Bob and the Prom

“So, what are we going to do about the prom?” I asked.

“Do? I wasn’t planning on doing anything about the prom,” Bob said. “What do you mean, do? Like a booby trap or a practical joke? Exploding punchbowl? Take over the sound system?”

“Bob, we’re in high school now,” I said patiently. “In high school, people go to the prom.”

“Hmm,” said Bob. “I guess we’re people, even if we’re nerds. Do we have to go?”

“Come on, Bob,” I said. “It’s supposed to be fun.”

“Well, I don’t know anything about dancing,” Bob said.

“You learned to play the guitar,” I pointed out. “You didn’t know a thing about music a year and a half ago.”

“Pfaah!” grunted Bob. He stared down at the circuit board on his bench. “I suppose you’re going to expect me to take a date, too.”

“Of course,” I said. “Only losers go to the prom alone. At least that’s what I’ve heard.”

“Yeah, right. Who would I take? There aren’t any girls I like,” he said. “Or that like me,” he added as an afterthought, looking into the distance.

“Nora,” I said promptly.

“Nora!” he howled, glaring at me indignantly. “Nora? She’s my worst enemy!”

“Bob, she’s not an enemy,” I said. “She’s a rival. It’s different. Tony’s an enemy. Nora’s just your biggest rival.”

“Right. My archrival. And I suppose you’re going to take Junior,” scoffed Bob.

“Yeah,” I said. “That’s what I was thinking.”

Bob burst out laughing. “I can’t believe you’re saying this stuff!”

“Think about it, Bob. Who else could you really talk to? You and Nora are on the same wavelength. Both top of the class, both science whizzes, state science fair honorees…. And she’s not bad looking.”

“Not bad looking!” scoffed Bob. Then he reflected for a minute. “No, I guess she’s not ugly, if she’d just get rid of those glasses. But she’s such a show-off!”

I laughed. “So are you.”

Bob glared at me. “Et tu, Brute?”

He turned his attention back to the circuit board and was silent for a few minutes. After a while, he said, “Well, you’re right about one thing. Nora is one of the few girls I can respect. But she hates me.”

“I don’t think so,” I said. “She always wants to do better than you, and to have the last word, but that doesn’t mean she hates you. Have you ever just talked with her?”

“Mike, she hates me! She puts me down all the time.”

“You do the same thing to her,” I said. “Remember yesterday in science class? And you weren’t even right that time.”

“What are you talking about?” said Bob defiantly. “Oh, that,” he said, a bit deflated.

He ruminated. “You’re really going to ask Junior?” he said after a few minutes.

“Yeah,” I said, grinning. “I think.”

“She’s nicer than Nora,” Bob said.

“She’s cool. I think Nora could be nice if you were nice to her. Nora and Doug are friends.”

“Doug’s so laid-back, he’s even friends with Tony. And Nora’s a pyromaniac. Pushes people into fires and stuff,” Bob said. He absently reached down and scratched his ankle.

“How do you know she was the one who did that? Besides, the girl who pushed you into the fire also pushed you into the river and splashed you with water to put the fire out,” I said.

“How do you know she’s not the one who was beating on me with a stick?” Bob shot back.

I laughed. “Because that was Junia.”

“How do you know?” Bob asked curiously.

“Why do you think Nora calls her the Barbarian Queen?”

Bob wheeled to look at me. “Well, that’s another thing. Would you really take a girl to the prom that beat on me with a stick while I was enveloped in flames?” he asked.

“Well, she didn’t beat on me,” I said. “Besides, that was a long time ago.”

“Pfaah!” snorted Bob. He whirled back around to his circuit board. “Some friend you are.”

“Think about it,” I said. “I’ll see you later.”

For all my seeming confidence, the thought of asking Junia or any other girl to the prom was terrifying. I hemmed and hawed and finally asked my sister for advice.

“Sure,” Nancy said. “If you ask nicely, the worst that can happen is that she’ll say no. But I’m thinking she’ll probably say yes, from the way you’ve talked about her. Just be yourself, and don’t make a big production out of it. It’s better if you ask in person, but the telephone is okay if you’re really chicken.”

“But I don’t know how to dance,” I said.

“Does she?” asked Nancy.

I shrugged. “I thought all girls could dance,” I said.

Nancy laughed. “Have you ever watched a dance? Most people don’t really know what they’re doing. They just get out there and move around. There isn’t any right way to dance to rock music. Now if it’s disco, or a waltz or polka or something, there are steps. But they’re easy to learn. I can teach you, if you want.”

“I need all the help I can get,” I said. “And Bob is totally clueless when it comes to those kinds of things.”

