Substance-Induced Amnesia [Confessions, Pt I]

Before the limo, everything’s quiet. But the second you get into the limo and everyone scrambles into their afterprom dress…suddenly, it’s about reckless and out of control and who can drink fastest, scream loudest and take pictures that maximize the amount of fun you seem to be having when they’re later posted on Facebook. It’s more than letting loose, it’s about hitting rock bottom then digging deeper, it’s about doing something worthy of TFLN or last night’s party or Tucker Max.

The evening started blurring in the party after some guy did a shot then licked the salt off Luna’s neck and Tucker and I linked arms like a couple getting married and flipped them back and slammed them down then went to dance And always, always the dance floor is too tight and if you misstep you careen into a fist-pumping boy and some of those boys are doing the jump and chant and the one closest scraped his heels ALL THE WAY down the backs of my ankles. And it’s hot, so hot and you’re dying for water which you should drink anyway.

and the club is supposed to stay open til 4 but someone got caught in the ladies’ room with a boy and another girl got caught with Xannies so they kick us out around 2. we all pile back into the limo and drove to Zeke’s because his parents went somewhere, he’s not sure where, and will probably stumble home tomorrow morning and not to worry. And all of Tucker’s friends come, and all of Rose’s and Ashley’s and that kid Petya from English class with a boys’ crew and a smooth way with the co-eds but no Luna and we don’t stop partying but it gets hot

Tucker and me outside for air and I’m suddenly so enthused with giddiness I spin giggling across the lawn even though it’s cold out and the moon is almost gone but the stars are out and Tucker suddenly grabs my arm and pulls me towards him and I stop spinning, confused and he kisses me and—

We’re back inside dancing but it’s the close kind, the kind that gives off vibes and another shot and—

Black. My memory goes black.

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omission or obligation

I thought I wasn’t going to put this up. I told myself that I had no obligation, that I kept this blog for myself. But I’ve committed to it now. I told myself, to avoid losing myself in all this mess, I should make my private thoughts public, so that my thoughts and actions and little hypocrisies are subject to the public, to the jury of my peers. Or at least available to them. It would obligate me to staying true to myself.

And to omit this would be a lie by omission. So, the ugly parts of prom will follow:

part I

part II

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the world as my oyster.

Tonight at dusk, Tucker and I crept over to Luna’s house and called her cell phone. We circled around the backyard and through the grass, which was cold with dew although the night air was only cool.

She popped open a window and hopped out, barefoot, hair unkempt and nail polish chipped.
“What the hell?” was Tucker’s charming opener.

“I’m grounded,” Luna said brusquely. While we gaped—Luna’s parents didn’t do grounded, the did negligence—she flipped her hair over her shoulder. “What the hell do you want?”

Tucker blinked, scowled. “We are trying to ascertain whether you are in good health, physically and mentally and maybe even emotionally. We are trying to be there for you.”

“Then maybe,” she retorted, “you should have watched my back at afterprom instead of going off to neck under the moonlight.”

There was an ugly silence during which my cheeks slowly flushed. Luna looked from face to face.

“You’re kidding,” she said flatly. “This is too precious for words. Feckin’ Tucker and little Jenny sittin’ in a tree, making love and peace and happiness. Wow, Jenny, you really committed to the cliché, hunh? Cashin’ in the ole vcard on Prom Night. I may puke with the sickly sweetness of it all.”

Tucker was enraged. “How dare you talk to Jenny like that! She hasn’t done a thing. She’s been nice to you, defended you when I haven’t. How dare you throw slander at her like that after all the times I’ve driven you to clinics and held your hair back and cut you off and drove you home.”

“So??” she screamed. "I’ve done the same for you. And you know what? Whatever. Jenny plays the good little girl, but no one stays that innocent. One day she’ll be just as twisted as you and me. And you—that little good girl vibe, that wholesomeness you wouldn’t stop talking about when we first hung out with her—it doesn’t rub off, dipshit. You’re trying to be good when you’re just as messed up as me! At least I’m self aware! I don’t delude myself!”

