On the landing, I open my rideshare app to see how quickly a driver can arrive to take me to the bus depot in Hyannis. Six minutes. It’s enough.
“Please don’t go—” Cole pleads as I empty my drawers, as I stuff everything back into my duffel bag. “Please just sleep on it — we can talk tomorrow —”
“I can’t—”
“Or at least let me drive you — I’ll take you to the bus station if you let me explain —”
I shove past him and thunder down the stairs with my bag, stopping at the door to shove my feet into my sneakers before I push my way out into the night.
He’s still behind me. “Ezra,pleasetalk to me —”
“Go back inside, Cole.”
The car pulls up, and I climb into the backseat. I don’t even look back. And as we head down the road, as Bree’s house recedes behind me, as I rest my head on the seat, it occurs to me that it’s twelve years ago all over again.
Only this time, I’m the one who’s leaving.
Fourteen
Don’t Do This
May 2013
“ALL RIGHT, BIG SMILES!”Courtney’s mom trilled. “Girls, you lookbeautiful—”
I was pretty sure that if I smiled any harder, my face was going to fall off.
It was prom night, and we were all gathered in Sharon’s garden — Cole, me, Hannah, Courtney, and all of our parents. Hannah looked great in a dark burgundy gown that was almost black. She’d recently had her long hair shaved on one side, and the rest was piled up on her head in a dramatic updo that went along with her dark makeup. Courtney, meanwhile, wasin some ruffly hot pink thing, and she’d talked Cole into wearing a bowtie to match. Our parents had made us pose for what felt like hundreds of photos — Hannah and me, Courtney and Cole, and the four of us together, first on the front porch and now in front of Sharon’s hydrangeas. But it looked like they werefinallysatisfied, which meant —
“Wait!” Sharon called. “Could we take one or two with just the boys? Because they’re such good friends.”
The girls stepped off to the side, and their mothers began to fuss over them, taking a few pictures over by the wisteria. Cole looked down at me and winked, then slung an arm around my shoulders, turning to face Sharon’s camera.
“That’s perfect, dears. Oh, you’re both so handsome!” Sharon actually looked a little teary.
“Hold on, one more —” With a grin, Cole spun me around and pulled me back against his chest, putting his arms around my waist for the classic cheesy prom pose while I shrieked with laughter. To anybody else, we would have looked like two teenage idiots goofing off, but I knew what it actually meant.
As we filed back out toward the front yard, Sharon took me by the elbow, linking her arm through mine. “I wish Linda were here to see what a lovely young man you’ve become,” she whispered. “She would have been so proud of you.”
I stopped in my tracks, then turned to give her ahug. “Thank you.”
The plan was for Cole to drive the four of us in Sharon’s car, and we both opened doors like gentlemen to make sure the girls were settled — Courtney in the front, and Hannah in the back. But as we walked around the back of the car to take our own seats, Cole put his lips close to my ear.
“All night, I’m going to be fantasizing about taking you out of that tux.”
“Fuck, Cole —” I was sure my blush was visible from space.
“One piece at a time, starting with your bowtie.” He wiggled his eyebrows at me. “You are gonna comesohard.”
When I got into the car, I could barely remember how the seatbelt worked, and Hannah looked over at me, a smile tugging at her lips. “You okay?”
“Perfectly fine,” I breathed, and turned to stare out the window.
It wasn’t so bad, heading to prom with the girls. I was feeling a little tongue-tied, shy around Hannah even though I’d known her since preschool. And every time I thought about saying something to Cole, my brain melted into hot lava. But it turned out that Courtney had more than enough to say for all of us, and she kept up a constant stream of chatter for the entire twenty minutes that we were in the car. After the first few minutes, Hannah unbuckled her seatbelt and easedherself across the backseat, settling in beside me. When she was buckled in once more, she reached out and took my hand, holding on to it for the rest of the drive. From time to time she would squeeze my fingers to get my attention, rolling her eyes at Courtney’s prattle, which made me laugh and drew Cole’s eyes towards us in the rearview mirror. By the time we pulled into the parking lot, I was feeling fairly relaxed.
And fuck, maybe Cole was right that prom was a rite of passage, that it was something weneededto do. We walked into the banquet hall under a banner that saidJERSEY STRONG — HIGHLANDS STRONG. And as I looked around the room, I couldn’t help thinking about what we’d all been through, how many of my classmates were still in temporary homes. I knew there had been a special fund to help those kids get ready for prom, donations of dresses and tuxes. And suddenly, I was glad we were all together, even if this wasn’t my scene, even if Cole wasn’t my prom date. Somehow, it felt important.
We ended up at a table with Melissa and Tyler and Drew and some girl from the next town over who he’d met at church, and I guess it wasn’t so bad. I could barely hear what anyone was saying over the DJ and the clink of glassware and the chatter around us, and everything on my plate was pretty overcooked. But I had Hannah right next to me, touching my elbow from time to time to murmur something into my ear aboutbooks or music or the movies she liked. And Cole was on my other side, brushing my leg under the table, letting me know by touch that we were okay, even if Courtney was flirting with him so hard that I was pretty sure she was going to sprain her eyelashes.
