“I thought you weren't drinking anymore!” Grant frowned.
“Season's over, man, and I am officially drinking again,” Beans declared cheerfully, taking a long pull and wiping his grin with the back of his hand. He offered it to Jesse, and Jesse gladly took a swig, shuddering as the fiery liquid burned a path to his stomach.
The only one who didn't seem to have anything to say was Ambrose. But that wasn't abnormal. Ambrose spoke up rarely, and when he did, most people listened. In fact, he was the reason they were there, in the middle of nowhere on a Saturday night. Since the army recruiter had come to the school, Ambrose hadn’t been able to think of anything else. The five of them had sat on the back row of the auditorium, snickering, making jokes about boot camp being a walk in the park compared to Coach Sheen's wrestling practices. Except Ambrose. He hadn’t snickered or made jokes. He had listened quietly, his dark eyes fixed on the recruiter, his posture tense, his hands clasped in his lap.
They were all seniors, and they would all be graduating in a couple of months. Wrestling season had ended two weeks ago, and they were already restless--maybe more than they had ever been--because there would be no more seasons, nothing to train for, no more matches to dream about, no victories to enjoy. They were done. Done . . . except Ambrose who had been highly recruited by several schools and who had the academics and the athletic record to go to Penn State on a full-ride. He was the only one who had a way out.
They stood on the precipice of enormous change, and none of them, not even Ambrose–especially not Ambrose–were excited about the prospect. But whether or not they chose to take a step into the unknown, the unknown would still come, the yawning precipice would still swallow them whole, and life as they knew it would be over. And they had all become highly aware of the end.
“What are we doing here, Brosey?” Jesse finally said what they'd all been thinking. As a result, four pairs of eyes narrowed in on Ambrose’s face. It was a strong face, a face more prone to introspection than jest. It was a face the girls were drawn to and the guys secretly coveted. Ambrose Young was a guy’s guy, though, and his friends had always felt safest in his presence, as if just by being near him, some of his luster would rub off on them. And it wasn't just his size or good looks or the Samson-like hair that he wore to his shoulders in defiance of the style or the fact that it bothered Coach Sheen. It was the fact that life had fallen into place for Ambrose Young, right from the start, and watching him, you believed it always would. There was something comforting in that.
“I signed up,” Ambrose said, his words clipped and final.
“For what? School? Yeah. We know, Brosey. Don't rub it in.” Grant laughed, but the sound was pained. There had been no scholarships for Grant Nielson, though he'd finished in the top of his class. Grant was a good wrestler, not a great wrestler, and Pennsylvania was known for their wrestlers. You had to be a great wrestler to get a scholarship. And there was no money in some savings account for college. Grant would get there, but he would have to work his way through . . . slowly.
“Nah. Not for school.” Ambrose sighed, and Grant's face twisted in confusion.
“Ho–ly shit.” Beans drew the words out on a long whisper. He may have been on his way to being drunk, but the kid wasn't slow. “That recruiter! I saw you talking to him. You wanna be a soldier?”
There was a shocked intake of breath as Ambrose Young met the stunned gazes of his four best friends. “I haven't even told Elliott. But I'm going. I'm just wondering if any of you want to come with me.”
“So, what? You brought us out here to soften us up? Make us feel all patriotic or somethin'?” Jesse said. “'Cause that ain't enough, Brosey. Hell, what are you thinkin', man? You could get a leg blown off or something. Then how you gonna wrestle? Then it's over! You got it made! You got Penn freakin' State. What? You want the Hawkeyes? They'd take you, ya know. A big guy that moves like a little guy–a 197 pounder that shoots like he's still 152? What you bench pressin' now, Brose? There isn't anyone who can hang with you, man! You gotta go to school!”
Jesse didn't stop talking as they left the makeshift memorial and pulled back out onto the highway heading for home. Jesse had been a state champ too, just like Ambrose. But Ambrose hadn't just done it once. Four-time state champ, undefeated the last three years, the first Pennsylvania wrestler to win a state championship as a freshman in the upper weights. He'd been 160 pounds as a freshman. His only loss had come early in the year at the hands of the reigning state champ, who was a senior. Ambrose pinned him at state. That win had put him in the record books.
