Prom Queen Perfect Read online

  A designer bag, one that looked exactly like mine, dangled from her shoulder. I wanted to call her out for being a copycat, but I tried for a smile instead. The weekend’s events made me too happy to care.

  “I’m sure it can wait, Cory,” I said, calmly entering my locker combination.

  She didn’t get the hint. Instead of disappearing in a whiff of smoke like I wanted her to do, she leaned against the locker next to mine, twirling a lock of hair full of split ends between her fingers. “You know, everyone always assumed you would end up prom queen just like that”—she snapped her fingers—“but it looks like you’ve got some competition.”

  The notebooks I was arranging in my locker slipped from my hands. Mommy’s face from dinner last night flashed in my mind, full of certainty that I would win because my big sister always did. I didn’t even dare imagine the look on her face when she found out I disappointed her.

  Once again.

  I shook my head. Everything was great. Adam and I were finally on the same page, and nothing—no one, to be exact—stood in the way of my becoming prom queen.

  “You don’t believe me?” Cory’s voice still had that same singsong ring. She leaned a little closer until her snake-like mouth was right in my ear. “Go to the cafeteria. I’m sure you’ll be thrilled with what you’ll find.”

  I whipped my head up from my open locker in time to see her disappear around the corridor. Cory hated that I was prettier, smarter, and more popular, and she had been trying to usurp my position of power practically since kindergarten. I told myself all these things, but I still found myself walking toward the cafeteria with no idea what was in store for me.

  When I got there, a bunch of students were gathered around the gigantic bulletin board in one corner. Underclassmen whispered among themselves. Eve, the student council’s freshman representative, gave me a questioning look as I walked by her group’s table. My heart thudded in my chest, and I had the deep urge to vomit when the smell of the tuna pesto they were serving hit my nostrils.

  This was not good. I made my way to the students gathered around the bulletin board, pushing aside a pimply freshman who gazed at me like he wanted to find me under the tree this Christmas. Students parted upon seeing me. A hush fell among them when they realized I was there. Christy stood in front of the bulletin board, her eyes wide and uncomprehending.

  Then, she turned around and flashed a dazzling smile in my direction. This is Christy, your best friend, my brain reminded me. Under the white fluorescent lights, she resembled an angel on a brief visit to earth.

  For one terrible second, I thought everything was going to be okay, that Cory was being a jealous bitch as usual, that my world was not about to tilt on its axis.

  “Alex!” Christy ran up to me and gripped my shoulders. “You’re not going to believe this.”

  “B-believe what?”

  Before Christy could answer, I glanced at the bulletin board. Every possibility I imagined earlier paled in comparison to the reality before me. Someone had taped a gigantic pink poster on the board with the words ‘Christy Marquez for Prom Queen’ in swirly silver letters. On the corner was a smiling picture of Christy with a glittery cartoon crown on top of her head.

  “Can you believe it? Me. Nominated for prom queen,” Christy said as if I hadn’t seen the poster. Disbelief and pure, unadulterated joy shimmered in her eyes. “This never would’ve happened without your help.”

  My throat dried up, becoming as raw as sandpaper in a matter of seconds. She was right. One thought echoed over and over in my head: this was my fault. If I never let Adam get under my skin, never even bothered to talk to Christy, this never would’ve happened. I had no one to blame but myself.

  “That’s great.” I tried to rearrange my features into something resembling happiness. “Who would’ve thought?”

  Hearing the bitterness lacing through every syllable, Christy stepped back and stared at me. The happiness faded from her face, like someone had turned off the lights in a big, empty room. Red splotches blossomed on her cheeks as she said, “You’re not happy about this at all, are you?”

  This was the problem with tearing my walls down, cutting the barbed wire that surrounded my heart, and letting people come close. They saw who I really was, and they never liked the real me.

  Adam was right.

  I was selfish, but it was better than being weak.

