Tied to My Fate

8. Shadow Dancing

Prom started thirty minutes ago. Elisa has curled and set my hair into a curly updo. I hope her methods work better than mine, because my hair hardly ever holds a curl for more than an hour. My makeup is as good as I can get it and the borrowed jewelry from Elisa is in place.

I'm ready.

At least physically speaking.

Physical on the outside, not inside. My stomach is doing all sorts of flips and somersaults right now.

"Excited?" Elisa asks me.

"Not really," I say.

"Don't go if it stresses you," she says back.

"After you went through all this trouble?"

"It was no trouble. You shouldn't force yourself to do anything for my sake."

"Thank you, but I don't want to disappoint Zach."

She clasps a gold necklace around me.

"Is that why you're going?"

I nod. "I just want to make him happy."

She stands back and looks me over. She smiles but I see tears beginning to well up in her eyes.

"I'm sure he will be," she says. "You look beautiful, I'll meet you in the car."

She leaves me in the room alone. I guess this is it. Time for prom. I grab my ticket and put it in my purse. When I walk into the living room, Zach is standing by the coffee table.

"You look...nice," he says.

"Three hours of work and that's all I can manage? Nice?" I say with a chuckle.

His hue turns peachy.

"You're as gorgeous as you always are," he says, more quietly this time.

I feel my cheeks warm. That's been happening ever since he admitted his feelings. At first I thought it was my illness lingering, now, I'm not so sure.

"I asked my mom to get this for you," he says, pointing towards a box on the table. I pick it up and open it. Inside is a corsage made up of red roses. The ribbon is gold and matches the details of my dress perfectly. I pick it up, but he stops my hands.

"Allow me, please," he says. He knows how to get my hands to do what he wants now. When he holds them, it's like they aren't even mine. He slides the corsage onto my wrist. My stomach isn't flipping anymore, it's filling with butterflies.

"Ready to go?" I finally ask.

He nods and puts out his elbow. I hold onto it as we walk over to the car. I sit in the back seat with him, his cold fingers wrapped around mine. I don't know if it's to comfort me or because of his feelings.

Prom is being held at a hilltop restaurant on the outskirts of town. Winding up the road makes the stomach flips come back. I don't know why. I shouldn't care what anyone thinks of me. They'll all be too busy having fun to notice me anyway. Still, that logic doesn't stop my anxiety.

Elisa pulls the car in front of the entrance.

"I'll be here at 1. Call me if you want me to get you sooner."

"Yes ma'am. Thank you."

I grab the door handle. Elisa begins speaking words in Spanish, but all I can make out is Zach's name and the word for 'love'. I step out of the car and wait for Zach to come to my side. I'm slightly late, but I wanted to be unnoticed. Very quickly, it's looking like that plan is going to backfire.

After I show my ticket to the person at the entrance, I go into the reception area where my prom is being held. The restaurant is one of the fanciest in town, usually serving French and Italian food at a ridiculous price. So of course the inside is nice, with fresh flowers and dark wood and crisp white walls. Chandeliers and purple cloth hang from the exposed beams on the ceiling. Sunset takes up all of the floor-to-ceiling windows, and damn if it's not one of the most romantic things I've ever seen.