Love Letters to the Dead

I am usually good at finding things to look busy with, but there was nothing. I unstuck a bobby pin from my hair and stuck it back. I could hear a muffled version of “Bad Romance” coming from inside the gym.

Finally, I saw Natalie walk in with this boy Brian, who sits alone at the double lab table in Bio and raises his hand all the time. She had on a floor-length black dress that fit perfectly on her body. Her skin was smooth like usual, with no makeup. Brian trailed behind, wearing a bow tie and too much hair gel. She looked as relieved to see me as I was to see her, and we rushed over to each other.

“Why do people do this?” I asked.

Natalie laughed. “No idea. But I guess we’re as stupid as the rest.” She pulled out a little flask from her purse and handed it to me. “Schnapps?”

I took a swig. And another. Natalie loved May’s dress, and I spun in it for her, and spun again and again. I spun until I was almost happy.

Natalie did a bang-up job of more or less ignoring Brian until Hannah came in. She was wearing satin like most of the girls there, but it looked beautiful on her. Her pale freckled shoulders stood out against the straps of the midnight blue dress. She was holding on to Kasey’s arm. It was the first time I’d seen him. He’s short, and even without heels on, Hannah must be taller than him. But he’s made of big stocky muscles, the kind that you only get if you work really hard on them. As she maneuvered him over to say hi to us, all of a sudden Natalie pulled Brian closer. Clearly Hannah didn’t feel the way we did about the dance, or she didn’t let it show, or her pi?a coladas weren’t virgin, or all of the above. Because she was a perfect girl on a college boy’s arm, chatting and giggling at a private triumph, and finally dragging Kasey off to the photo booth.

When Evan finally returned and handed me a half-drunk glass of punch, I didn’t ask what had taken so long. He shifted from foot to foot, looking unhappy about the company. Finally he said, “We’re here to dance, yeah?” Then he reached his hand out to me. “Shall we?” I tried to be a good date and followed him into the gym. I was high enough on the swigs of Schnapps that I had stopped caring that this was not the way my first dance was supposed to be. They were playing a Jay-Z song. Evan was mouthing along, except he sang the real “Can I get a fuck-you” lyrics over the bleeped-out “Can I get a what-what” version they had on. He thrust around from foot to foot and put his hands halfway into his pants.

I tried to go with Evan’s rhythm, but when it came down to it, he had none, and when he put his hands on me and tried to move me around, all I wanted was to wriggle away. Evan kept thrusting his hips, and the more I danced away from him, the more he tried to grab me, and the harder I danced away. As the song was ending, I saw him watching Britt, his ex, across the room. She was blowing pink bubble gum that matched her pink satin dress and shifting from foot to foot. He wanted her satin and watermelon. Evan probably asked me to the dance ’cause he thought I’d say yes, and then he’d have someone to make Britt jealous with. I should have been mad, I guess, but it didn’t matter.

I said, “You should go ask Britt to dance.”

He looked at me, caught off guard.

“Look,” I said, “she’s staring at you, too.”

“Are you sure?” Evan asked.

“Yeah,” I said. “She totally is. Go for it. Anyway, I’m kind of thirsty.” And I walked off.

I went to the punch table and took a long time choosing one of the identical glasses. I put the pink stuff to my lips and let the ice clink on my teeth before I chewed it. And do you know what happened then? They started playing “The Lady in Red.” I saw Evan across the room, dancing with Britt now. I must have been a good ruse, because they looked like they couldn’t get close enough. Her watermelon gum had probably made its way into his mouth. I saw Hannah, dancing with Kasey. She looked over his shoulder at Natalie, who was dancing with Brian. Natalie was looking back. Hannah blew her a kiss. Natalie turned her face away. But then she changed her mind and reached her hand and caught the kiss from the air behind her. She put it softly to her lips. But Hannah’s face, by then, was hidden in Kasey’s shoulder.

I couldn’t watch them anymore. I stared into my punch glass. I picked a sequin off the hem of my dress and folded it between my fingers. I licked my lips and tasted the crayon color of the lipstick I had on. I thought of May wearing this dress at her first dance, brown curls all falling around her face, gliding across the floor in someone’s arms. I tried not to cry.

Then, out of nowhere, Sky came up beside me. “Hi,” he said.

I turned. He still smelled of the clean cold of the night outside. He was wearing his leather jacket over suit pants and a button-up shirt.

“Hi.”

“You’re wearing red,” he said. “Like the song.”

“It’s my sister’s dress.”