Jesse threw his hands up and swore, letting loose a string of obscenities that made even Beans, Mr. foul-mouth himself, feel a little uncomfortable. Jesse would kill to be in Ambrose's position.
“You got it made, man!” he said again, shaking his head. Beans handed Jesse the flask and patted his back, trying to soothe his incredulous friend.
They rode in silence once more. Grant was at the wheel out of habit. He never drank and had designated himself the driver and caretaker ever since they all started driving, even though Paulie and Ambrose hadn't partaken in the comfort that Beans had to offer that night.
“I'm in,” Grant said quietly.
“What?” Jesse screeched, spilling what was left in the flask down the front of his shirt.
“I'm in,” Grant repeated. “They'll help me pay for school, right? That's what the recruiter said. I gotta do something. I sure as hell don't want to farm for the rest of my life. At the rate I'm saving money, I'll finish college when I'm forty-five.”
“You just swore, Grant,” Paulie whispered. He'd never heard Grant swear. Ever. None of them had.
“It's about damn time,” Beans howled, laughing. “Next we just gotta get him laid! He can't go to war without knowing the pleasure of a woman's body.” Beans said this in his best Don Juan, Latin lover voice. Grant just sighed and shook his head.
“What about you, Beans?” Ambrose asked with a smirk.
“Me? Oh, I know all about the pleasure of a woman's body,” Beans continued on in accented English, his eyebrows waggling.
“The army, Beans. The army. What about it?”
“Sure. Hell, yeah. Whatever.” Beans acquiesced with a shrug. “I got nothin' better to do
Jesse groaned loudly and put his head in his hands.
“Paulie?” Ambrose asked, ignoring Jesse's distress. “You in?”
Paulie looked a little stricken, his loyalty to his friends warring with his self-preservation. “Brose . . . I'm a lover. Not a fighter,” he said seriously. “The only reason I wrestled was to be with you guys, and you know how much I hated it. I can't imagine combat.”
“Paulie?” Beans interjected.
“Yeah, Beans?”
“You may not be a fighter, but you aren't a lover either. You need to get laid, too. Guys in uniform get laid. A lot.”
“So do rock stars, and I am a lot better with a guitar than I am with a gun,” Paulie countered. “Plus, you know my mom would never let me.” Paul's dad had been killed in a mining accident when he was nine years old and his younger sister was a baby. His mom had moved back home to Hannah Lake with her two little kids to be closer to her parents and ended up staying.
“You may have hated wrestling, Paulie. But you were good at it. You'll be a good soldier, too.”
Paulie chewed his lip but didn't answer and the car fell silent, each boy lost in his own thoughts.
“Marley wants to get married,” Jesse said after a long lull. “I love her, but . . . everything is moving so damn fast. I just want to wrestle. Surely some school out West wants a black kid that likes white people, right?”
“She wants to get married?” Beans was stunned. “We're only eighteen! You better come with us, Jess. You gotta grow up some before you let Marley put a collar on you. Plus, you know the saying. Brose Before 'Ho's,” he quipped, playing on Ambrose's name.
Jesse sighed in surrender. “Ah, hell. America needs me. How can I sa
y no?”
Groans and laughter ensued. Jesse had always had a pretty inflated ego.
“Hey, doesn't the army have a wrestling team?” Jesse sounded almost cheerful at the thought.
“Paulie?” Ambrose asked again. Paulie was the lone hold-out, and out of everyone, Paulie would be the hardest for him to leave behind. He hoped he wouldn't have to.
“I don't know, man. I guess I gotta grow up sometime. I bet my dad would be proud of me if I did. My great grandpa served in WWII. I just don't know.” He sighed. “Joining the army seems like a good way to get myself killed.”
There wasn't a fancy hotel or a posh location anywhere near Hannah Lake to have the Prom, so Hannah Lake High School made do decorating their gymnasium with hundreds of balloons, twinkle lights, hay bales, fake trees, gazebos, or whatever the prom theme dictated.
This year's theme was “I Hope You Dance,” an inspirational song which offered no inspiration with regard to decorating ideas. So the twinkle lights and balloons and gazebos made yet another appearance at yet another Hannah Lake High School Prom, and as Fern sat next to Bailey, staring out onto the gymnasium floor filled with swirling couples, she wondered if the only thing that had changed in fifty years was the style of the dresses.
