(no subject)
So, I need to write this down, for two purposes. One, because this is the sort of thing that you want chronicled in your life. Two, because poor Sandra's ears must be hurting from all my rambling. Thus. Here we go.
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The day started off on an interesting note. My mom decided to wake me up about fifteen minutes before my alarm was set to go off, so that I could come with her to drop Shawn off at work and perhaps run a few prom-related chores. So, I scrambled to get ready, and completely abandoned the idea of makeup for the sake of applying it better later on. Turns out that would be a mistake, but I'll talk about that later.
We drop Shawn off after the usual tiff between him and mom, and the girly part of the day begins. Soon, after a stop at the Superstore to pick up some coffee, a forgotten wallet, and an employee with too good of a memory, it's off to Bayshore Mall we go to find bejewelled hair combs. At first, we make a mandatory stop in the Disney store that lasts a good half hour... both mom and I ogled over Jack Sparrow pillows and shirts for hours, not to mention the action figures and costumes. It was a grand old time. But then we remember our real purpose for being there, and get back on course. We stop in Accessorize. Too expensive, too weird, too little. We stop in Dynamite. No hair stuff. We stop in Claire's... bingo! Spotted the perfect combs, and grabbed them, but not after my mom had a brief moment of insanity where she considered buying her wedding jewellery there. Thankfully she snapped out of it. I noticed Steph Lui and Julie were there, making last minute purchases as well. I ended up also buying three little elasticized rhinestone rings for six bucks... hey, it sounded like a good deal at the time.
So we leave the mall and head for Dollarama (they accept interac now, donchaknow). In search of what? I can't precisely remember. But we ended up getting water along with it.
Lunch time. We were going to go to the Subway at the mall, but realized they're silly and don't carry Atkin-ized wraps anymore. I suggest Tim Horton's, my mom suggests Wendy's. We could, conceivably, do both; but in fact, we end up doing neither. On the spur of the moment, my mom decides to take me to East Side Mario's, where we are the first customers of the day. She had a delicious-looking chicken and salad, while I had a delicious-tasting mariboli wrap and salad. No need for the "bloatation effect", eh?
She decides to call Ingrid, because god forbid the future came up, and suddenly my mom's job wasn't looking so sturdy. They talk for a while, I smile awkwardly at the waitresses, and then she calls Mike. Same deal. Kinda put a damper on my day.
But then we get home, and that's when the real girly stuff starts happening. I go on my computer to wait while mom sets up the "spa", and try to find either Logan or Cody. Temporarily, I find Cody, and tell him that his boutonniere is actually white. I don't find Logan, and temporarily freak out because I'm not sure of the importance of having our tickets to get into prom. Cody assures me that he actually has them, which he does, and I breathe. Time for a manicure.
My mom does the whole deal in a rather grandiose way... I entered the room and Josh Groban was playing over her laptop... my water was poured into a more formal glass... and my chair awaited me. It was much like Christmas, only not. From then on, I proceeded to browse through fashion magazines while having my feet soaked, massaged, and pedicured... and then my hands manicured. It takes longer than expected, and my mom starts freaking out. It's 2pm, and we haven't started my hair.
I quickly dash to get a blouse on, check my messages, and the hair process begins. It takes forEVER. And I mean foreeeeeveeeeer. By forever, I mean, it was 4:45 (the time Cody was supposed to show up) and we still had about ten ringlets to curl. I was doing my makeup while my mom did my hair, which sounds simple, but believe me, it really isn't. When your head is being tugged every which way, and you're far away from the mirror, it's really difficult to be accurate. Alas.
So we finally get the head area finished, and I get into my dress. Photo time! We go onto the main floor and take a good dozen pictures before I realize that I should probably call Natasha to tell her I'm going to be late. I give her a ballpark of about twenty minutes. Little did she or I know, I was lying. Cody didn't show up for another twenty minutes, due to the fact that he had no idea where I lived lol
The doorbell finally rang, and I quickly ducked behind the corner of the wall as my mom answered the door. According to a later account, she thought he'd be another "oh, I'm so good looking and all the ladies love me, and I know it" type. *coughHALLERcough*. But then he must have said or done something that totally destroyed that image. I popped out from the wall corner, and we said hi and all that jazz. There was a little time where he showed me the corsage he'd bought (which was gorgeous, and absolutely perfect... lilies are my favourite flower, and the ribbon was black to match my dress), but then we immediately rushed into photoshoot mode lol started with taking pictures of the whole corsage-and-boutonniere ritual... further proof that guys have it easier than girls. Whoo, an elasticized band that MIGHT go around her wrist... how ever does that work? *SARCASM*. Boutonnieres? Whoever invented them, hated women and wanted them to DIE. I tried so hard to get that thing pinned through his lapel, and then it just ended up flopping upside down lol we had a good laugh, and then my mom stepped in to fulfill the tradition of the mother being the one to fix the boutonniere.