There was a little silence. Tucker spoke, calmer now: “Luna, this time you’ve gone too far with your hypocrisy. I know you think you’re untouchable, but you can’t talk your way out of this mess this time with that silvered tongue of yours. You have to appear in court, for crissakes. That’s not something to brush off.”

“Whatever,” Luna replied, looking away, the fight gone out of her.

“I’m through, Luna. I’m done holding your hair back and listening to you spew this crap. I’m out. Jenny, let’s go.” Tucker left, not looking back. Stomping through the grass. I lingered.

“Luna…please. It doesn’t have to be this way. Turn it around. Repent. Tell the judge you’re sorry, turn over a new leaf. Talk to your parents. See someone. Apologize to Tucker.”

She snorted. “You’re that kind of girl, Jenny. If the world were your oyster, you’d send it back to the farm to grow old and make pearls and tiny, adorable little baby oyster. The farm would be green and the oyster would live and die happily, free from pollutants and French chefs and tacky nouveau riche who think oysters and pink champagne are status. But really, it’s Maybachs and sleeping pill addictions that tell you money’s been bottled, chilled, and properly aged. But I bet you didn’t know that.”

She met my eyes dead-on, and I shivered. They had the dead look you see in inner-city cops and barracuda lawyers.

“Now, honey, I have predatory instincts. I would lever that sucker out and suck it down like fossil fuels at a Nascar convention. And squeeze a few fucking pearls out of it, too.”
She crawled back through the window and glided out of sight, and I was left staring into the empty frame.

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warning signs

our trip to some happy beachhouse has been canceled. i can't even begin to process what's happened in the past 48 hours. how perfectly stereotypical, to have a traumatic prom.

but luna...she's beyond reach. she got rushed to the emergency room to have her stomach pumped. at least, that's the word.

we can't find her. presumably, someone has cut her off. stopped her. maybe she's heeded the signs.





[photo from here.]

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scheduled like in prison

today:
10 AM. Crawl out of bed.
11 AM to 12:3o PM. Hair & make-up.
12:3o to 2 PM. Find something to eat, try desperately not to muss anything.
2:3o to 3:3o PM. Pre-prom with Luna's group of eccentricities.
3:3o to 4:3o PM. Pre-prom with Rose and Tucker's Round Table.
5 to 6:30 PM. Parade around the gym for the school pre-prom.
7:3o PM. Arrive at prom.
12:3o AM. Leave prom.
1:3o to 4:3o AM. Afterprom party and various shenanigans.
5 to 6 AM. Postprom Breakfast. At least two people will fall asleep at the table.
7 AM. Crash in convenient location.
4:3o PM. Depart for beach house.

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overwhelmed.

It's sort of astonishing.

I tell my teachers I'll be missing one day of school, and they throw more information than I'd learn in law school at me.

I'm actually making tests up ahead of time. And papers. And presentations.

I cry nightly.

[photo from here.]

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stuck at prom

Prom is Friday. I literally have to devote all of it to getting ready.

Tomorrow is nails, waxing, tweezing, etc.

Friday kicks off with hair and make up appointment, followed by pre-pre-prom at Tucker's friend Rose's house, followed by the school pre-prom in the gym, followed by prom, followed by afterprom, followed by the after afterprom breakfast, followed by crashing at someone house, followed the after prom weekend trip to someone's beach or summer house.

In case you were wondering, the picture

<-----

is from Duck Brand duct tape's Stuck at Prom scholarship contest. The outfit has to be made entirely of duct tape and must be worn to prom. You win a boatload of cash for college scholarships. But...you have to weather the indignity. And show the pictures to your children.

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The Afterprom

Prom 2.0: the Explicit Version.

The war. I won it. I should take a victory lap. I feel like I just killed a rabid panther with my bare hands. I felled an empire with a slingshot. I slayed a dragon with a toothpick. I can go to afterprom. Afterprom is the party following prom where people do things that could get them sentenced to an afterlife of the Hellish variety. Normally, some enterprising individual will rent out club space in the city and charge admission. Tickets are a certain price and said individual usually makes a killing.

This year, Betty Walker rented out the ballroom of a hotel. It’s gorgeous and tickets are $55 a pop. More for VIP tickets. Plus limo fees. It will be full of writhing bodies and sin and substance abuse. Part of the prom experience.

