Prom Night in Purgatory (Slow Dance in P)

~3~

A Time to Be Born





Bobby and the Bell Tones were pretty good. They looked slick and professional in their matching light blue sport coats and jaunty black bow ties. The guy at the mic could really sing, and they played all the crowd-pleasers, with enough slow numbers that the boys could hold their girls every other song. Johnny arched his back and tried not to pull at the collar of his too-tight bow tie. His white sports coat was too hot, and he longed for denim and boots. Tonight he was slicked up and pressed into the fancy duds his momma had insisted he wear. He had thought he should make a statement and wear his leather jacket to the Prom, but Momma nixed that idea.

The cheerful pink carnation pinned to his lapel defied the heat of the overcrowded, over-decorated gymnasium. The room had been transformed into a water world for its “Under the Sea” theme, complete with fountains and aquariums. Huge fishing nets hung overhead, filled with seafoam green balloons that were clearly meant to look like bubbles. Giant glittering starfish hung precariously from the nets, and the entrance had even been made to look like the gangplank of a sunken ship. Irene Honeycutt’s daddy had given the prom committee, of which Irene was president, a healthy donation, and they had put it to good use. So often the band was the thing they scrimped on, but not tonight. The kids were dancing their socks off.

Johnny hadn’t really wanted to go to the Prom, but Carter had a thing for Peggy Wilkey, and he had begged Johnny to ask her so they could double date. Johnny had asked Carter why he didn’t ask her himself. Carter moaned and claimed his momma said Peggy was a tramp and he had to take his cousin because she would never get asked. Johnny liked to dance, so he’d taken pity on Carter; plus, Johnny liked Peggy, and he knew her daddy would hate it if he asked her. Peggy’s daddy was a cop, and he was always pulling Johnny over for the slightest thing. Johnny figured making the old man sweat a little was just payback, and it was nice to stick a thumb in his eye when he got the chance. He watched as Carter swung Peggy around the dance floor, Peggy’s pink dress swinging around the two of them as they moved. Carter’s cousin Nancy didn’t look too happy about it, but at least she’d gotten to come. She caught him looking at her and immediately elbowed the equally glum girls sitting at her sides. Their heads swiveled toward him and they straightened their backs and fluffed their skirts in syncopated rhythm. Then they all stared at him like a pack of piranhas. Johnny rapidly shifted his attention elsewhere.

Irene Honeycutt tapped her feet and looked longingly out at the dance floor. Roger Carlton was surrounded by a bunch of his friends, chatting away, ignoring his date. Johnny had already asked Irene to dance once, just to get under Roger’s skin. He started forward to ask her again when he saw the girl. She was in fire-engine red, and her dark hair was long and unbound, waving past her shoulders and swooping across one eye, creating a peek-a-boo effect. None of the girls wore their hair long these days. They all wore it in pinned curls and shoulder length styles with curled bangs. This girl’s hair looked like that movie star that Momma liked – the one from the 1940’s…Veronica Lake. She wasn’t very popular anymore. Momma said Veronica Lake had a bad reputation for drinking too much and getting married and divorced too many times. Momma said if it was a man drinking too much booze and spending too much time with the ladies, no one would mind. In fact, he would probably be more popular! She defended Veronica Lake like it was something personal. Johnny shook his head, banishing thoughts of his mother and her own flawed reputation.

The new girl looked like she had come alone. She walked down the gangplank entrance and paused, as if trying to figure out what to do next. She clutched a little silver handbag in her pale hands. Johnny’s eyes traveled from her hands to her smooth bare shoulders and down her slim form encased in red. The bodice was tight, and his eyes lingered where they shouldn’t. The skirt was a very full tulle -- that’s what Peggy had called it-- as was the style of most of the other girls’ dresses, but no one was wearing red. All the other girls were wearing different pinks and pastels. This girl stood out like a sore thumb…or a rose among carnations. The girl seemed to suddenly register this fact, and she looked down at her dress and back up again, out at the swirling shades of pale. She turned slightly, as if trying to decide whether to leave the way she had come. Johnny couldn’t let that happen. He started to walk toward her, weaving in and out of the dancing couples.

When he was about halfway across the floor her eyes latched onto him, and he saw the color rise on her cheekbones and her hand flutter to her chest. She watched him like she knew him, like she expected him to be there. He knew he’d never seen her before…he would remember if he had. She looked a little like Irene Honeycutt in her coloring and the wide blue set of her eyes. He wondered briefly if they were related. And then all thoughts of Irene Honeycutt fled. The girl smiled at him, and his heart hitched and his step faltered. He stopped several feet in front of her, and for the life of him he couldn’t prevent the smile that spread across his own face in response. His usual swagger failed him. He felt like he was twelve years old.

“Hi,” she said sweetly and smiled again. She looked at the dance floor and back at him. “Are you going to ask me to dance?”

