WHEN WE WENT DOWNSTAIRS, ETHAN LOOKED ANNOYED
“You took forever.”
Mom walked straight toward him.
“Ethan?”
“Yes?”
“Can I have the first dance?”
His eyebrows shot upward.
“Mrs. Bennett…”
He looked around our living room.
“…this is not prom.”
I burst out laughing.
Mom turned on music anyway.
For thirty awkward seconds, Ethan counted steps while Eleanor repeatedly moved in the wrong direction.
Finally, he sighed.
“Mrs. Bennett.”
“Yes?”
“Sophie dances better.”
Mom smiled.
“That’s why she’s your date.”
Then her expression softened.
“Thank you for staying.”
Ethan frowned.
Like she had thanked him for breathing.
Then he shrugged.
“She stays too.”
Mom closed her eyes.
And I realized—
that was what she had needed to understand all along.
AT PROM, THE FIRST SLOW SONG STARTED
Ethan held out his hand.
“Sophie.”
“What?”
“You owe me.”
“Twelve years?”
“Yes.”
I took his hand.
Five seconds later—
he stepped directly on my shoe.
“Ow!”
“Your dress is badly designed.”
“You’re terrible at dancing.”
“You agreed to this.”
“When I was six!”
“A promise is a promise.”
We laughed until people stared.
There was no dramatic applause.
Nobody gathered around us.
Nobody treated the moment like some inspirational spectacle.
We were simply two eighteen-year-olds from Bellmere—
dancing badly together at Willowcrest High School prom.
Exactly the way it should have been.
