while, Willowdean and Amanda show up with extra gloves in hand.
“Thanks for helping us out,” Hannah tells them.
“Any reason to escape my brothers for the night,” Amanda says.
Willowdean nods. “I don’t mind cleaning as long as it’s not my room. Or anything adjacent to my room.”
“That’s a mood I can get into,” I say.
We all fan out into different parts of the room. After a few minutes of working, Willowdean lets out a sigh.
Amanda puts an arm around her. “You could try talking to him again.”
Willowdean pulls a latex glove over her hand. “It’s kind of hard to talk to someone who’s not talking back to you.”
Hannah snaps her fingers in agreement.
“I don’t get it,” I say. “You’re mad because he invited you to prom?”
Willowdean begins to pluck trash off the ground and put it into the trash bag Amanda is holding out for her. “He’s so hot and cold. One minute, he’s ghosting me, and the next, he’s doing these huge grand gestures like asking me to prom in front of a restaurant full of people. We would be at work and he would just run off after our shift when we would normally hang out, or he would be busy texting other people when he’d invited me over, and when I asked if it was another girl, he was, like, offended that I’d even think that. What else was I supposed to think? And now prom is coming up and I don’t have a date and I never thought I’d ever care about that, but I guess I do.” Her nostrils flare as she lets out a loud huff.
“If it makes you feel less alone, I am very, very much dateless and I’d love to hang with you at prom,” I tell her.
“Me too!” says Amanda. “It’ll be great. We’ll all be together. Why is it that we work so hard to get through twelve years of school and somehow the pinnacle of it all depends on whether or not you have a date for one random night?”
“She’s not wrong,” I say.
Amanda tips her invisible cap to me.
Willowdean musters a smile and nods. “Thanks, y’all.”
“Cherry Bomb” comes on through the speaker, letting me know this is definitely Clem’s playlist, and Hannah cranks the volume up. “Less talk. More work!”
After a few songs, Tucker jogs into the room, sweat beading down his jaw. “Sorry I’m late,” he says, trying to catch his breath.
I hand him my dustpan. “Did you run here?”
“Uh, yeah, actually, I did,” he says, slumping against a collapsing desk.
“In jeans?” It’s hot enough today that you could break a sweat sitting perfectly still. Running in jeans? That’s asking for swamp ass.
“I think the people of Clover City would prefer I keep my pants on.”
“Speak for yourself,” says Willowdean from across the room with a laugh.
The blush in Tucker’s cheeks spreads up his ears, or maybe he’s just flushed from his two-mile run. “I was having car trouble, so I left the truck at school and hoofed it.”
“You could’ve called me,” I tell him, even though I’m even more pissed now that he’s late, and having to give him a ride after that incident in the parking lot would have made my day even worse.
“I didn’t want to bother you,” he says as he lifts the edge of his T-shirt up to wipe the sweat off his face, giving the whole room a look at his abdomen, which isn’t jacked but is much more defined and tan than anything below the collar of my shirt has ever been.
“Or you didn’t want to be seen with me?” I ask, very clearly remembering the way he refused to look at me in the parking lot and determined to not be swayed by the sight of his chest for the second time in the last month.
He grits his teeth but says nothing.
I hand over my broom. “I think I’m going to pass the broom torch to Tucker and start working on those windows outside,” I say. “I could use some air.”
Tucker takes the broom and stands there while I grab some supplies to take with me.
Clem eyes me thoughtfully. “You want some company?”
“Nah, you stay here.”
I take my window cleaner and squeegee outside to pout in private.
From inside the sanctuary, Pastor Rich and Sheila are singing along to the Beach Boys while they paint once-faded walls a crisp but warm shade of white.
Church was always a social thing for my parents, but once Clem and I came out, we all