  Fury surged through my veins and left a trail of fire behind it. I was angrier than I had ever been in my life. The other students watched us with rapt attention, a lot like cars slowing down to check out a fiery wreck on the side of the road.

  “Why should I be happy about this?” I lifted my chin in the air before delivering the killing blow. “Two months ago, no one even knew who you were. This must be some kind of joke.”

  “I don’t believe this.” Christy shook her head. She narrowed her eyes at me like I was dirt underneath her fingernails. It was an expression I had seen in the mirror more times than I cared to count. “So, it was okay for me to be your lapdog but not your equal?”

  “My equal?” I said with a little laugh. The words cut through the tension between us like a knife through butter. “Don’t kid yourself, Christy. I have no equal.”

  She flinched, looking like I had raised my hand and threatened to slap her. Her doe eyes reminded me of Bambi so much my chest started to hurt. The first tear rolled down her cheek and was quickly followed by others until she was practically sobbing. Don’t cry, I wanted to scream at her. Tears are a sign of weakness. Haven’t I taught you anything at all?

  To my utter horror, a lump formed in my throat, my own tears threatening to fall. What was happening to me?

  Without a word, I pushed my way through the crowd as fast as my three-inch heels allowed me to. The silence in the cafeteria threatened to swallow me whole. The maroon carpet seemed to shrink underneath my feet.

  I didn’t know how I got to the girls’ bathroom on the second floor, but before I knew it, I was looking at my reflection in the mirror above the sink. My reflection stared back at me, pale with flecks of dried mascara on the left eyelid.

  Breathe in. Breathe out.

  Turning around to leave, I stopped dead at the sight that drew my eyes like magnets. The words ‘Alex dela Cruz is a total bitch’ were written in violent, red letters on one of the stall doors. They were carved so deep into the wood that the person who wrote them must’ve been furious at the time. I let out a hysterical laugh, unable to rip my eyes away.

  Whoever had written those words had no idea how right she was.

  ***

  If I were forced to think of a metaphor for the rest of the day, I would’ve said the entire school felt like a fish bowl. I was the goldfish who kept bumping my head against the glass over and over, just dying to get away.

  But that was on the inside.

  On the outside, I was a force to be reckoned with. Bulletproof. Rumors about what happened at the cafeteria flew out of glossy lips. People stared at me in the hallway, awe-struck and a little scared. I merely rolled my eyes and continued on my way.

  When I walked out of my last class for the day, I found Adam leaning against the lockers waiting for me. My heart slammed against my ribcage at the sight of him. It was so easy to walk up to him, tell him how I managed to screw everything up, and ask him to help make it all okay, but the expression on his face stopped me cold. He looked so serious that I could almost imagine a dark cloud hovering above his head.

  “People are going crazy over what happened in the cafeteria,” Adam said when I finally stood in front of him. He blew out a breath, refusing to even look at me, like I had a contagious disease that could be transmitted through eye contact.

  This Adam in front of me? He wasn’t the same person who pulled me closer and traced the skin on my arms. That Adam was as far away from me as the North Pole. I hugged my spiral notebook to my chest, pretending it could protect me from what was about to unfold.

  “Oh? Christ
y and me, you mean?” I forced a cat-that-ate-the-canary-smile on my face. “She was getting a little ambitious, so I put her in her place. All in a day’s work.”

  Adam’s eyes narrowed, his hand grabbing my arm before I could even think about running away. He looked at me for what felt like a lifetime. Something he saw in my expression made him soften, and he shook his head at me. “Alex, I don’t know what’s going on, but this isn’t you.”

  “Wake up, Adam,” I said, all pretense of playing it cool gone. “This is me. You just didn’t know it.”

  I pried my arm away from his hold and walked away without turning back no matter how much I wanted to. The wind whipped my hair around as I made my way to the parking lot.

  The second I got inside the car, I pulled my phone out and dialed the one person I could always count on, the person whose shadow seemed to stretch for miles and miles. I was already crying by the time Alice picked up.

