At lunch, Bo, Amber, and Emily are whispering to each other.
“What are you being all secretive about?” David asks.
Instead of answering, Bo stands up on the table and pulls a freaking megaphone from her backpack.
“Can I have your attention, please?” she shouts, and the room goes quiet.
“As some of you may have noticed, I won’t be attending prom anymore. I know I’m not the only one here who doesn’t agree with the rules. So, this is for anyone who feels disenfranchised by this school or the code of conduct, or if you want to be able to wear what you want, and dance without leaving room for Jesus. I’m going to be hosting anti-prom at my house. Same time as regular prom. And one more thing.” She hops off the table and puts the megaphone down. She gets on her knee and takes my hand. Everyone goes dead silent so they can hear what she says next. “Yami, will you go to anti-prom with me?”
I can’t stop smiling. People are cheering so loud I’m sure she can’t even hear my “yes.” I nod so she can be sure. We hug, and people are whistling and shouting for us to kiss. We don’t. Because I don’t want to kiss for them, and I don’t want to get in trouble. But we hug again.
“Your parents are okay with that?” I say over the cheering.
“It was their idea! They wanted to raise hell about it, but I told them that would just embarrass me, so this was the next best solution.” She laughs.
The support from the other students is exhilarating. I thought they’d be booing and throwing food.
The cheerers are actually the minority, but they’re the loudest, so I’m grateful for that. Plenty of others are giving us judgy looks. Some people are sitting awkwardly, and some are clapping because that’s what they think they’re supposed to do. I’m sure most of them don’t actually care, but it’s drama, and this school can get pretty boring sometimes, so I get it.
The hype doesn’t die down all week. About half the promposals over the next couple of weeks are for anti-prom. Two of them are even gay. So we’re trendsetters, I guess. I don’t know if they’re straight and proving a point or if they actually like each other, but I’ll take it as a win either way. People are even starting to call it gay prom.
With only a few days to spare, I go dress shopping with Amber, because Bo says she wants to be surprised by how beautiful I look. Amber is the middle-girl for us. Her job is to advise both of us about what to wear based on the other’s choices. With Amber’s help, I end up choosing a purple dress that’s short in the front and long in the back. The sleeves are long, mesh, and sparkly. I think it makes me look like a fairy princess, and I spend the next few days feeling giddy about it.
On the morning of prom, I wake up at five a.m. I don’t need to be up this early, but I can’t sleep. Cesar’s up early, too; I can hear him pacing his room. I knock on his already open door to get his attention. He nods at me but doesn’t stop pacing. I walk in and sit on his bed, and just wait for a minute in case he stops pacing anytime soon, but he doesn’t.
“What are you doing?” I finally say.
“Exercise.”
I raise an eyebrow.
“They said it’s good to move around if I start feeling . . . you know, KMS-y.” Cesar admitting he’s feeling suicidal right now is like a punch straight to the gut. I didn’t expect him to completely heal overnight, but it’s hard to hear he’s still feeling . . . like that.
“Do you want to talk about it?” I ask.
He slows his pace a bit.
“Um . . . maybe?” He stops walking.
“What’s going on?”
“Look, I’m not gonna do it, all right? I just get really down on myself sometimes. I don’t know how to turn it off.”