Nancy laughed. “Bob at the prom. Now there’s a thought!”

“Did you ask her? What did she say?” I asked Bob eagerly a couple of days later, back in his shop.

“She said she’d go to the prom with me when heck freezes over,” Bob said disgustedly. “I told you she didn’t like me!”

“She actually said that? When heck freezes over?” I said, and burst out laughing.

Bob glared at me. “Some friend you are,” he muttered.

“It’s just a funny expression. Bob, you actually sound disappointed,” I said. “I thought you didn’t even like her.”

“I’m not disappointed. I’m insulted,” Bob said. “There’s a difference.”

“Well, that’s a bummer. I’m sorry. I thought it was a good idea, but I guess not,” I said.

“What did Junior say?” Bob asked.

“Oh, she said yes. But she was really surprised that I asked her. She sounded like you did: ‘I thought we were enemies.’ I said, ‘No, just rivals.’ And she said, ‘Oh, okay. I guess so.’”

“I guess so,” repeated Bob. “That doesn’t sound very enthusiastic.”

“No,” I admitted. “She didn’t leap into my arms and smother me with kisses. Good thing, too! But I think we’ll have fun. She’s pretty cool.”

“Blah. I guess I actually am disappointed,” Bob said. “I’ve been wondering what it would be like for the four of us to hang out together without fighting. We’d have plenty to talk about.”

“Yeah, we would,” I said.

“Well, I guess I’ll drown my sorrows in solder,” Bob said. “See you later.”

“Take it easy.”

As I left the shop, I thought heard Bob mutter, “Heck is where people go who don’t believe in gosh.”

Monday afternoon, I went over to Bob’s shop after school. Bob was still working on the circuit panel. He turned when I came in.

“Guess what?” he said.

“You’ve got the fifty bucks you owe me?” I said.

“Right. Hey, Nora told me at lunchtime that she had thought it over and would be okay with going to the prom with me.”

“So heck froze over,” I said. “Great! Congratulations.”

“I think Junior had something to do with it, because Nora said she had talked about it with someone. Maybe she found out about Junior saying yes, and then she didn’t want to stay home alone.” Bob was silent for a minute. Then he said, “I sort of apologized for being sarcastic in science class last week.”

“Good,” I said. Then, “What do you mean, sort of?”

“Well, I said that as much as I hated to admit it, she was right that time.”

“Oh, yeah? What did she say?”

Bob grinned sheepishly. “She laughed and said, ‘So the Supernerd has a sensitive side.’”

“Hmm,” I said, impressed. “Come over to the sensitive side, Luke,” I intoned in my best Darth Vader voice.

I spent several evenings with Nancy, learning rudimentary dance steps. After the fourth lesson, she said, “Well, you’re not Fred Astaire, but at least you won’t be an embarrassment to the family name. Have you lined up a tux and flowers yet?”

“Bob and I are going to go after school tomorrow,” I said. “Any suggestions?”

“Black,” she said promptly. “Black always looks good.”

“I don’t think I’ve ever seen black flowers,” I said, ruminating. “What kind would they be?”

Nancy burst out laughing. “The tux, you idiot!” she said. “You can’t go wrong getting a black suit and shoes, and a white shirt. If you get something colored, it might look tacky or clash with your date’s gown. And white is so disco.”

“Yeah, right,” I said, regretfully dismissing my fantasy of dazzling the crowd with a gleaming white John Travolta outfit. “What about flowers, though? I’d hate to get something that didn’t work with her dress. Seems like girls are so picky about colors.”

“Well, white always works, with multicolored ribbons. Or you could get a mixture of several colors of flowers. But actually, as long as you go with pale-colored flowers, almost anything should work. They’d be less likely to clash than something really bright.”

“White or pale flowers,” I mumbled to myself. “Black suit. Black shoes.” Aloud I said, “Any other guidance, oh wisest of siblings?”

“Yes. Make sure the shoes fit, and get the suit altered if it’s shaped wrong for you. The people at the tux place will be able to tell you,” she said. She grinned. “I wonder what Bob’s taste in suits is like.” She snickered. She started towards the kitchen, then stopped. “Get your hair cut, too, at one of the good places. It’s worth the extra five bucks.”

I sighed and scratched the visit to Benny’s Barbershop from my mental list. This was going to consume all the money wadded up in the old sock in my underwear drawer, and make a significant dent in my bank account. I would have to look for more lawns to mow.

The first place we visited was Olshan Rentals, on Main Street. When Bob found out what it cost to rent a tux for one night, he was furious. “Forty bucks! I could buy a suit for that!” he exploded. “Come on, Mike. Let’s get out of here.”