Then we posed for the "couple" shots. This was weird. At that point, I was previously informed that Rena had announced her feelings to him, and that he had announced his to her. Monica and Chandler, she'd described their relationship. I purposely posed to make it seem like we were just friends, but my mom kept insisting for me to lean my head in. Cody kept pulling me, by my waist, closer to him. He's a gentleman, and a total sweetheart... I couldn't help but relax and just fall into it. We got to a point where we were heading out the door, and every five seconds (no joke) my mom would ask us to pause and she would take a picture. At one point, he took my hand and led me down the steps to the door.
The worst part is, he never laughed at us. He always laughed with us. His mom is apparently the same way.
We finally get ourselves into the SUV, and we're going down the road, and my mom decides to start "extreme photography", which means that she is actually taking pictures of us as she's driving. Terrifying stuff! Cody of course totally goes along with it and actually figures out a way to perfect it. Along the way, he proved his mesh-well-ness with our family, when we spotted geese across the road and were like "birdy birdies!" and he was like "ducky ducks!"
Then we finally got to the area where we were supposed to be dropped off... and we take pictures in front of the house that we initially thought was the one we were supposed to be at... little do we know, it's not 10 Steggal, it's 70. So, we rush back into the car, faces beet red, and head on our way to the Williams'. A hesitant speculation by my mom confirmed that it was indeed the right place, and we take just a couple more pictures before we head to the backyard. Ellen looks gorgeous in her purple dress, and Natasha is a downright knockout. James, Anna, and Stefan come around, and it's all just wonderful. We posed for a few pictures in the backyard, and James is all like "hello, Emily!" when we had our arms around eachother's waists. I was like "haha...what?". Cody continued to put his hand around my waist.
Everyone headed towards the limo, and I let myself fall behind to walk with Cody. Suddenly I realize my mom is, once again, taking pictures of this occasion lol at this point, I'm like "okay stalkerazzi, you can go home now!". We do something almost identical to the backyard poses (with commentary from James and all), and then it's finally time to get into the limo. Flip, who'd have known those things were so clumsy to get into? But overall, those things are darn cool. We had our own bar and everything in there, only, without refreshments. Cody takes a seat next to me, Ellen takes a seat next to him, and Natasha, Stefan, Anna, and James make themselves at home on my other side. Stalkerazzi/mom pops up one last time, out of nowhere, and takes pictures of us inside. The door is shut, and we're on our way.
A ruined french manicure, a disappeared seatbelt, and 200 km/h later, we were on our way to Sala San Marco.
It was weird to see the other couples in the limo. James and Anna were completely at home with one another, Tash and Stefan seemed comfortably couple-like, and here you had me and Cody and Ellen... the "just friends who aren't really sure if they are just friends" couple, and the "girl who had a date up until about a week ago because he is a jerk". It was like a progression of relationship.
**** This is the part you can read if you don't feel like reading ALL the gory details. This is the fun part. ****
Then we got to the place. We weren't really sure at first, cause it seemed like a sketchy neighbourhood, and a small building, but it was the place nonetheless lol we all got out and were met with a slew of teachers who were just chilling outside. Ironically, that somewhat makes the evening circular. But you'll see why later. Me and Cody stood together for a slight awkward minute, and then went inside. The place is gorgeous. Main foyer has a sky painted on the ceiling, with a beautiful chandelier hanging from it. We search for our names on the list, take a moment to celebrate that we're table number one, and then enter the room. It. Is. Madness. Fifty four tables, all about a foot apart... and it doesn't go in numerical order, either. We spend about ten minutes searching desperately for our table, and finally we're pointed in the right direction by Shona. We get there, and there's no chairs for us! This would lead to much utensil confusion later that night, as well as food lol the chairs finally got there, and we sat down.
Almost as if on cue, the picture taking started. Logan took pics of each side of the table. I leaned back into Cody. He wrapped his arm around me.
We had a minor adventure trying to decide if this one bowl was salad dressing or bread dip. We later discovered that it was, in fact, salad dressing.
