I'll Be Here

with me, I’ll give him a call but I don’t think that I want to go to prom with him.”
    Laney shakes her head and gives me a direct look.  “Of course not.  You’re going with Alex.”
    I laugh.  “Yeah right.”
    Lance stretches his arm across my shoulder.  He pulls me toward his warm body.  “Look babe.  If you don’t ask Alex Faber to be your prom date then maybe I’ll take him.”
    I start to giggle but the look on Lance’s face is so serious that I swallow hard.
    ***
    Aside from staring at the back of his head in calculus, I have my first real encounter with Dustin on Tuesday morning, a week and a half after our break-up.  Today, I’m late to school because I agreed to take our neighbor’s Australian Shepherd out three times a day for the next four days while they are out of town.  This morning Aaron came with me, tripped over the leash and landed on his juicebox.  This necessitated an outfit change for both of us. 
    I’m running to my locker so that I can switch out my books and make it to American Lit before Mr. Greyson sends me to the office.  Rounding the corner, I see Dustin slipping something through the locker vents.  I slow up my pace thinking that I’ll be able to shirk bumping into him, but he looks up at the sound of my steps in the nearly empty hall.  For a brief moment I wonder at the guilty look on his face and then I see where his hands are at.  
    Wait.  Is that my locker?
    With his head tilted slightly to the side so that his hair falls forward, Dustin flicks a wave to me.  He shoves his hands in his front pockets and rocks back on his heels while he waits for me.  I would swear that time slows to an exaggerated lop as I move toward him. 
    “What are you doing?”  I croak.   
    The toe of Dustin’s two-tone top-siders bounce against the locker with a thud.  He looks embarrassed.  “Oh, sorry Willow.  I was—uh—I wrote you a note.”
    All I can think is: oh.
    So that’s what I say. 
    “Oh.” 
    Very articulate, I know. 
    At this point, I am really late for class so I sort of sidle past Dustin and spin my combination (which he knows) and switch out my books.  The note is in my hand and I stuff it in between the pages of my Lit book. 
    I am trying not to notice that he still wears the cologne I got him or the way his shirt sleeve brushes my arm.  Dustin looks over his shoulder tensely and I briefly wonder if he’s looking for Taylor. 
    He meets my eyes and says, “So read it, okay?” 
    “Sure.”
    Then he just looks at me for awhile and I start to feel like there’s something wrong with my face.  Maybe I have a booger dangling down from my nose.  Or maybe a bit of strawberry cream cheese from my bagel this morning is clutching my cheek. 
    “What?”  I ask, defeated.  Deflated.
    He says nothing.  Just more of that quiet looking and weirdness.
    It’s like the rules are changed and we don’t know how to behave.  I don’t even know what the rules are anymore and maybe Dustin doesn’t either.  So I turn away because I’m not sure what else to do. 
    In my head I say something about Taylor ruining everything and Dustin agrees with me. 
    In my head we kiss and happily ever after sprawls out before us.   Taylor disappears in a puff of evil green smoke and Dustin and I work everything out and it’s all perfect. 
    Because Dustin and I had been a couple and Taylor had interfered with that.  We had been happy.  Right?
    I can feel Dustin’s eyes on the back of my neck the whole way down the hall.  It takes everything I’ve got to not look back.
    A few heads turn my way as I enter the classroom, but I’m able to slip into my usual seat without Mr. Greyson making a big deal of my late entrance.  He simply acknowledges me with a weary look over his glasses that says, thank you for gracing us with your presence Miss James .  I smile innocently and flip my book open to the page number written on the board.  Mr. Greyson is a hard-ass when it comes to essay questions and papers, but for most of the other stuff he’s a pretty tame teacher. 
    My seat is just below an air conditioning duct and the edges of Dustin’s note flutter temptingly.  I wait until Mr. Greyson is well into his lecture about Jonathan Swift before I risk it.
    Dustin’s penmanship is awful.  It’s like trying to decipher the work of a dyslexic chimpanzee.
     
    Willow,
    Saturday afternoon I was downtown with my dad and I saw you walk out of the Quick Mart