I ignored him, reaching around the back of my dress again, when suddenly he was right up against me, his breath in my face when I turned around. I didn’t remember him ever being so tall. He slid his arm around my waist, reaching back to the gaping fabric, and stuck his hand down my dress, brushing over my underwear. I just stared at him, dumbstruck, and watched his face get closer and closer, eyes closed, tongue starting to stick out—

“Get off me,” I said loudly, pushing him away. He stumbled, tripped over a tree stump and landed on the sidewalk just as another group of people started to pass by. I leaned against the wall, not caring anymore about my dress, or this night, and tried to hide myself.

“Whoa,” a guy in the group said as he stepped over Noah, who was still prone, blinking. “You okay, buddy?”

“She’s just—she’s such a ...” Noah sputtered as he got to his feet, unsteadily, and started to weave back around the side of the building, muttering to himself. The guy and his date just watched him go, then laughed a little nervously and headed across the courtyard to Melissa Ringley and the cafeteria. And I was alone.

I thought about going home. I had money and could easily call a cab, or my father, and just give up entirely. But Scarlett would worry, I knew, so I bunched together the back of my dress, holding it that way, and went to tell her myself.

I found her on the dance floor, with Cameron. They couldn’t dance that close but they did what they could, her stomach between them. All around her were these perfect girls, hair swept up and wearing lipstick and high heels, with their dates in dark tuxedos and dress shoes. I saw Ginny Tabor and Brett Hershey, wearing Prom King and Queen crowns, making out by the punch table. And Regina Little, one of the fattest girls in school, in a huge white dress with a hoop, dancing with a guy in a military uniform who looked at least thirty. And lastly, in the corner, I saw Elizabeth Gunderson and Macon, not dancing or smiling or even talking, just standing there staring at the crowd, same as me.

Macon saw me, and right then I felt it for the first time in so long, that rush and craziness, that feeling I’d had at Topper Dam. He looked good and he grinned at me, and I thought that in this desperate moment, alone at the prom, he could take me away.

It was too much, all of a sudden, everything rushing at me. The prom and Michael and my mother and the baby. Macon and Ronnie’s house and that night in the car, with the glass shattering around my head. Elizabeth Gunderson and her sly smile, the cold of the woods as I’d gotten sick on New Year’s Eve, Grandma Halley’s hand, thin and warm, in mine. And finally, Noah coming closer and closer to me, his tongue sticking out, and now Scarlett on the dance floor, right before my eyes, swaying to the music and smiling, smiling, smiling.

I pushed through the crowd, still holding my dress, thinking only of getting out, getting away, something. I pushed past girls in their princess outfits, past clouds of cologne and perfume, past Mrs. Oakley, the vice principal, who was eyeballing everyone on the lookout for drugs and drunks. I didn’t stop until I reached the bathroom door and ran inside, letting it slam behind me.

The first person I saw was Melissa Ringley, standing in front of the mirrors with a lipstick in her hand. She looked at the mirror in front of her, and me beyond it, and turned around, her mouth still in a perfect O.

“Halley, my goodness, what is wrong?” She put the lipstick down and walked toward me, lifting her dress off the ground so it wouldn’t brush the floor. It was black, with a full skirt and a modest neckline. She had a small gold cross hanging from a chain around her neck. “Are you okay?”

I did look crazed, wild even. My hair, so carefully crafted into a perfect French twist by Scarlett, had somehow come un-tucked and was sticking up like a lopsided Mohawk. My face was red and my mascara smeared and that didn’t even include my dress, which was bagging open in the back now that I had let go of it. Two other girls, checking their makeup, brushed past me, glanced at my exposed underwear and clucked their tongues as they pushed the door open, leaving me and Melissa alone.

“I’m fine,” I said quickly, moving to the sink and wetting a paper towel, trying to do something about my face. I pulled my hair down, bobby pins spilling everywhere. “Just a rotten night, that’s all.”

“Well, I heard Noah was drunk,” she said, whispering the last word and taking a furtive look around. “You poor thing. And what happened to your dress? Oh my God, Halley, turn around. Look at that!”

“I know,” I said, my teeth clenched. I couldn’t believe I was mooning Melissa Ringley. “I just want to get out of here.”

“Well, you can’t go out there like that,” she said, moving around behind me. “Here, hand me some of those bobby pins, I’ll see what I can do.”

So I stood there, with Melissa behind me muttering to herself and stabbing bobby pins into my dress, all the while wondering how the night could get any worse. And then, it did.

Elizabeth Gunderson was wearing a tight black dress and spike heels that I could hear clacking outside before she even opened the door and came into the bathroom itself. When she saw me she narrowed her eyes and looked me up and down before moving to another sink and leaning into the mirror.

“Well, this should at least get you through the rest of the night,” Melissa said cheerfully, coming out from behind me and tossing the extra bobby pins into the trash. “Just don’t try any radical movements or anything.”

“Okay,” I said, staring at my reflection. I could feel Elizabeth watching me. I told myself it was only fitting she was with Macon; they deserved each other. This didn’t really make me feel better. “Thanks, Melissa. Really.”