Nick, who was beside me, and who was Logan's date (as is natural when you've dated the person for like ever) kept snarking with me. And I'm like "dude, I barely know you. I save my snark for people such as my date to my right". It felt awkward, I'm not going to lie, cause it felt like he was talking more to me than to Lowg. Eventually it faded out, and I had a "phew" moment. I turned my attention fully to Cody.
The schedule for the meal part of the night seemed to be this: have the course delivered to you, eat it, talk amongst yourselves, and then, while you wait for the next course (it took like half an hour between each!), you get up and socialize with as many people as possible.
I introduced Cody to Lisa, and she asked if we were just friends or more... at first, neither of us answered. I stumbled over my words, we looked at eachother, and I finally said "It's complicated", with a joking arm around his shoulder. God knows why I said that. He agreed with me, and Lisa laughed.
I introduced him to Sam, and henceforth he decided he wouldn't be able to stand her.
I introduced him to Kaitlin, and he sympathized for my poor ear. The girl was about to talk it right off.
I introduced him to my circle, and he was a perfect gentleman. Everyone wanted pictures with me, so he kindly took my camera and took the pictures for me. Perfect, perfect gentleman. And Anarosa has never looked so lovely.
... When we travelled through the tables, I either put my hand on his arm, or he did the same.
He told me that he couldn't dance, so I decided to try and teach him the simplest of all dancing moves; the robot... and strove to document this occasion with my camera lol the picture of me doing it that he took, I look like a zombie. The picture I took of him looks like the predecessor to domestic abuse lol
The slideshow came on, and we just stood against the wall so that we could see (we couldn't see from our table). I had to be close to him because he couldn't hear me over the music otherwise. We laughed at the two pictures of me that appeared out of nowhere, that I most definitely did not submit. You could tell who was popular by the amount of applause each person got :D
Then there was the dessert. By this point, he'd gotten into a habit of pulling out my chair for me. The dessert itself was disgusting, and I only ate about half of it.
And then the dance started.
As is protocol with such things, it started with fast songs. Cody reminded me that he doesn't dance, and we went outside for a breath of fresh air. Little did we know, it was raining, and hotter outside than in. We came back inside and had new appreciation for the air conditioning.
It was at this point that Cody decided to be even more gratuitous and told me and Shauna to go out on the dance floor. We did, briefly, and he took a picture of us (ahahah that picture), but the song ended quickly, and it turned into a slow song. I came back to him, and was like "It's a slow song" and he's like "THIS I can dance to".
We walked towards the dance floor, and he took me by the hand. It was gentle.
He took that hand, and we settled into a typical dance position. Hands held, my arm around his shoulder, his around my waist... and somehow it progressed into something a lot closer, a lot more intimate. I think... we were dancing, and talking at the same time, just small talk, and he was like "I'm not used to dancing with girls your height" and I reminded myself of my first dance with Nathan, and how his shoulder was the perfect height for me, so I did something of a shoulder-check on him. I rested my head there, and he was like "what?" and I pulled back and said "you're a perfect height". And he smiled and it was there that the waltz pose turned into a true slow-dance.
He put both arms around my waist, and I wrapped both arms around his neck. At first it was just simple. Occasionally, we would part a little bit and be inches away from eachothers' faces just to say something... haha, at one point, he was like "everyone's like, making out" (which they were), and that totally caught me offguard. I didn't know what to say, without sounding like I was asking for it... so i said "well... it's a very makey-outy song?" (any one who's familiar with homestar runner and teen girl squad will get why that's funny). He laughed, and we settled back into position. The song ended, and we parted. Not for long, though... as we soon realized that the next song was Josh Groban's "You Raise Me Up"... not exactly a fast song.
We laughed, and settled back into position. Again, it started with the waltz pose, and melted into the closeness of the other. We would talk, but this time it was right into eachother's ears. Heads side by side, we could communicate perfectly without having to pull apart. Apparently everyone was staring at us :D
But suddenly, I felt the scruff of his chin settle into my shoulder. We went silent, right at the chorus of the song, and he settled himself into my shoulder. His hands adjusted themselves on my waist. It was somewhere around then that I let myself fall. And I fell hard. I sunk my chin into his shoulder, and adjusted my hands to be closer around his neck. We just... stayed silent, and fell into eachother.
And then the song ended, and our parting was a little slower than the first time. We went into the foyer, and chilled for a good half hour, just looking at the pictures i'd taken and talking about life, the world, and everything.