Johnny held out his hand, and she walked forward and slid hers into it. Her hand was smooth and small, and he had the inexplicable urge to grip it tightly so she couldn’t slip away. He led her to the dance floor just as the music kicked up into a rollicking swing. Damn. He wanted to pull her close, not swing her around. He turned to ask her if she wanted to wait this one out. One look at her, and he knew what her response would be. She was practically vibrating with the music, her eyes sparkling, waiting for him to engage. He hoped she could dance.

Without a word, Johnny took her little purse and shoved it into the inner pocket of his tuxedo jacket. She couldn’t dance with that thing in her hand. She didn’t protest but gave him both of her hands and lifted her eyes to his. And they began to move. Oh yeah, she could dance. It was like she knew what he was going to do next, like she understood his timing and had danced with him before. He spun her around, pulling her in and out, and watched her in amazement as she matched him step for high-paced step. The kids around them started to take notice, and the space around them widened, clearing their way for more ambitious steps. Her long hair streamed around her, and her skirts flew around her slim legs as her feet dared him to keep up. He tossed her up, and her legs snaked from side to side and up into a hand stand and quickly down before her skirts revealed more than she would have liked. There was a gasp and a smattering of applause, and Johnny swung her around his hips like a hula hoop. She laughed out loud and whirled back into his arms like it was where she belonged. The music ended with a crash of cymbals, and their audience whooped and hollered. Johnny thought he heard Carter and Jimbo taking credit for some of his moves. He laughed and looped his arms around his partner’s waist, pulling her into him. The music cooperated, and the Bell Tones began a slow doo-wop as Bobby crooned his affection into the microphone. She raised her eyes to his, and his breath hitched once more. Her eyes were so blue and welcoming, and he desperately wanted to kiss her. Man, he was known to move fast, but not this fast! He had met her only minutes before, and here he was, wanting to kiss her in the middle of a crowded dance floor. Her lips were parted in a smile, and her slim arms were embracing him in a dance that felt suddenly too intimate and yet not nearly intimate enough. She raised her chin the slightest degree, and his eyes dropped to her mouth. She breathed his name. “Johnny.”

His eyes closed as he felt her whisper cross his lips.

“Johnny….”

And then she was gone. His arms still held the memory of her form. His face was flushed from the exertions of their dancing. He could still hear the song they had moved to echoing in his head. His eyes snapped open, and he shot up in his bed, only to cry out as the pain in his chest and right shoulder awoke right along with him.

“Johnny?” It wasn’t her voice anymore. He wondered at what point it had changed. The woman who professed to be his sister stood at the side of his bed.

“Your heart monitor started beeping like you were in cardiac arrest. I’m sorry I woke you…It just scared me. You must have been having quite the nightmare.”

Johnny almost laughed at the sheer irony of her words. The nightmare existed only when he opened his eyes. He refrained from commenting though. It would only sound like a complaint, and he knew she was only trying to help him. She had barely left his side, and for all the confusion and anger he kept hurling her way, she never lost her temper with him or addressed him in frustration. He had done what she had told him, only because he didn’t know what else to do. He claimed he had no memory of who he was, and she had done all the rest, running interference with his doctors and making sure he was taken care of.

She looked like his mother. She wasn’t glamorous or beautiful, but the resemblance was still there. She looked like Billy, too. Her hair was dark like his had been, and she had the same cowlick in front. This made it easier to accept that she was family...and harder to accept that they were gone. Johnny slid back down to a prone position and stared at the ceiling. The late afternoon sun peeked beneath the blinds at his windows, reminding him that he slept constantly. They said it was a normal part of the healing process, it must be working, because he was healing fast. He couldn’t care less about that. He just welcomed the escape sleep provided from the despair that was every waking moment. He slid his eyelids closed, willing himself to return to the dream.

It had been a dream, after all. He recognized the mystery girl now that he was awake. It was her, the girl who had sobbed her heart out at his bedside the day before. The girl he hadn’t been able to remember. Margaret. Maggie. In the dream she hadn’t worn glasses, but it was her. The prom had been real though -- down to the smallest detail. He remembered it all clearly. After all, it had only been a few months ago. He stopped himself then. According to him, that is. It wasn’t 1958 anymore. Jillian Bailey said it was now March 5, 2011. That would make Prom 1958 an event that had happened almost fifty three years ago.

He had taken Peggy Wilkey. She’d worn a pink strapless gown that displayed her generous cleavage to perfection. Carter had just about died when he had seen her, and he had spent the whole night trying to woo her, despite the fact that he was supposed to be showing his frumpy cousin a good time. It was all the same as in the dream: the people, the fishing nets and glittering starfish, the discomfort of his tie and his wish to be free of it. All of it the same….except for the girl, except for Maggie. Funny, in his dream she had been wearing the dress Irene Honeycutt had worn. He remembered that dress. Nobody else had worn red. Pastels were the flavor of the occasion, and Irene had shown up in that little number and tongues had wagged and wagged. Irene had wilted under the scrutiny. He had thought she looked wonderful, but apparently she wished she had chosen differently.