  “Alex, are you okay?” My sister’s voice sounded tiny, which was funny because she had always been larger than life. “Why are you crying? What happened?”

  “I screwed up,” I said, barely able to get the words out. “I screwed up so very badly.”

  ***

  To her credit, Alice didn’t react like I thought she would. There were no words of wisdom ripped out from Hallmark cards, only a small hint of disappointment. When I walked into the living room that smelled faintly of jasmine, my sister sat on the couch waiting for me. A pitcher of lemonade with cucumber slices floating inside it stood on the center of the coffee table.

  It was so domestic that the sight of it made me burst into tears again. I didn’t deserve fancy lemonade, not after everything I did.

  “Ssssshhh.” Alice led me to the couch until we were sitting side by side. She pulled me closer, her arms encircling me. “I’m sure things aren’t as bad as you think they are.”

  “But they are,” I said, hugging my sister back with everything I had in me.

  When I was little, Alice used to make everything better with Nutella crepes from our regular breakfast place. From not being at the top of my class or another argument with Adam, she made it all go away. It didn’t matter that she was Mommy’s favorite, because I was hers.

  “We’ll figure something out, okay?” Alice whispered into my hair.

  I nodded, my throat too clogged up for words. The look on Christy’s face during our confrontation in the cafeteria flashed in my mind again. I closed my eyes in an attempt to block it out. There was no way she could possibly forgive me.

  I couldn’t even forgive myself.

  ***

  For the next couple of days, the weather echoed my mood. Rain poured down on the entire city. It banged against the rooftops of Asia Pacific Academy, drowning out lectures about atoms and socialism.

  I started wearing an old, gray hoodie that belonged to Alice in college, the hood pulled over my head most of the time. At first, it almost gave my freshman fan club a heart attack, but they soon started wearing old hoodies of their own. I didn’t know whether to be irritated or amused.

  The hallway seemed even more deserted than usual as I made my way to my last class, the bell only a few minutes away from ringing. Too busy stuffing a notebook into my purse, I didn’t notice the sight before me until I stumbled right into it. Patricia and two of her friends surrounded Christy amidst the lockers.

  Just like before, Patricia and her friends passed a book back and forth. Christy had her back pressed up against a locker, biting down on her lower lip almost hard enough to draw blood.

  Fight back, I wanted to yell at her. I wanted to choke something at the sight of her standing there and not doing anything.

  “Take a look at this thing.” Patricia flipped the pages of the book open with a fake yawn. “It’s as boring as its owner.”

  This time, it wasn’t a notebook. It was Misery by Stephen King, one of Christy’s favorite books.

  “Just give it back, Patricia,” Christy said, her voice sounding small in the mostly empty hallway.

  Patricia’s head snapped up at this small sign of insolence. She looked at Christy, a look of puzzlement on her face, like things weren’t going according to the script she’d written in her head. She looked at her friends then back at Christy, the book clutched even tighter in her nasty, little claws.

  “You think you’re somebody just because you got nominated for prom queen?” Patricia spat the words out. Her lower lip curled in disdain. “Guess what? You’re still a nobody.”

  This was my chance to intervene, my chance to redeem myself once and for all, but Christy saw me before I could do or say anything. The look on her face stopped me cold. Her smooth features turned into ice in a matter of seconds, and in that moment, I knew. She hated me more than Patricia and her friends put together.

  I had hurt her worse than any of them.

  Pretending that she hadn’t seen me, she narrowed her eyes at Patricia, her back becoming as rigid as a ruler. She looked down her nose at them in the exact way I had taught her. In a voice that was as cold as the peaks of Mount Everest, she said, “If I’m a nobody, what does that make you?”

  You could’ve literally heard a pin drop in the silence that followed. I wished I watched National Geographic more often so I could give you an example of an animal who hunted its prey only to discover that, no, it wasn’t the hunter. It was the prey, and it was about to go down.

