said.
I told Daniel I was not going to have children, and he said that would be a shame because I had such beautiful red hair and stunning green eyes and I should give those qualities a shot at continuing . . . not to mention the huge heart . . . which all made me cry and grab Daniel and actually take him on to the dance floor and dance.
I don’t know what anyone thought of us. I don’t know if people even talked about us; I didn’t care at all. I didn’t react anywhere in my mind or in my body when Keira and Jacob were crowned prom king and queen. They looked beautiful. Really. They had that kind of beauty that shows up in teenage movies and magazines. I could smell their freshness just by looking at them.
After the king and queen dance, Daniel grabbed my hand and we managed to sneak out through the kitchen, avoid chaperones, and make it to Daniel’s car. He grabbed his guitar and something else and ushered me, breathless from running, behind the science building and under a tree with low hanging branches. It was dark, but the stars were many because the sky was so clear.
We sat down and Daniel pulled out the one remaining joint from our night of sin. “No! Daniel, we can’t do that here. I can’t.”
“Come on, Danielle. Just to seal the deal. High school. Been there. Done that.”
“Ahhhhh. Why do you do this to me?”
“Because you are my fruit fly.”
“You snot. One hit.”
And so he lit the joint, and we took turns inhaling and staring into each other’s faces. I wonder if he thought the same thing I did—that I never imagined the face of my best friend would look like this. I never imagined any face after Emily’s, but I surely couldn’t have imagined his. Daniel has beautiful black hair, and he, too, has green eyes. They were piercing and cold, like frozen winter ponds, but they were the windows to the warmest soul I’d ever known. He was a gift from somewhere, from someone. Gay or straight, I love him, the way people are supposed to love.
“Sing me a song, Danielle. You really have a sexy voice.”
“I do?”
“Yeah. Even your speaking voice is sexy as hell. It’s all whispery and shit. Some man is going to go wild over it.”
I smiled. A real, true woman’s smile.
“Now start me a song, woman.”
In my green, elegant dress that was now more wrinkled and dirtied than I should have ever let it become, with my foggy head that was higher than I should have ever let it become, I sang.
There was something about singing into the night air that made me feel powerful and safe. A space inside me expanded. Daniel’s gorgeous guitar melody was so easy to feel, not just hear, and words kept coming out of me. I imagined them floating all the way up to the sky. In my mind’s eye, without trying, I saw Emily hear them, and strangely, I swear, I could hear the soft sounds of an oboe.
When our impromptu song ended, and the air was still cool and crisp and smelled of greenery, Daniel pulled out the joint one more time, but as he lit it, Ms. Harrison walked around the side of the building and stood above us. Something about the way she was there, about the way she moved in the darkness, made me feel like she had been standing there for a while.
I panicked inside and my heart beat wildly. Daniel quickly hid the joint behind his back in a futile attempt to save us and grabbed my hand as if to silence my heart. We both stared at my favorite teacher.
Calmly, but with purpose, Ms. Harrison said, “I want you two to get up, go back inside, and do not leave the prom until I give you permission to go. This evening’s festivities are to be enjoyed inside.”
I breathed an audible sigh of relief and choked back tears that had been building. Maybe Ms. Harrison wasn’t doing the right thing according to the school, but I was so grateful for her response. In my mind I said to her, I’ll never smoke pot again. I swear. Thank you for pretending like you don’t know what we were doing. Thank you.
Back inside, Daniel and I danced for a while, and then we talked to Marv. Daniel really liked him, like thought he was handsome, that kind of