Page 33 of Sam & Justin

“Is that the real reason?” The tone of her voice told me it was more than that.

“I want to see the outfits.”

“You realize I’m going to be there early. No one else will be there yet.”

“Early birds,” she insisted as she grabbed my elbow and started to drag me off the porch. She stopped when I reminded her that I needed to get my keys and lock the door. She let me go just long enough to lock up, and then she continued dragging me to her car.

As I settled into my sister’s car, I found myself hoping that I would not be calling her for a ride home.

13

Reunion - Saturday Evening

Booking in at the motel was looking like one of my better ideas as I slipped out of my room in my newly purchased old suit. If I’d been at the hotel with my classmates, I’d have had to walk through a lobby full of people staring at me. This way, I only had to pass a housekeeper who was too busy screaming at someone on her phone to pay me any mind. Guess that was another check in the positives column, right alongside not having to spend time drinking at the hotel bar with people who looked right through me even though we’d known each other for most of our lives.

By the time I got to the school, I wasn’t feeling bothered by my suit. Because I didn’t stand out at all in this crowd. Most of the girls I went to school with were dressed to theme with their hair teased high. I didn’t think I’d seen that much blue eye shadow in one place since the Drew Carey Show. And the guys? Well, let’s just say that my gray suit was the least offensive thing in the parking lot.

It looked like the thrift stores in Gomillion had turned a good business on powder blue suits. Maybe I should’ve gone with that one. Might have stood out less.

No one paid me any attention as I joined the throng of people at the door and checked in with the students at the registration desk. They were all dressed in crisp white shirts and black slacks or skirts. Guess they weren’t supposed to dress to theme, or maybe they had another theme in mind. Didn’t know enough about the 80s to know if they were dressed in what caterers wore back then. Something told me a catering outfit was pretty universal no matter what decade we were in.

Once I got through the doors, I started looking around.

The planning committee had gone all out with this thing. Every inch of the gym was decorated. I wondered if any of it was recycled from our actual prom, or if they’d made it all fresh. I’d have to ask Justin about the giant Rubik’s Cubes and the DJ booth made to look like neon cassette tapes. Something told me he had a hand in these decisions, whether they were new or old. He’d been involved like that when we were younger, and I knew he was just as involved now. Even the tables set up for the formal dinner were decorated to theme with a centerpiece.

I started looking around for Justin, trying to find him so I could congratulate him on a job well done. I spotted Vanessa easily. She had a group of teens around her, and she looked like she was giving them instructions. I was a bit surprised to see that she’d dressed up, given that she wasn’t a part of the graduating class. I thought she’d dress in some kind of power suit to show off her status as queen of the help staff.

I kept looking around, and then I spotted him. He wasn’t hard to miss. He had on a sparkling green jacket that shined like some kind of beacon, light reflecting off it in all directions. He was talking to the same blonde guy he’d been with at Timbers and Tallboys the night before. I was pretty sure I’d seen them together in the hallways when we were in high school, walking to class or talking at their lockers. I wondered what they were talking about now, because the conversation was looking pretty deep from across the room.

And then Justin looked up.

I saw the moment he realized I was looking at him. His face changed right before my eyes. I saw the way he smiled, the way he lit up, shining brighter than his jacket. I watched as his friend gave him a little shove and a grin, and then he was on his way to me. Well, I sure as hell wasn’t going to keep him waiting. I half expected music to start playing, just so it could swell when we met in the middle. Really give into the whole John Hughes fever dream he was going for with this prom. It didn’t because this wasn’t a movie. This was the real world, and that shit didn’t happen. Just like no one moved out of our way as we walked toward each other, so we had to weave around groups of people until we met about halfway across the room.

“You look amazing,” he said immediately, his eyes moving over the shitty suit I’d bought last minute. I wondered if he’d been drinking or something. “You brought a suit?”

“No,” I told him honestly. “Brought a nice shirt if I decided to come, but I knew what this meant to you. Went out and bought one on break.”

I didn’t think it was that big of a deal, but the way he smiled? I was starting to have my doubts. Maybe it meant something more than I thought it did.

“You bought a suit?”

“Wasn’t that big of a deal. Hit a thrift store.”

“You bought a suit,” he repeated, shaking his head in disbelief.

“I’m guessing you did too.” I was starting to feel a bit weird with the way he was looking at me. He might have thought buying this suit was a big deal, but it wasn’t. It was just a last-minute impulse buy because I knew how much this night meant to him. I wanted to put the focus on him, on the way he looked like he had stepped out of some vintage clothes catalog. The color looked damn good on him, too. I didn’t think I’d like that jacket on anyone else, but Justin? He could pull it off.

Justin tugged at the bottom of his jacket, like maybe he was starting to feel a bit weird as well. “It had matching pants,” he admitted after a beat.

I raised an eyebrow because he wasn’t wearing matching glittery green pants. I didn’t know much about fashion but even I could see that. “Why aren’t you wearing them?”

His face flushed. “Because I thought it might be too much.”

Too much? Did he not see what everyone else was wearing? There was a girl walking by wearing a hot pink dress that looked like a Barbie reject. Her hair was teased so high it was a wonderit didn’t hit the ceiling. Yeah, his shirt might have been catching the light and shining like some kind of disco ball, but at least it drew the right kind of attention.

“Think it would’ve looked good anyway,” I told him with a shrug. “So, we gotta sit anywhere special during this thing or what?”

Justin gave me a look at the quick change in topic, but could he really blame me? The most I knew about clothes were my sizes. Pretty sure that day was the longest I’d spent in ages looking to buy anything. Normally, I just went shopping at those big box stores. It was always the same stuff too, packs of tee shirts, a few button-downs, and some pants if I needed them. Why the hell would I want to sit and talk about clothes for much longer than telling him that he looked good?