And I won the battle. I can go. We’ll go from prom, change into our afterprom dresses, and party it up. afterward we’ll crash in some hotel room Luna’s friend rented.

The battle with my parents was epic. They don’t know how bad it gets, or they’d never let me go. Still, I’ve promised to stay with Tucker AT ALL TIMES. I text them every time I change locations. I have the local police precinct on speed dial. They’re so naïve.

I’m feeling…optimistic. I can go out there, I can be that girl, I’ll be just like everyone else. Sometimes conformity is a comfort. It’s strange. Now that I fit in with people…now that I act like them, at least on the surface, they know who I am. I guess sheep don’t look the same to other sheep.

Tucker and I will dance and Luna and I will do the girl bathroom buddy thing. I’ll see Ashley with her soon-to-be-ex, James of the wandering ways, and I will tell her how gorgeous and kickass she looks. Tucker’s Round Table will be momentarily stunned, then hit me with a barrage of witty and vastly gratifying flattery. Ivan, from my English class, whom I’ve always had a soft spot for, will turn his attention away from his incomparable date for just a second when I walk by. I will see and be seen. And I’ll leave my thoughts here.

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Brown-Eyed Girl v. Blue Steel

Luna has exquisite taste. Truly. Her own way of dressing may be…eccentric, but she has an eye for fit and line and color. She’s very thorough. I tried on dress after dress after dress. Some of them looked like shapeless sacks on the rack, until they clung to my every curve. And hawk-eyed Luna raked over every inch of me, for rumples or pulls in the fabric, for poorly-stitched seams, for hemlines and necklines and frayed edges.

It was fascinating. She was in her element. The shopgirl would suggest something that would “suit my figure” (read, somehow give my short and skinny the illusion of height and curves), and Luna’s take one look and snap “too skimpy” or “she’ll look like she’s playing dress up” or “the color won’t suit.” She’d be right every time.

We settled on a demure but elegant midnight blue short dress. Luna said it’d make me look sweet and yet edgy. I guess she’d know. But it won’t call undue attention to me, since I’m just a lowly Sophomore and must know my place.

I asked Luna about her gown. It’s floor-length and a deep olive green, to set off her skin tone. It has clean flowing lines and folds and she’ll be wearing gold jewelry and eye shadow. Luna, she has this feel about her. Even when she’s wearing jeans and a t-shirt, when she walks by, your eye looks to her. There’s something that draws your eye in; a vitality or a confidence or a fascination. She plays it up.

I think that fascination is the basis of her friendship with Tucker. No doubt he takes pleasure in understanding her more than anyone else; knowing the deeper thoughts and dreams of someone so off-setting. Tucker likes to understand things.

Luna admitted as much. We were in the handicapped dressing room and the hooks and bench were littered with dresses. I met her eyes in the mirror. I tried to mend things with Tucker, tried to explain why he was weary of how she acted in front of other people. I added to it the things she said and the lines she re-used and the little captivating tricks she seemed to recycle.

“Or maybe,” she said, “he understands me now. I was interesting before he got the trick of me. Now that I’m predictable, he doesn’t need to stay near to have access to me. He can dream it up in that big brain of his, or take little doses when he feels like it.”

“Luna, no one has ever found you predictable. Unless they predict that you’ll do something unpredictable. And that wouldn’t explain his friendship with me. I’m very constant.”

“You’re good. You’re kind and…empathetic. You care. You’re a nurturer. It’s something you see less and less. The only way you can stay that way in a small town like this is by isolating yourself from it.”

“I know that’s not how you want to be viewed, though.”

She shrugged. “Public perception is fluid. Easily manipulated.”

I digested that in silence. The way she said it… “Luna, you’re not…jealous of me, are you? You don’t want to…” I paused, licked my lips, and changed my mind. “Tucker’s right. You do it deliberately. You make yourself seem untouchable and cool and wild. But he’s also wrong. You are all that, actually. But sometimes…you’re like me. You want to be kind, even though you’re ruthless in that little social politics game.”