Fern fiddled with the neckline of her own dress, smoothing her hand over the creamy folds, swishing her legs back and forth, watching the way the skirt draped to the floor, thrilling at the hint of gold sparkle when the fabric caught the light. She and her mother had found the dress on a clearance rack at a Dillards in Pittsburg. It had been marked down over and over again, most likely because it was a dress made for a tiny girl in a color that was not fashionable among tiny girls. But taupe looked good on red heads, and the dress looked wonderful on Fern.
She had posed for pictures with Bailey in the Taylor's living room with the bodice pulled up around her chin the way her mother liked it, but two seconds after she left the house she pushed the ruffled neckline off her shoulders and felt almost pretty for the first time in her life.
Fern hadn't been asked to the big dance. Bailey hadn't asked anyone either. He had joked that he didn't want to make any girl dread going to her prom. He'd said it with a smile, but there was a flash of something mournful in his face. Self-pity wasn't Bailey's style, and his comment surprised Fern. So she asked Bailey if he would go with her. It was Prom, and they could sit home and sulk that they didn't have dates or they could go together. They were cousins, and it was completely lame, but being uncool was better than missing out. And it wasn't like going to Prom together would cause any image problems. They were both the epitome of lame–literally in Bailey's case, figuratively in Fern's. It wouldn't be a night for romance, but Fern had a dress for her Prom and a date too, even if it wasn't a conventional one.
Bailey was outfitted in a black tux with a pleated white shirt and a black bow tie. His curls were moussed and artfully placed, making him look a little like Justin from N'Sync . . . at least that's what Fern thought. Couples rocked back and forth, their feet barely moving, arms locked around each other.
Fern tried not to imagine how it would feel to be pressed up against someone special, dancing at her Prom. She wished briefly that she was there with someone who could hold her. Fern felt a flash of remorse and looked at Bailey guiltily, but his eyes were locked on a girl in hot pink sparkles with cascading blonde hair. Rita.
Becker Garth held her tightly and nuzzled her neck, whispering to her as they moved, his dark hair a striking contrast to her pale tresses. Becker, who had more confidence that he deserved and a swagger that some smaller men develop out of a need to make themselves seem bigger, was twenty-one and too old for a high school Prom. But Rita was in the early stages of infatuation, and the dreamy look on her face as she gazed at him made her more beautiful still.
“Rita looks so pretty.” Fern smiled, happy for their friend.
“Rita always looks pretty,” Bailey said, his eyes still held captive. Something in his tone made Fern's heart constrict. Maybe it was the fact that she, Fern, never felt pretty. Maybe it was the fact that Bailey had noticed and was captured by something Fern thought he was immune to, something she thought he put little value in. Now here he was, her cousin, her best friend, her partner in crime, lured in like all the rest. And if Bailey Sheen fell for the pretty face, there was no hope for Fern. Ambrose Young would surely never look at one so plain.
It always came back to Ambrose.
He was there, surrounded by his friends. Ambrose, Grant, and Paulie seemed to have come without dates, much to the despair of the senior class girls who sat home, uninvited to their Senior Prom. Resplendent in black tuxes, young and handsome, slicked up and clean-shaven, they celebrated with everyone and no one in particular.
“I'm going to ask Rita to dance,” Bailey said suddenly, his wheelchair lurching out onto the floor as if he had just stumbled on the decision and he was going for it before he lost his nerve.
“Wh-what?” Fern stuttered. She sincerely hoped Becker Garth wouldn't be a jerk. She watched in equal parts fascination and fear as Bailey motored up alongside Rita as she and Becker looped hands to walk off the floor.
Rita smiled at Bailey and laughed at something he said. Leave it to Bailey; he was definitely not short on charm. Becker scowled and walked right past Bailey, as if he wasn't worth stopping, but Rita dropped his hand and, without waiting for Becker's permission, sat gingerly on Bailey's lap and looped her arms around his shoulders. A new song pulsed from the speakers, Missy Elliott demanding to “Get Ur Freak On,” and Bailey made his wheelchair spin in circles, round and round, until Rita was laughing and clinging to him, her hair a blonde wave across his thin chest.
