walk to the dance together. I ran out of the bathroom to my room. I quickly put on my necklace, earrings and a beautiful bracelet my mom let me borrow. I knew it was costume jewelry but I didn't care. It was sparkled like a million diamonds. I took one last glance at myself and with an approving nod I ran downstairs.
The drive seemed to take forever. I wanted to tell my dad to hurry up, but I knew better then that. So I just sat there with a smile on my face and nodding at everything he was telling me.
"Don't talk to any adults outside the building where the dance is."
"Make sure you girls stay together."
"No kissing boys!"
To which I answered, "Ewl, Pop." But my heart was pounding at the thought of that certain boy kissing me.
Finally reaching my best friends house, I thank my Pop for the ride, jumped out and ran to the front door. I didn't even have to knock. She swung the door open and I could tell she was just excited as I was. In the house, we told each other how awesome we looked and touched up our makeup. Two more of our friends showed up, and we had to tell my best friends mom to stop taking pictures so we could leave already. We knew we didn't want to be the first ones there, but we didn't want to the last ones either. Camera put away, us four headed out the door, feeling like a million bucks, to walk the two blocks to our school.
The cafeteria looked beautiful. Streamers strung everywhere, long tables with food and drinks on them and balloons everywhere. The strings of the balloons were kept long with curly ends, it was perfect. The DJ was spinning all the jams and we hit the dance floor hard. Janet Jackson, Lisa Lisa and the Cult Jam, Michael Jackson and Madonna kept us on the dance floor. I was having so much fun, the boy of my dreams almost slipped my mind. My best friend tapped me on the shoulder and pointed to the door. There he was. He looked so good, it almost stopped my heart. He had on some black slacks, button up shirt and a tie. He caught me looking at him and flashed a huge smile my way. Pretty sure I almost died. When I smiled back at him, I could totally feel my cheeks flush. If I wasn't brown, you would have been able to see the red on my cheeks. However, I didn't want to seem too eager. Or to let on in anyway all the hard work I put into my appearance was all for him. So I did what any other girl would have done my age, I ignored him for the next hour. I thought if I acted like I wasn't interested, it would make him want me more. I mean, that is what I had seen in all the movies, so of course it would work in real life. It had to...right? Wrong!
After thirty minutes of me not smiling back at him, or making eye contact, he asked some other girl to dance. But not just any girl, the girl I disliked the most. Tracy Spellman. She thought she was so cool with her blonde hair and blue eyes. She always had the newest everything and her older sister would drop her off at school in her convertible mustang. She talked to people as if she owned them. I had nothing nice to say about Tracy Spellman.
I saw her take his hand and lead him on to the dance floor. I couldn't believe it. I just stood there, with my mouth wide open. This wasn't suppose to be happening, I thought. He is suppose to ask me to dance. This was suppose to be our night. I felt a tingle in my nose and knew the tears would start to well up in my eyes soon. Don't cry, I told myself. Don't you dare cry. As I turned to head to the bathroom, I heard Tracy laugh and tell him he was so funny. That was all it took. The floods opened and I could no longer stop the tears streaming down my face. My best friend was right on my heels as I walked faster to the bathrooms. Once inside, I locked myself in a stall to try and calm myself down. My best friend was in the stall next to me, standing on the toilet and looking over to talk to me.
"Don't cry honey, you know he doesn't like her", is what she started to tell me.
"Don't say that, 'cause we really don't know how he feels about her", was my response.
"This dance is something we have been waiting for for months", she said. "I am not going to allow you to ruin it for yourself over some boy. Come on, let's get cleaned up and go out there and shake our booties off!"
I finally looked up at her and smiled. God, I loved her.
I got myself up and out of that bathroom stall, wiped away the tears, smiled at myself in the mirror and with the support of my best friend returned to the dance.
The DJ started to play our favorite song and once again, we were dancing. Everything sad I was feeling I let it out on the dance floor. Swinging my hair around and laughing when we all started doing the robot. Before I knew it, we had a huge circle of people around us having a blast. For the next hour the only time we stopped dancing was to get something to drink. I didn't even look around to find the boy of my dreams. I decided this dance was for me, not him anymore.
The DJ started to say that he had a great time with us, but this was going to be the last song of the night. We all pouted. Then, he put on my favorite song by Keith Sweat. Ugh, I thought, why does the last song have to be a slow one? I was about to ask my best friend if we should leave, when I felt a hand on my shoulder. I turned around and there he was in front of me.
"Can I have this dance?', he asked me.
I had no words, so I nodded.
He grabbed my hand and lead me out to the middle of the dance floor. He brought me in close to him, his hands on my hips and mine on his shoulders.
"I wanted to ask you to dance all night, but you looked like you were having so much fun with your friends, I didn't want to interrupt", is how he started our conversation.
"Oh", was all I could get out.
"You look really pretty tonight", he said.
"Thank you, so do you", I said with a smile. Then thought, oh geeze, did I really just call him pretty?
He laughed and thanked me. He had a great laugh.
Out of the corner of my eye I could see Tracy Spellman starting at us. She didn't look happy at all. Standing there with her hip popped to one side and arms crossed in front of her. I had no idea what she was thinking, but I finally knew what they meant when they say, "If looks could kill".
"I don't think Tracy is very happy about us dancing right now", is what I told him.
He looked over her way and shrugged his shoulders. "She can be a nice person", he said, "But, she knows I only like her as a friend".
This made my stomach do flips.
He stepped a little closer to me, his arms going around my waist.
"Maybe", I said, "She is confused because you asked her to dance earlier".
He then told me, "I didn't ask her to dance, she asked me. I didn't want to be mean, so I said sure".
Again, my stomach did flips.
"Besides", he continued, "I was looking forward to seeing you tonight. So, how could I want to dance with another girl"?
It was the first time I ever felt happy chills run through my whole body.
We continued to dance, but no longer talked. I placed my head on his shoulder and let the sweet sounds of Keith Sweat drown out everyone and everything.
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