At one point, he brought up the whole Rena situation. I can't remember why, I just remember that he did. He said "Rena likes me, eh?" and we talked about how she'd come into his room that one night and announced her feelings to him. He then said "I told her I liked her when I was like, eight, when I first met her"... which caught me by surprise, as that is NOT the response that she told me. She said something along the lines of "he told me he'd liked me since he was like, eight". He, on the other hand, made it very clear that he harbored no feelings for her anymore.
We went back into the dance hall, and I revealed that Kyle Bentley is harboring something remotely like feelings towards me. Feelings that I really don't want. I was on the dance floor dancing to a fast song with some friends, and Cody was trying to take pictures from his seat off the dance floor... and then I broke from the group for literally a SECOND, and Kyle was behind me, saying something like "funny how you can make someone laugh just by staring at them". It was like a flipping moth to a flame! So I kindof laughed awkwardly and then made my way over to Cody, wrapped my arms around him from behind, and was like "Save me!" and he agreed to... he had a jolly good laugh at the whole Kyle situation.
And just as though it were on cue, a slow song started playing. I believe it was "Hey There Delilah" or something... I lean into Cody and am like "you wanna go?" and he gets up and we go onto the dance floor, settling right into position again. Again, we didn't separate at all, we merely talked into eachother's ears... Cody was having so much fun lmao he was like "He's totally staring at us right now... oh, oh, he's approaching us." I was so tempted so many times to say something like "you wanna really make him jealous?"... but instead, I just laughed and settled my head further into his shoulder. He did the same. Hands about the waist... me hugging him tightly to me... this time, I let myself relax so much that I just shut my eyes and almost fell asleep... I was so comfortable, so at peace in that moment.
The song ended, and again, we parted very slowly. Kyle was off to the side, having clearly been watching me and Cody. Most other people had left already for the after parties, so me and Cody headed to the foyer. I asked him if he wanted to go for a walk, and he was like "sure".
We get outside, and realize very quickly that it's raining. Ducking back under the shelter, Cody says to me "perfect timing for a walk!" laughingly. I hesitated for a second, contemplating the effects of water on my dress... and said "To hell with it" and just dove right into the rain. He came with me. We walked along the sidewalk, just talking... then we ducked under the corner of a building, and there we discussed our equal fears of thunder :D lightning struck, and I instinctively clutched a pole near me, and he was like "I'm the same way!"
After deciding that where we were was pretty sketchy (there was a total ghetto down the alley), we continued to walk... at one point we hid under the roof of a store, and that did very little lol so we moved on again, and this time we stayed. We sat on the front steps of this African convenience store that happened to be closed, and also happened to have a lot of shelter. We watched the lightning flicker, and gasped at how cool some of them were. From then on, we actually discussed life, the universe, and everything. We discussed how our moms are so similar that it's frightening... we discussed how he can't stand his girlfriend, but how he can't break up with her because he doesn't have the heart to... we even bloody discussed cosmetics lmao which actually led to something interesting... I was like "your eyes are a warm color, so you'd look good in like, cool colors" and then I asked what color mine were, and he looked at them and was like "holy crap, your pupils are huge! they're so dilated!" and I had to take a picture to see for myself lmao
It was after that, and taking a few artsy pictures of him, a puddle, and a UFO, that we started walking back through the rain to see if my ride was there yet. I called, and my mom told me that Mike had JUST left. Leaving us to chill with the rebellious teachers who were still there, one of them smoking... me and Cody just slipped past them so I could get my purse from the staff of the Sala San Marco, and then we sat on the bench just outside of the building. At one point, I sighed and was like "I'm tired" and he was like "You look it" and I leaned into him and rested my head on him, and he wrapped his arm around my shoulder.
Soon enough, and after a few awkward conversations with the teachers, Mike came to pick us up. The entire way back, Cody proved that he belongs in this family yet again. He and Mike got along famously. But we eventually got back to Cody's place.
Just as he was leaving, he gave me a huge hug... something that I almost felt embarrassed about doing in the presence of Mike, because it was so intimate. We eventually parted, and he left.
And that was the end of it...
****
But now, nothing will happen. We will just be friends. So long as there is the possibility of him and Rena getting together, I am backing off... it hurts like hell, but it's the right thing.
And all at once the crowd begins to sing
Sometimes the hardest thing and the right thing
Are the same.
The Fray - "All At Once"