Fern bobbed her head with the music, wiggling in place, laughing at her audacious friend. Bailey was fearless. Especially considering Becker Garth still stood on the dance floor, his arms crossed unhappily, waiting for the song to be over. If Fern were a beautiful girl, she might dare go up and try to distract him, maybe ask him to dance so that Bailey could have his moment without Becker chaperoning. But she wasn't. So she gnawed at her fingernail and hoped for the best.
“Hey, Fern.”
“Uh . . . hi Grant.” Fern straightened, hiding her jagged nails in her lap. Grant Nielsen had his hands shoved into his pockets as if he were as comfortable in a tux as he was in blue jeans. He smiled at her and tossed his head toward the dance floor.
“Wanna dance? Bailey won't mind, right? Since he's dancing with Rita?”
“Sure! Okay!” Fern stood up a little too fast and wobbled in the heels that gave her three inches and made her a staggering 5'5. Grant grinned again, and his hand shot out to steady her.
“You look pretty, Fern.” Grant sounded surprised. His eyes roved over her and settled on her face, his eyes narrowed as if he was trying to figure out what was different.
The song changed about twenty seconds after they started dancing, and Fern thought that was all she was going to get, but Grant looped his arms around her waist when a ballad began and seemed happy to partner up for another song. Fern swiveled her head around to see if Bailey had relinquished Rita, only to discover he hadn't. He was making lazy figure eights around the other dancers, Rita's head against his shoulder as they mimicked slow dancing as best they could. Becker was standing by the punch bowl, his mouth twisted and his face red.
“Sheen's gonna get pounded if he isn't careful.” Grant laughed, following Fern's gaze.
“I'm more worried about Rita,” Fern said, realizing suddenly that she was. Becker made her nervous.
“Yeah. Maybe you're right. You'd have to be pretty messed up to hit a kid in a wheelchair. Plus, if Garth touches him, all heck would break loose. No wrestler in here would allow it.”
“Because of Coach Sheen?”
“Yeah. And because of Bailey. He's one of us.”
Fern beamed, glad to know the feeling was mutual. Bailey loved every member of the wrestling team and considered himself the team's assistant coach, mascot,
personal trainer, head statistician, and all-around wrestling guru.
Next, Paulie asked Fern to dance. He was his sweet, distracted self, and Fern enjoyed dancing with him, but when Beans sidled up and invited her onto the dance floor, Fern started wondering if maybe she wasn't the butt of a private joke, or worse, a bet. Maybe Ambrose would be next, and then they would all ask her to pose with them in a picture, laughing uproariously at their sham of a prom. Like she was a circus sideshow.
But Ambrose never asked her to dance. He never asked anyone. He stood head and shoulders above most of the crowd, his hair pulled back tightly in a sleek tail at his nape, accentuating the plains and valleys of his handsome face, the wide set of his dark eyes, the straight brows and the strong jaw. The one time he caught Fern looking at him he frowned and looked away and Fern wondered what she'd done.
On the way home, Bailey was unusually quiet. He claimed fatigue, but Fern knew better.
“You okay, B?
Bailey sighed and Fern met his gaze in the rearview mirror. Bailey would never be able to drive, and he never sat in the front seat. Whenever he and Fern cruised around town, Fern would borrow the Sheen's van because it was rigged for wheelchair use. The middle seat of the van was pulled out so Bailey could drive his wheelchair up a ramp and into the body of the vehicle. Then his wheels were locked and he was strapped in with belts that were anchored to the floor so he wouldn't tip over in his chair. Dragging Main Street wasn't much fun with Bailey in the backseat, but Fern and Bailey were used to it, and sometimes Rita would come along so that Fern didn't feel like a chauffeur.
“Nah. Tonight's one of those nights, Fernie.”
“Too much reality?”
“Way too much reality.”
“Me too,” Fern said softly, and felt her throat close against the emotion that rose in her chest. Sometimes life seemed particularly unfair, unduly harsh, and beyond bearing.
“You looked like you were having a good time. Bunch of the guys asked you to dance, right?”