In his dream, Irene had worn a fluffy peach dress with little bejeweled straps. He had danced with her, just like he had in real life. The song was even the same. Just the dress was different. Strange, that. Why would his subconscious mind dress Maggie in Irene’s dress and place her at the prom? He could still see her, standing there with her long hair and that red dress, like she had become part of the memory.





“He doesn’t remember me,” Maggie spoke the words that had been bottled up inside her since she had been released from the hospital the morning before. “It’s like none of it ever happened, Gus. It’s like he fell from the balcony in 1958 and woke up in 2011. The years in Purgatory are gone, wiped away – and the only thing that’s left is the time that passed while he was there.” Maggie and Gus bounced along in Gus’s old truck, Gus at the wheel, Maggie leaning against the passenger door, staring out into the late afternoon sky.

They were alone for the first time since she’d arrived home. Irene had sent them to the store to pick up a couple of things for dinner, and Shad was out with some new friends. His star had risen since he’d survived the fire at the school. He’d been invited to several parties and been begged time and time again to share his tale. He and Gus had agreed to leave Johnny’s part in the story out of the retelling. In Shad’s story, he’d forced his way out of the locker, only to collapse before he’d exited the school. His grandpa then acquired hero status when he had found Shad and carried him out to fresh air and safety.

Gus reached over and grabbed Maggie’s hand, holding it tightly in his. He didn’t say anything; he just held her hand. His sweet gesture was her undoing. Maggie felt the dam burst, the disappointment and disbelief pouring out as the tears came. Gus pulled to the side of the road, threw the truck into park, and pulled her close. He wrapped his arms around her and soothed her with a gentle, “there, there, Miss Margaret.”

“I….th-thought it…it…w-was a mir-miracle,” Maggie gulped, clinging to Gus’s wiry arm.

“It is,” Gus responded quietly. “It is a miracle.”

“No it-it…isn’t,” Maggie struggled to push herself upright, to look into Gus’s face. “It’s just another form of purgatory…don’t y-you see? It’s a n-nightmare for J-Johnny.” Maggie scrubbed her face, trying to make the tears stop flowing. She breathed in and out several times, fighting for dominion over her despair. She didn’t speak until she felt exhaustion start to douse her raging emotions, and her tears slowed to a stop.

“You know how they say be careful what you wish for?” Her voice was so soft it was amazing Gus even heard.

But he did hear, and he nodded, his dark eyes full of sympathy.

“I wished so hard that Johnny could have a second chance….that we would have a chance. I think I made it happen, just by force of will. Now the universe is laughing…and I am once again the butt of the joke.”

“I think sometimes we do make things happen….just by wantin’ ‘em bad enough. That doesn’t mean things is gonna be easy, though, even when you get what you want. Life is work, girl. Love is work. Plus, fallin’ in love is fun. Ain’t nothin’ like it. Just think, you get to fall in love with Johnny all over again.”

“I never fell out of love with Johnny.”

“But you’re acting like it’s over,” he rebuked softly. “Love isn’t pretty, Miss Margaret. I think that’s why so many people don’t make it. They don’t appreciate the hard times. They expect it to be all airbrushed and touched up like the pictures you see in them magazine ads. Why, just the other day, I was looking at some pictures in a magazine my daughter Malia left laying around.”

“Gus!”

Gus leveled a look at Maggie that had her biting her lip and trying not to laugh, as heartsick as she was.

“There was an article showing how they made the models in the pictures look a certain way. They trimmed off a little weight here and there, touched up a blemish, even made their womanly assets look bigger, and when it was all done, the woman didn’t even look like a woman anymore!”

“Womanly assets?”

“You know what I mean, Miss Margaret,” Gus chided. “They made the woman look like a doll - all fake and plastic, with her face painted on.” Gus sighed dramatically, as if someone had taken a marker to the pages of his Bible. “When my wife Mona got cancer, she lost a lot of weight. She used to have beautiful curves and thick curly hair. Her hair fell out when she went through chemo. She cried and told me she didn’t think I would love her anymore.” Gus’s voice had grown soft, and his eyes were bright with the painful memories.

Maggie squeezed the hand that still held hers, comforting him in return. Gus sat without speaking for a time.

“The truth is, Margaret, I just loved Mona more. I saw her strength and her patience, her gentle heart, and her love for me and her desire to shield me from pain. All those things were more beautiful to me than her curves or her pretty hair. All those wonderful traits were on display like they’d never been before, and she took my breath away. I loved her more when she died than I did the day I married her. The woman I married was beautiful, but the woman I lost was stunning.

“Don’t forget your miracle so quickly, Miss Margaret. The hard times are often the best times, ‘cause they draw you closer. You should be singin’ hallelujahs from the rooftops - celebratin’.”

Gus’s voice was gentle, and Maggie didn’t take offense. Though she thought she had reason enough to want to forget, she wouldn’t forget her miracle - not now, not ever. Even though he had forgotten her.