Love Story: Prom?

Note: this is the first in a series about how my dear Professor and I fell in love.  Everybody likes a good love story, right?

Senior year of high school, I was pretty sour on the idea of prom.  Junior Prom had been fun, but it was kind of awkward: my group of "going stag" friends all got dates at the last minute.

Which left me sitting in the bleachers for Grand March.  By myself.

Other than that, it was a great night: we went to dinner as a big group, danced the night away, and then went to a school-sponsored post-Prom party (complete with games, snacks, racketball, sumo suits, you name it) that lasted until morning.

But nobody had asked me to go with them, and I went through typical, teenage, nobody-will-ever-love-me angst over it.  And when prom came around senior year?  I wanted nothing to do with it.

I also launched into long, unending rants about how I wanted nothing to do with boys, would never get married, and planned a dream journalism career for myself in which I was too busy for romance anyway.  (How my friends put up with me during that time, I still don't know.)

My best friend happened to be discussing prom with a fellow classmate who mentioned he wasn't likely going since he didn't have a date.  She saw her chance.  "You know, Michelle doesn't have a date, maybe you should ask her."

This boy and I didn't know each other well, but in a class of just 150, you know everybody to some degree.  We were both on speech team and had friends in common--who were more than willing to let me know he was going to ask.

So when my morning plans fell through one day and I ended up sitting in front of my locker at 7:15, I knew exactly why the lanky kid from five lockers over sat down beside me.

We exchanged good mornings, but then, feeling shy about the whole thing, I turned my attention back to my homework.  American Government, maybe?  Even at the time I couldn't make any sense of it.

"Hey, I was wondering..." he started, sounding nervous.  "You're probably already going with somebody, but I was wondering if you would maybe want to think about maybe going with me to Prom."*

"No," I said.  His face fell, crushed, before I could say another word.

"No," I repeated, then sped up. "I'm not going with anybody.  I'd love to go with you."

And oh that little grin on his face.  "Well, great," he said.  "Now I'm just going to go...jump for joy."

He really did jump up from the hallway floor then sprinted down the hall and around the corner toward the calc classroom we'd both sit in once the bell rang.

I'm not sure his feet really hit the floor as he went, and I doubt either one of us learned much in calculus that day.

*Did you notice all those maybes and hedge words?  Professor still does this and it makes me smile.

{Linked up to the Perspective on Life and Love Carnival at ModernMrsDarcy.com}