By Erica L. Williams

Today, stupid boys ask stupid girls to eleventh-grade junior prom. Each year the promposals get more outlandish. Last year Damien Wade had his pregnant mother come to class and pretend to go into labor. She stretched out on the table, and Ms. Vicknair, the teacher who was in on it, covered her with a blanket. Damien crawled from underneath, holding the sign:

“DAPHNE, I WAS BORN TO TAKE YOU TO PROM”

Pinchback High School had designated this day for boys (and girls) to prompose. I didn’t have a boyfriend, and I’d never had a boyfriend in my sixteen years unless you count Julius Davis in kindergarten who’d planted a kiss on my cheek every day.

My sister said it’s no big deal not to receive a promposal. She’s one to talk. In high school, her class had voted her the three P’s. Prettiest. Popular. Personality. She’d written a paper about promposals at Southern University, where she was a freshman. Although they were now considered a rite of passage, promposals could cause unnecessary anxiety and perpetuate a toxic syndrome of a dangerous need for validation in teenagers. That was a direct quote.

The lunchroom sizzled with talk of the best promposals. So far, no one had outdone Damien’s “rebirth.” The popular girls congregated in huddles. My best friend, Destiny, wasn’t at school, allegedly coming down with food poisoning. Neither of us was popular per se, but we weren’t losers either, floating somewhere in the middle.

I plopped down at a table intentionally away from the crowd since Destiny had flaked. The cafeteria reeked of bleach, mixed with the bland smell of spaghetti sauce, the store-bought kind, not the marinara my grandmother made, filling our house with the scent of garden tomatoes.

Julius sat next to me. He’d come a long way from the chubby kissing bandit. His build was football material, broad-shouldered, sturdy legs, although he had no athletic inclination. In elementary school, he had trouble reading, but made decent grades because of his comprehension skills. After mastering reading in fifth grade, he told me, “It’s a wrap for these amateurs.” Since then, he stayed on the principal’s list with straight A’s.

One promposal had happened in the cafeteria so far, and it was lightweight. Michael held up a sign from across the room while Ashleigh, his girlfriend, cried as if it was a showstopper.

Julius and I watched as if locked outside of a secret society. I wondered what it would be like to be the IT girl people pined over. The person who worked the room with ease at parties, not the one who stayed in the corner hyperventilating because her social anxiety overwhelmed her.

I smiled, watching Julius stuff a meatball in his mouth. I’d skipped recess to go over sight words with him in elementary school. On several occasions, he’d threatened to beat up boys who’d teased me. We were never more than friends, but I always sensed we could end up together. My sister swore we would tell the kissing story to our grandkids one day, saying it’s always the one you least expect.

“You still live on Nellie Street?” Julius asked. “The house next to Addie Baker, right?”

I nodded. Mean girl Addie Baker once told everyone that my dad was a grease monkey when he came to Donuts and Dads in his mechanics uniform when we were in the fourth grade.

“I was wondering if you…” He stopped mid-sentence as Alex Rochester walked in dressed like a police officer looking to arrest Jennifer McGee to take her to prom. The cafeteria exploded in a cacophony of shrieks and high fives. The lunch period ended as the commotion died down. I didn’t realize Julius had left.

~

After school, I stepped off the bus and walked two blocks home, ignoring Destiny’s calls. If she wanted a play-by-play of the day’s events, she should’ve not deserted me. I almost stumbled when I spotted Julius, wearing a long-sleeved blue oxford shirt and gray slacks, walking down the street from the opposite direction with his parents. That’s not the outfit he’d worn at school. Wasn’t he hot in this Louisiana heat that lingered in the nineties but felt like triple digits? The whir of a small plane circling above caught my attention. My heart stopped when I read the banner:

WANNA TAKEOFF AND GO TO PROM?

Goosebumps pricked my skin. He tricked me. Making small talk during lunch when he was planning an epic promposal. I struggled to keep my composure. Would I say yes? Of course, I would. Why did I wear jeans and this wrinkled black Kendrick Lamar T-shirt instead of something more presentable? I hadn’t even fluffed out my curly hair that morning, wearing it in an afro puff instead.

Did I have time to dash in the house and put on some bronze lip gloss that complemented my brown skin? Destiny is going to die when I tell her. I could hear my sister saying, I told you so. Mom peeked out the door. Was she involved?

I stood in my driveway, trying to look nonchalant as Julius neared. He began to slow down, then stopped in front of Addie Baker’s house. A knot formed in the pit of my stomach. Addie walked out, wearing a yellow spring dress, her face glimmering with makeup the color of cocoa. I watched in slow motion. Julius pointed to the banner. Addie mouthed yes. His parents snapped pictures like they were paparazzi.

It’s a wrap for these amateurs.

For a moment, it seemed as if it were my turn.
Instead, tomorrow, Destiny and I will rank the best and worst promposals and laugh at the preposterousness of it all, secretly wondering if our moment will ever arrive, while pretending it doesn’t matter.

“Isn’t that the cutest thing you’ve ever seen?” Mom said.

I blinked back tears. “No, it’s the stupidest.”