The Prom Goer's Interstellar Excursion (4 page)

“My suggestion is you try Utu, Sumerian ruler of the sun,” she said. “I always liked that particular deity.”

“You're putting some
deep
knowledge on display there.”

“I like arcane information,” she said. “It makes me feel like
less of a cookie-cutter human being if the things in my head aren't the exact same things that are in everybody else's. I never in my life want to have a conversation about a reality television program.”

“What about being on one?”

“My deepest nightmare.”

“Nobody would ever consider you a cookie-cutter human being,” I said.

“What do you like to do outside of school?” she said. “I don't know anything about you, except that you play music.”

“…You know that I play music?”

“When you plug in your amplifier, I hear you playing guitar in your house,” she said. “Do you have a microphone too? Because sometimes I think I even hear you singing through the amp.”

“Yes, I have a microphone.”

“Maybe
that's
what can set you apart from everybody else when it comes to getting off the wait list. You should send Princeton a
Sgt. Pepper
–style concept album about how much you want to get in.”

My stomach twisted. The thought of Sophie hearing me playing guitar—hearing me
singing
—was petrifying. I never even sang if my
parents
were in the house. I only practiced when I knew I was alone. I had never realized my unfinished songs would drift outside into the street and be carried to Sophie on the treasonous desert wind.

“I'm not sure Princeton wants me to send them a playlist of my crappy songs,” I said.

“Your songs aren't crappy at all, but you should finish one sometime. I've noticed they always seem to cut off in the middle. I'd love to hear a whole one someday.”

I didn't know how to respond. I had used her
name
in my songs before. I glanced over to see if she had a look on her face that might indicate she was aware that I sang about her, but she was playing with the tape deck again, trying to get the
Phantom of the Opera
cassette to come out.

“So where else did you apply to college?” she said.

It was time to feel stupid again.

“Princeton was the only place I applied,” I said.

“You're
kidding.
”

“I genuinely thought they would accept me. In retrospect, it wasn't my strongest idea.”

“
Thousands
and
thousands
of students don't get in. Just looking at the percentages, you're out of your mind.”

“My grades were basically perfect,” I said. “My SAT scores were at the low end of Princeton's average, but I thought they would at least put me in the mix. I guess I figured that I wanted it so much there was no way they would say no and just leave me here.”

Sophie whistled, a long, thin
whoooooo.
“Wow. I've never heard of anybody applying to just
one
college. I mean, if only one college in the world existed, it would make sense, but, y'know…there are quite a few.”

“Subconsciously, I think I must want to be stranded forever in the desert,” I said. “Where are you going to school?”

As soon as the question passed my lips, I regretted asking
it. Here I was talking about how I was worried about Princeton, and I didn't even know if she was
going
to college. Sophie wasn't in any of my AP classes, I never saw her in SAT test prep, and she didn't do any extracurricular activities, as far as I knew. On weekends, she usually just disappeared with her motorcycle—to see the ex-boyfriend, presumably, which probably isn't something you can really highlight on a college application. In the same way she seemed to be beyond popularity, she seemed to be beyond academia.

“I didn't mean to assume you were going to college if you're not, which is a perfectly fine choice,” I said. “Lots of people who don't go to college become entrepreneurs or artists or captains of industry….”

“I'm going to Princeton,” she said.

“What?”
I said.

My mouth went dry.

“I'm going to Princeton. I applied early action and I got in. The letter came in December, I think.”

A cold wind blew through my car, though it was ninety degrees outside. Somewhere in the distance, I heard a chorus of hyenas laughing. The
Phantom of the Opera
cast recording suddenly grew louder—
Past the point of no return…The final threshold…
I clicked it off. We rode in silence. I saw a dead coyote on the road. It looked like the vultures had already gotten to it.

“How did I not know about that?” I croaked eventually, because I had to say something.

“I didn't tell anyone,” said Sophie. “It's nobody else's business.”

“That's…a great accomplishment,” I said. I was sweating. I could feel the synapses in my brain misfiring, yelling at each other to form coherent thoughts.

“Thank you,” said Sophie.

“You know, I read somewhere that Princeton doesn't typically accept two students from the same school,” I said. “Especially if it's a public school like Gordo High. Did you know that? Did
yooooouuu…
”

The dryness in my mouth went up to my brain.

“Are you okay?” she said. “You just made a sound like you were having a stroke.”

There were two more dead coyotes up ahead.

“
Enough
with the dead coyotes,” I said, or maybe yelled. My motor functions were scrambled. The emergency lights were on in my head, and there was no engineer coming to save the day.

“There does seem to be a lot of roadkill around,” said Sophie. “You're turning pale. Maybe we should pull over….”

“Just feeling a little light-headed,” I said. “One question—if you had the academic credentials to get into Princeton, how come you're not in any of my classes?”

“If you study the AP review books hard enough, you don't need the classes, so I only took the tests.”

“You only took the
tests
?”

“I got a bunch of fives. Look, I don't want to talk about this. I know how it probably soun—”

“What about the SAT?”

“When I was fifteen, I scored high enough on it that I never had to take it again. We really don't have to discuss—”

My tongue tasted like antifreeze. My body was trying to poison me from the inside out.

“What about extracurricular activities?”

Sophie looked at me and sighed. I could tell that I was making her feel awkward, but I had no conscious control over my tongue, and the questions kept coming. It's rare enough that Princeton accepts one student from a public school. But
two
—it almost never happens. I could see the letters of my name plummeting off the wait list onto the admission office floor, then being swept away by an Ivy League janitor, who in my mind was wearing tweed.

