Dance With Me

I am never going to live this down.

My life is over.

WHY ME?!

I suppose I should start from the beginning. I woke up super late and missed the bus to school, which I got yelled at later for, because taking the bus is very expensive around here. I finally got into morning assembly, soaked from the downpour outside, just in time to hear a reminder that there was a social coming up tomorrow. The entire school cheered, and then left, bowling me over and making me late for my first class, math, taught by the meanest teacher of the school. I got mid-day detention because of that, and then had to endure a lecture about tangents. What are tangents, anyway? And why am I learning about them so early? I'm not even in honors! Anyway, after that ordeal, I got to lunch and forgot that I had mid-day detention, which earned me another detention. I was seated next to Kristopher, which started out to be a good thing. We started passing notes, and I had the absolutely brilliant idea of asking him to the dance.

NOT!

It transpired he was already going to the dance with Isabel, who is incredibly cunning, pretty, and mean. I felt like such a dork! How was I supposed to know that Isabel had asked him already? We were dismissed and I made the mistake of leaving the notes on the table. My social studies teacher, who was protcoring the mid-day detention, found them and reenacted them, quite dramatically, in front of the class.

He should be fired for that.

I was totally relieved to get out of school, until I realized I had after-school detention and had to suffer through an hour after school with the troublemakers, who are all immature boys and who constantly cracked jokes about me in front of me. We scrubbed the entire school until Isabel and Isabelle could have used it to preen in front of.

AND THEN I GOT HOME!

Where I was yelled at for getting detention and missing the bus, because it's seven-hundred dollars a year in this zone. Then my parents told me I was grounded and Dirk stuck his tongue out at me. I ran up to my room, sat on the windowsill, and cried for a while.

There was a knock at my door. I went quiet, but made no effort to get up and answer it. The person at the door knocked harder and two familiar voices yelled out at me:

"Honey! Open the door!"

"Or we'll bust it down!"

I smiled weakly at the thought of skinny Isabella trying to bust down my bedroom door. I got up, shuffled to the door, and opened it, where I saw Isabella and Emily looking back at me.

"Gosh, you look horrible," said Isabella.

"Gee, thanks."

"Hey, we're here to help," Emily said, sitting on my bed. "Think of us as your own personal agony aunts."

"Like I'd take advice from you two," I replied. "You'd make horrible agony aunts."

Isabella looked hurt. "What happened?"

I recounted my entire day to the two of them, then sighed and looked out the window, where it was pouring freezing cold rain down. The window was fogged up and it was a hazy pale gray. I could feel the two of them exchanging looks behind my back, but I didn't say anything.

"Well..." said Isabella. "You don't have to go to the dance with Kristopher. You could come with me and Emily. You know, GNO."

"Fat chance," I said gloomily. "You'll be off with Phineas and Emily'll be off with Ferb."

"Well, aren't you just picky!" said Emily jokingly, but I didn't crack a smile. "You guys can go with Phineas and Ferb. I'll just stay home and... watch reruns of Invader ZIM."

"If you say so," said Isabella, but I could tell from the tone of her voice that she was concocting a plan in her head. The door shut and I lay down on the windowsill, eventually falling asleep.

I woke up the next morning still on the windowsill. I looked at the clock and saw that it was 10:31. I freaked out and leapt off the windowsill, knocking the yellow pillowcase off. "MOM!"

I flew down the staircase, tripping on the last step, to see my mom nonchalantly sipping her coffee. "Morning, Honey."

"Mom — it's 10:31 — shouldn't I — ?"

"I let you take the day off school."

"But the dance — it's tonight! They don't let you go to a school event if you didn't go to school that day —"

"It's all sorted out," my mother said, waving her hand.

I walked up my stairs, crawled under my covers, and flicked on the TV to Invader ZIM. I watched it until 5:45, when Isabella and Emily came in, all dressed up in fancy dresses.

"Wow, she stuck to her promise," Emily said, looking at the screen, where GIR was taking pictures of Dib next to the Megadoomer.

"Get up," Isabella said, waving a pale yellow dress in my face. "Now."

"No," I whined. "I want to see whether Crop Circles Magazine puts Dib on the front cover."

"You've seen this episode already. Now get up and put on the dress."

Reluctantly, I got up and shut off the TV. I went into the bathroom, changed into the dress, and came back out, only to find Emily practically shoving a pair of heels up my nose.

"No, no, no," I said, frightened. "I'll break my ankle in those things."

Emily didn't say anything, but continued to hold the heels in front of my face. I sighed, put them on, and nearly fell down the stairs. Isabella and Emily howled with laughter as they walked out the door.

"See you later!" Isabella called.

"Wait!" I said. "I'm going to go alone?"

"We'll meet you there!" Emily said.

Such friends, I thought, as I walked back upstairs and changed into a pair of jeans and a t-shirt. No use getting dressed up, but I guess I'll go anyway. I walked down the stairs and my mother said, "Oh, Honey, I'll drive you. You don't have to walk."

"I wasn't planning on walking."

"Well, good."

I slid into the passenger side of my mom's SUV and slunk down in my seat. I put in earbuds but didn't listen to anything, so that she wouldn't try to talk to me. We pulled up to the school and I tossed my earbuds in the glove compartment, said a quick goodbye to my mom, and ran into the cafeteria, smack into Isabella and Emily.

"Why aren't you wearing your dress?!" Isabella demanded.

I didn't answer her. Behind her I spotted Kristopher dancing with Isabel. My insides burned and I said, "I'm going to go outside."

I took off out the doors of the cafeteria and onto the patio. I sat down on the wall overlooking the large drop, swung my legs over the ledge, and sighed. It was a totally bad idea to come here.

"Feeling blue?"

Kristopher's voice made me jump. I whirled around and almost hit him in the face with my hair. "Kris!"

"Yes, me," he said, sitting beside me. I noticed he was wearing a purple shirt and a pair of jeans, and felt kind of relieved that I hadn't dressed up either.

"Come tell Uncle Kris what happened," he said, grinning at me.

"I've had my share of agony aunts," I said, thinking of Isabella and Emily.

"I'm an... hmm, what's an adjective that starts with U?"

I smiled, but it faded quickly. Kris put his arm around me and a yell sounded from behind us.

"KRIS!"

I looked behind me and saw Isabel standing behind us, wearing a black torn dress. Her short hair was in a neat bob instead of its usual "I-just-rolled-out-of-bed" style.

"Just what," she said, clenching her cup so tightly in her fist that it crackled and collapsed, "do you think you're doing?"

Kris shrugged. "Talking to Honey?"

"Oh, I bet," she snapped. "You know what, Kris? We're through. I don't ever want to see your face again."

"Cool."

Isabel made a noise of rage and left. I put my head on Kris's shoulder and sighed. We sat there for a while, and when kids started filing out of the cafeteria doors, I came out of my trance and sat up.

"Well..." Kris said. "...night."

"Night."

He swung his legs over the ledge and walked across the patio. I sat there on the ledge for a while, trying to decide between feeling happy that Kris at least liked me as a friend (do you put your arm around more-than-friends?) or a bit guilty that I was the reason for his and Isabel's breakup.

I decided on happy.