Prom Narrative

Dad drove me to school so I could take my surrealistic painting to Art class. I figured I might as well work on it there, considering I now had to have a chaperone to work in my own art studio.

Besides, the trailer was an active crime scene. Sergeant Anderson was sending an officer to the house this morning to meet with Dad about the rock-throwing incident yesterday. I could picture my studio being cordoned off with bright yellow plastic tape with black letters reading POLICE LINE: DO NOT CROSS. Just like the church had been after the theft of the twin bells.

After Dad dropped me off, I carried my canvas to the art department, then hurried to homeroom. Our regular teacher was back, and he let us read to ourselves. I continued with The Schwa

“Pah-leeeeze!” Jenni squealed. “Nothing’s more important than prom.” She proceeded to talk about the music the Entertainment Committee was planning for the night. They couldn’t decide between a DJ and a live band.

Enough already with the prom talk! The bell rang, putting an end to my misery. I put up my tray and headed to Art class.

As students worked on their paintings, Mr. Lasky circulated around the class, observing and offering suggestions. I finished laying in thin washes of color over my detailed drawing. So far, so good.

When Mr. Lasky came to my painting, he nodded his head, his ponytail bobbing on his back. “Excellent, Gabrielle! How’d you come up with the idea?”

“I’ve been having dreams about the theft of the twin bells—Bigfoot, tornado, swans. The swans won out.”

“Wise choice,” he said with a grin. “Tell me, did the dreams have anything in common?”

Let’s see. Obviously, in all my dreams, the twin bells were taken from the church, but by vastly different means. In every case, though, I was a helpless bystander. Did I really want to share that with the world?

“Well, Gabrielle?” Mr. Lasky prodded.

I cleared my throat. “I sort of had a feeling of . . .

A bowl of cherries perhaps? I was afraid to ask. I slid away, glad I hadn’t selected cubism for my assignment.

Drew Edwards’s abstract picture was baffling—a flurry of black footprint-like marks on a white canvas. Weird. But that was Drew.

Next was PE. We played basketball again. I almost scored a goal . . . again.

In Spanish class, we practiced rolling the double r.

“It’s simple,” Matt said. “The key is the position of your tongue.”

“Right,” I said, looking around at all the struggling students. One boy sounded like the sputtering motor on Pop’s bass boat.

“Pay attention, Elle,” Matt said. “Vibrate your tongue against the back of your top teeth . . . like this.” He pronounced carro as if he were doing a drum roll.

“And why do I need to know this?”

“It can make a big difference in the meaning of the word. For example, take the sentence El carro es caro—the car is cheap. You wouldn’t want to say, ‘The cheap is cheap,’ now would you?”

“Okay, okay. I’ll try it.” I paused, trying to remember what he had told me. “Carrrrr . . . .” My tongue was stuck! A stream of saliva went flying onto Matt’s new shirt.

He stifled a laugh.

Matt was easygoing, a trait I admired in him. Little things that would irritate most people (including me) didn’t seem to bother