“That’s ridiculous. And you’re naïve. The world’s not that simple and that didn’t even make sense.”

I shook my head in irritation, trying to grasp a concept just out of reach. “Luna, what are your morals? I mean, do you have a sense of honor? Where do you draw the line? How far can you go in ruining someone’s life before you’ve gone too far? If you see a nice girl crying in the bathroom, do you ever just want to…I don’t know. Help her, comfort her, defend her?”

She was silent. I leaned in, searching her blank eyes. They were deep blue--indisputably blue. But there was something...gray, gray as granite about them, like a layer of steel lay behind that mess of blue-pigmented mess of nerves and mush. Iron hard, and impenetrable past that layer. In that second, her eyes refocused. She blinked, turning her expression down, and somehow her eyes and her expression were closed, hard--like a shield. Like that layer of steel. I saw a muscle on her jaw tighten, and knew that her little moment of sharing was over. I had done something wrong, off, again, and I might suffer for it. Luna's social instincts were flawless. I was sure she could tell when to stop trusting someone. I had overstayed my welcome on insights into her character.

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Do I Buy the Boutonniere?

Earlier this Week:

“Go to prom with me.”

I laughed. Tucker stared at me. “Tucker, you’re going with Luna. Luna, your best friend? You asked her in March, for crissakes.”

“Luna and I aren’t going together. So much the better.” He waited. I began to get annoyed.

“That’s it? You simply aren’t going? Does she know this? Is she gonna come claw my eyes out or what?”

“Look, it’s not that big a deal. We had a tiff.”

“A tiff?” I screeched. “So you’re giving me two weeks to find a dress, shoes, hair, makeup?!”

“It’s a little more than two weeks. And, well, you are an underclassman.”

I smiled in that snarky way I learned from my mother. “So I should be grateful.”

“No, that’s not what I meant. It’s just…” He growled and ran his hands through his hair, muttering apologies and curses.

I grabbed his hand. “Tucker, talk to me. What is going on?”

He sighed, angrily. “Luna and I had a fight.”

“Obviously.”

“She got asked to prom by one of her puppy dogs. And she tried to use it to make me jealous. And I got mad at her, since we’re only going as friends. And she said that since I like you so much better, I should take you. And I screamed fine!, and that I spend so much more time with you because she’s too busy playing at ringleader and playacting for her adoring fans.”

“…Tucker…What. Are. You. Talking. About. Adoring fans?”

“Look, you…Ugh. You don’t know her like I do. She puts on these airs. She constantly has to be witty and mysterious and she puts so much effort in to seeming spontaneous that she wears herself thin. A personality can’t be stretched out like that.”

“Tucker, that’s ridiculous. Luna doesn’t put anything on; she just is.”

He shook his head. “No, you don’t see her like I do. There’s something wrong with her. Everything she does is adopted and calculated for effect.”

“I think maybe you’re just disenchanted. I think she just is that way and you’re trying to impose order on chaos, trying to find some reason for her method or madness. But you’re wrong. Luna, like the universe, tends toward entropy.”

“We’ll have to agree to disagree. Come to prom with me, and we’ll debate it further.”

“So you’ll stick it to Luna by proving her right?”

“No. I’m sick of doing things because of how they look to other people. Come with me because I want you to. It’s only junior prom, but at least this way I’ll remember it fondly.”

I know we all say that we don’t care about appearances, that we shouldn’t. But appearances are social glue. Your standing, your job, your college acceptances; it’s all about how people perceive you. And when you can’t hold that together, when you can’t project the illusion of some conformity, you lose ground. People want to know where you stand.

So Jenny, the lowly sophomore, the girl who can’t seem to color in the lines no matter how she tries, will trot through the prom dog-and-pony show. She’ll carefully slip on an over-sized corsage and stilt-wobble out in a new pair of heels and endure the faux-romance of the “just friends” couple at prom. All because Tucker has unraveled so much that he can’t be worried about appearances.

So my weekend was spent with all three of us ignoring the obvious issues. Keeping up appearances, if you will. Luna offered to go dress shopping with me tomorrow. Peace offering or obvious condescension? Or a pointed "I don't care" statement?

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