“For the past year, I've been doing these long-distance mud runs two weekends a month with the guy I was seeing, which I guess the Princeton admission office thought was interesting,” she said. “I actually won a bunch of them. I don't think there's anything particularly unique about it. I just like to run. They said maybe I could be on the track team, but I'm not sure how much of a team kind of person I am. That's why I liked the mud runs. I'm pretty good at dealing with obstacles one on one.”

Sophie frowned.

“But I guess the prom
and
the mud runs won't be happening anymore,” she said. “I don't want to have to see my ex every time I go to a race. I hadn't even thought about that part of things.”

Abruptly, the engine of my truck began rattling, which jolted me out of my thoughts. I was surprised the vehicle had made it as far as it had—we had almost reached our destination and the ride had actually been smooth, like the truck was holding out as long as it could to give me a chance to talk to Sophie. This was the first time my vehicle was transporting a living, breathing girl in its cabin. It must have been as excited as I was at the beginning of the journey, and as disappointed as I was now.

“What's that
sound
?” said Sophie.

“Just the engine,” I said. “Hold on.”

My truck stalled and rolled onto the shoulder. For as far as I could see in either direction, there were no cars on the road. A tumbleweed smacked into my door, rolled around my front grille, and blew away across the empty landscape.

“Is this…bad?” said Sophie, staring at me. “Because it seems bad.”

Her concern was understandable. To someone who didn't understand my truck, I could see how the situation would seem bleak—smoldering temperatures outside, miles from civilization, dead coyotes all around us, their bones bleaching in the sun.

“The truck stalls all the time,” I said. “We'll be back on the road in ten seconds.”

“So this isn't a breakdown?”

“Nah, this is just the truck taking a breather. Watch.”

I rubbed the bottom of the steering wheel three times and whispered to my truck: “I love you.”

I turned the key, and the engine started.

“
That's
how you get the truck to go? You stroke the wheel and whisper that you love it?”

“Sometimes it gets insecure and needs to know that it's appreciated.”

“HA…hehhhhh…”

Hearing her laugh again, I decided this was the moment to be a good sport, which is what I
should
have done from the beginning.

“In all seriousness, that's great about Princeton,” I said. “I'm jealous and I'm concerned it gives me less of a chance of getting in, but it's a huge achievement, especially being from this area.”

“Thank you,” she said. “I'm sure you'll get off the wait list.”

We passed a sign:
ROSWELL—7 MILES.

“Though I have to say, if you're smart enough to get into Princeton, I can't
believe
you couldn't find a mechanic in Gordo. You probably could get whatever you need done at Jiffy Lube. This is an insane journey.”

“I have a confession,” she said.

“Confess.”

“I don't have a mechanic in Roswell. I wanted to drive around to clear my head.”

“You're kidding.”

“I'm not.”

“Is your bike even
broken
?”

“Yes, it's broken, so this isn't such a
huge
lie. I'm sure we
will
find a mechanic in Roswell, at which point I'll technically
have a mechanic in Roswell. But I needed to check you out. Prom is in one week. I have no date, and I need one.”

My body tensed.

“Bennett, let's try this again.
Prom
is in one week. I have no date. And I
need
one. I don't have any other options here, except for you. For all intents and purposes—and, looking at the landscape where we are, maybe even for real—you are the last man on earth.”

There was a difference between suddenly having an opportunity to ask Sophie to prom and actually
doing
it. I
wanted
to go to prom with Sophie—every guy in high school wanted to go to prom with her, to go anywhere with her—and I've loved her forever, but I had never considered the logistics of having to
ask
her. I had barely ever made
eye contact
with a girl before that day, let alone asked one out to a social engagement.

Sophie was staring at me, annoyed. The few muscles I have in my underdeveloped body were involuntarily seizing up with fear.

“Bennett,”
she said. “You're
literally
the last guy in school without a date. I've made calls to see if there was anybody else. I considered hiring a male escort, but all the good ones are in Santa Fe. You need to
ask me
if you want to go.”

“What if you say no?”

“I won't say no.”

“How do you know you won't say no?”

“It's
my
brain, it's
my
mouth. I would know if I was going to say no.
Bennett. Road.
”

I was steering the truck into the oncoming lane. Never had I been so distracted.

“Fine,” I said, steeling myself. “Sophie. Will you go to prrrrrrr…prooooooooo…with me?”

“You said
prrrr
and you said
prooo
but you didn't say
prom.
”

“Prrrr…ooooooooo…mmmmmm.”

Sophie puckered her mouth skeptically. I could feel her looking me over, up and down.

“I don't know,” she said. “How do you clean up?”

“You
told
me you wouldn't say no.”

“I
didn't
say no. I said, ‘How do you clean up?' I want to make sure you look good in a suit. Those prom pictures are arguably more important than the dance.”

I thought about this.

“I've never had to clean up before,” I said. “I wore a suit to my grandfather's funeral, but I was five, so I don't remember making any definitive style choices. I think I wanted to wear a top hat at the time, but I wouldn't do that for this particular occasion.”

“I could help find you something to wear, but it has to be
good.
I spent four hundred dollars on my dress. If you're going to rent a suit, it can't look cheap.”

“You spent four hundred dollars on a dress? What does it look like?”

“You'll see.”

“I will?”

“Yeah, you will.”

“So that's a yes, then.”

“Bennett,
yes
, I'll go to prom with you. You're not great with subtext, are you?”