Declan Hankinston is on a mission to find a new prom date amidst the pain of his first heartbreak. Encouraged by his cousin Aubrey, he ventures into the world of gay online dating and signs up for Grindr to seek a companion. Little does he know, Aub...
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"Not again," I whine and pound my head against my knees. I'm curled up against the foot of my futon in Ben's room, the wooden frame digs into my spine. I'm watching the strings of my hoodie sway in the space between my legs and my chest. I don't know what I was thinking, she'll never change. She's back at it again with her antics and it's not surprising one bit. I'm just utterly disgusted at myself for believing that she turned over a new leaf.
I can't let myself get caught up again, I have to grow some balls and say no. I need to figure out myself. There's never a day that I stop and think about what I want, who I am or where I strive to be. I have no goals, outlooks or prospects. I can't keep skating through life not caring. Fuck, the only thing I've cared about is Aubrey. The entire last year of my life has been about her. Before that, I can't say I cared about anything since Dad died. I lost the only person who cared about me.
When I look up, Ben is so caught up with whatever is on his phone that it takes a minute for him to piece together what I said. "Huh?" he asks. "Did you say something?" Okay, I guess he didn't pick up that I said anything at all. I can almost guarantee that he was mindlessly scrolling through TikTok. It's all I see him doing on his phone nowadays, that and Amazon. I don't think he knows his wishlists are public, he thinks I'm the greatest gift-giver in the world and swears I'm psychic. There's no way in hell I'm giving that praise up, I can be Mr Greatest Gift-giver/psychic, all day every day.
He makes the double chin meme face when I shove my phone at him to read Aubrey's text. "Great. Again? What now?" He says rolling his eyes. He blinks and his attention is back on his phone. "You gotta cut her loose, dude."
All the scenarios of what she might ask me to do swirl around in my head. Say no, John. Say no. Consider me all paid up.
?? I text back.
No words because I'm unamused and I want her to know it. I thought that since our conversation the other night that she would have learned from her past mistakes, but here she is asking for my help with something once again. And here I am actually intrigued. I'm sorry.
Ask Declan to prom?
"Dude, she's on one again" I scoff at her text and shove my phone back at Ben's face.
He tilts his head, squints his eyes and puckers his lips when he reads it, it's his go-to look when he's considering something.
"Oh! Well that, I can get behind. You should do it." He says and looks right back at his phone.
"Just so I can get rejected? No, I think I'm good. There's not much more that can happen between Declan and me, he's made that clear." An intrusive thought enters my mind about Ben only getting behind the idea because of what happened the other day when he caught me accidentally looking at his bulge. Maybe he's just trying to push me off to Declan so I don't look at him like that anymore. I didn't even mean to look at him like that in the first place, he just happened to turn around at the wrong time.
"When have you been one to take no for an answer?" He laughs. "Come on, get up." He throws his phone onto the futon and holds his hand out for me to grab after standing up.
Ben leads me to his closet and pulls out my most favourite tuxedo of his. After he hands it to me, he forces me in front of his stand-up mirror placed on the wall to the left of his door and makes me try it on.
"He'd be crazy to deny you when you look like this." I catch his eyes glinting through his reflection in the mirror. He tousels my hair from behind and pats the collar down.
I look ridiculous, especially because I don't even have pants on. I'm in basketball shorts and a plain white T-shirt with a tuxedo coat over it. I'm not Matt. I might look good but I'm not what Delcan wants. He's made it more than clear.
And yes, I catfished him and it was horrible and I suck.
It's been hard enough not being able to talk to him. I find myself going on to my phone and diving straight for the Grindr app out of habit. He deleted his profile so it's not like I can even message him on there anymore, but I can still view them, which is nice. I might be staring at a thread called "deleted user" and a grey silhouette of a person set as the thumbnail but the messages suffice. The messages and my memories. I should rid myself of it but I can't seem to. Almost like if I get rid of the app, then there goes some of the best conversations I've ever had in my life. Kind of like all of the old message screenshots I have when me and Aubrey first started dating—when our conversations were fun and wholesome.
"Now respond to Aubrey and tell her you'll do it."
"Ben.."
"John, I've never seen you as smiley and giddy as you were when you were talking to Declan. I want you to be happy and if it takes me helping you to get Declan to see you for who you really are—which you're amazing by the way—then I'll do that for you. So shut up, stop being so fucking stubborn and let's get you your boy." He smiles. "Also, I'm tired of seeing you mope around. It's depressing and I can't leave here for college knowing that you're still unhappy. Like I've always said, you deserve way more than Cain Hill has to offer."
I'll do it under one condition.
Anything you want.
After this, we have to go our separate ways. I can't keep doing this.
I'm not doing this for Aubrey, I'm doing it for me. And for Declan. He deserves to know how much I did take a liking to him. How much I do like him. He needs to know that it wasn't fake and that everything I said was me. I want him to know how much he has made an impact on my life even in the very short time that I interacted with him. Prom gives me one last chance to make it right.