  “Take. That. Back,” Patricia said, her voice low. If you could transform ‘how dare you’ into an actual facial expression, you would’ve seen it on Patricia’s face. The script she’d written in her head, the one where she walked away feeling like somebody, had veered dramatically off course.

  “I’ve let you walk all over me since freshman year, but I’ve had enough.” Christy stepped forward, two red spots blooming on her cheeks. “If you want to feel good about yourself, go watch a romantic comedy, go to a spa, do whatever you want. But stop trying to make me feel like shit.”

  Patricia’s eyes darted to her friends who had now stepped back and were looking at Christy with a reluctant sort of respect. As a last attempt at maintaining what little power she had over them, she grabbed both corners of the book she’d been holding and began to pull. The sound of a book being ripped apart rang in the hallway. Pages fluttered to the floor like confetti. After successfully ripping Misery in half, she let the now-divided book drop from her clutches.

  “You’re pathetic.” Patricia turned on her heel and stalked off.

  I watched her walk away, her friends trailing behind her and leaving me and Christy alone in the hallway. Now that the rest of them were gone, Christy stood unmoving, letting out little breaths like she’d just run a mile. A bead of sweat trickled down the left side of her face.

  “Wow,” I finally said.

  Christy’s head snapped up, remembering that I was still there. She held up her palms. “Alex, don’t even try.”

  “What? I can’t even congratulate you for what just happened?”

  “Why? Because this was part of the plan? Because I was supposed to learn how to stand up to Patricia and her friends all along?” Christy shook her head. The look on her face wasn’t even angry. It bordered on the thin line between furious and devastated. “But my getting nominated for prom queen wasn’t part of your plan, was it?”

  For the first time, I noticed the antiseptic smell that lingered in the hallway, and I wanted to be anywhere but there. The bell chose to ring at that exact moment. Christy and I stayed where we were as if glued to the spot.

  She was right. She was absolutely right.

  There was nothing I could’ve said to change her mind, but I gave it a try anyway. “For what it’s worth, Christy, you were my friend.”

  Christy let out a bitter laugh that sounded so like mine it was scary. Before leaving me standing there like last season’s castoffs, she stopped and turned back to me. Her eyes were sad, not angry, as she said, “I was never your friend, Alex. I was your project.”

&
nbsp; ***

  When my teacher called on me in Economics, I looked up from the notebook I’d been staring at for five minutes, gave him a blank look, and tried to speak. Nothing came out as the sound of my complete, utter humiliation filled the room.

  Cory snickered louder than ever.

  Stephen sat two desks away, doodling in his notebook. Usually, he’d give me a wink or a commiserating shrug of his shoulders, but things had changed after what happened with Christy in the cafeteria.

  All I wanted was to go home and drown myself in some online shopping with a big tub of cookie dough ice cream. When the bell rang, my classmates filed out of the room while I stayed in my seat, arranging my pens and highlighters in a pink eggshell case Alice got me. I slung my purse over one shoulder and walked out of the room.

  I saw Adam before he saw me.

  We were walking down the hall in opposite directions. He looked so good that I wanted to stop right then and apologize for being so stupid. He had gotten a haircut, his hair as short and brutal as it was during our first argument about the prom venue. The tip of his nose was red, probably from playing soccer all afternoon. My mind counted down until the exact moment we were going to pass each other. My heart braced itself for the impact.

  And then it happened.

  In the movies, critical moments often happened in slow motion, the seconds slowing down until every painful moment was highlighted in stark detail. Droplets of blood hovering in the air for almost a lifetime.

  We walked by each other without saying a word. Adam turned his face away from mine at the last possible second. My heart splintered into a thousand pieces. Deep down, I yelled at myself to grab his arm and say something, but I couldn’t. I kept right on walking, chin up in the air. My head was so heavy it felt like I’d buried it in sand.

  “Hi, Alex,” Kelly, the sophomore representative, said as I passed by her locker. She stood in front of it, clutching a bunch of books to her chest. To my utter surprise, she started walking with me, like I walked down the halls with presumptuous sophomores every day.