The Anti-Prom - By Abby McDonald Page 0,71
back into place.
“Don’t even try. You deserve each other.” Bliss looks past him, at Brianna and all the other vultures, watching wide-eyed. “Hell, you all do.”
For a second, it looks as if she’s about to stalk off with her head held high, but then she pauses, and a wicked smile comes over her face. Two quick steps, and she’s in front of Cameron, her hands planted firmly in the middle of his chest. She shoves him, hard.
He lands in the pool with an almighty splash.
She turns to Kaitlin.
“No way!” she screeches, but Bliss is already moving. They tussle for a moment, knocking into me, and then Kaitlin loses her footing. She grabs at Bliss, who yanks at my arm for balance.
For a moment, we’re all teetering on the edge of the pool, then gravity takes over, and we fall.
“I’m thinking law, or maybe poli-sci, so that means Harvard — of course — and then Yale, Cornell, Columbia . . .” Tristan ticks them off. “My dad is pushing Duke, so we’ll take a trip out to visit in the fall, but I don’t know . . . I think I can do better.”
“Mmmhmm,” I murmur happily, perched just inches away from him. The party is winding down now — or at least, the music is — and people have split off into groups to laze around, talk, and even sleep; sprawled in piles of blankets in the darker corners of the house. Tristan drapes one arm over the back of the couch, his fingertips brushing my bare shoulder. The touch sends shivers through me, and in my breathless haze, it takes everything I have to even focus on a single word he says.
“It’s the extracurriculars that kill you — you better look out for that,” he’s telling me helpfully, “but I’ve been packing my résumé with all that volunteering stuff since I was, like, in preschool. The only thing I’m not sure about is sports.” He frowns, the light behind him shining through his hair in a perfect blond halo. “I’ve been on the swim team, but do you think that’s enough?”
“I don’t know, it should be.” I lean forward to take a sip of my soda and then sit back, this time close enough for my whole left arm to press against his body. My thoughts scatter at the contact, but I recover. “I, umm, don’t have any sports, and the guidance counselor said —”
“But it’s kind of late to start anything,” Tristan interrupts, still pondering his future applications. “They always can tell if you join stuff senior year. Maybe I should do another internship this summer. I’m already lined up at my dad’s office, but I could throw in some time teaching, like, disadvantaged kids how to play softball. Two hits in one!”
“Right.” I look up at his face: tanned, and perfect, and looking straight at me, as if there’s nobody else around. I smile back at him. “That sounds like a great idea.”
We stay in the den for a while, chatting about college applications and his plans for summer vacation, until a group of seniors arrives armed with pillows and claims the room as a designated sleep area.
“Who are you looking for?” Tristan asks as we wander back through the house.
“Oh, nobody.” I take time to glance in every room, but I haven’t seen Jolene all night, and even Bliss has disappeared. She’s probably camped out in Brianna’s suite, back with all her real friends. Not that I can really blame her now — everything worked the way she promised. I turn to Tristan with an encouraging grin. “What were you saying, about Mexico?”
“Oh, yeah.” Tristan brightens. “Everyone always just sticks to the beach, but I want to go trekking, out in the mountains. Maybe stay in one of the villages . . .”
He keeps talking for a while, but I let my attention drift, enjoying the envious looks from people as we pass, and the weight of his arm on my shoulder. This is what Bliss must take for granted every day: the sense of belonging, as if you have a place in the world carved just for you. No worries that nobody will talk to you, or that they’ll turn away and laugh behind your back; this is what it’s like on the inside. To be someone who matters.
“Amit, wait a sec.” Tristan pauses to talk to one of his student government buddies, and I wait, patiently exchanging smiles with the other boy’s girlfriend. Girlfriend.