I followed him out, looking around at the elegantly dressed mannequins that lined the walls. “Where to?” I asked.

“I’ve seen tuxes at Recycle Sally’s,” he said, throwing his leg over his bike seat. He hit the power switch, and his bike lunged forward, jerking his head back. I swung onto my ten-speed and pedaled hard to catch up.

Recycle Sally’s was an all-purpose thrift store next to the old railroad depot. The building had once been a diner, catering to the train passengers who would dash in for a bite while they waited. There was still a bar with barstools bolted to the floor, and an old kitchen with grease on the walls and the rusty stove hood. The counters and stools were piled with merchandise. Some things had prices on little cardboard tags that hung from string. A lot of stuff wasn’t priced, and you had to find Sally and ask her what she wanted for it.

Sally was sprawled on a threadbare chintz sofa, wearing a faded India cotton wraparound skirt and an army shirt with sergeant stripes. Her sandaled feet rested on a throw pillow. A tag hung just below her left heel. It said, “50¢”. I speculated whether it was attached to her sandals or to the pillow, or maybe even to her ankle. That would be cheap for an artificial leg.

Sally raised an eyebrow over the Russian novel she was reading and said, “Good afternoon, gentlemen.”

“Good afternoon, Sally,” Bob said politely. “Do you have any tuxes?”

She put her novel down and eyed Bob speculatively. “A few. They’re in amongst the suits. I don’t know if they’ll fit you, but you’re welcome to try them.” She made a vague directional gesture and went back to her reading.

Bob seemed to know right where to go, so I followed him. The suits hung on a couple of racks in a corner near the entrance to the kitchen. There were a lot of colors and shapes. My eyes lit on an orange leisure suit. I pulled it off the rack and held it against my chest. “What do you think about this one?” I asked Bob.

He glanced at it. “Too short for you,” he said. He thumbed through the rack, pulled out a lime green suit, checked the size, shook his head, and put it back.

“Interesting,” I said, checking out a rose-colored polyester sports coat.

“Most of this stuff seems to be designed for short, stout guys,” Bob mused. He glanced at the waistband on a pair of chartreuse slacks. “42 x 29,” he read. “I’d have to get them seriously altered.”

“Or wear them sideways,” I said. “You could use them for a sail if your bike battery died.”

“She did say there were tuxes,” Bob said. “Oh, here we go.” He pulled out a green velvet smoking jacket. “Wow! Look at this!” He held it against himself.

“It’s a little worn in the elbows,” I said. “What’s the size?”

He looked inside the jacket. “46S,” he read. “I guess that means Short. And the slacks are…” he pulled the waist open, “44 waist. It doesn’t say what the length is.” He pulled the green pants off the hanger and held them in front of him. The cuffs hung just below his knees.

I snickered. “Oh, those are definitely you, Bob. You and your date could fit inside them together.”

“One in each leg, huh?” he said regretfully, looking longingly at the green velvet jacket. He reassembled the outfit on the hanger and moved on.

I actually found a black tux, but it was quite worn, and way too small. All the other suits seemed to be in odd colors, and most were short and wide. Hardly any were tuxes.

“Ah! Now we’re talking!” Bob exclaimed. He held up an electric blue coat with glossy satin lapels and long swallowtails.

“You’re kidding,” I said.

“No! I think the size is actually pretty close. And look at this! It’s only $17.50!” Bob pulled the coat off the hanger and tried it on. The sleeves hung well below his hands. The tails hung against the heels of his tennis shoes. “See? I can get the sleeves shortened, but it feels pretty good in the shoulders.”

“That color is just like your guitar,” I observed. “A very speical shade of blue.”

“It is, isn’t it?” Bob said. “Too bad we aren’t performing at the prom. Hey, look at the pants!” He unhooked a pair of smudged white slacks from the hanger. They cascaded onto the floor in front of him, about a foot longer than his legs. There was a blue satin stripe down the outside of each leg.

“Is the waist the right size?” I asked.

Bob looked inside. “It says 30,” he said. “I use a 32. They can alter them for me.”

I tried unsuccessfully to picture someone who could fit into the suit.  “Must have been a basketball player,” I said. “A really, really thin one.”

“The shirt even comes with it,” Bob said. He brandished a shiny white silk shirt with a ruffled front.

“Is that a man’s shirt, or is it a blouse?” I asked. The shirt evoked a vague memory of the cover on an old Tom Jones album. I think my oldest sister owned it. She didn’t take it with her to college, for some reason.

Bob looked at the tag. “15-38,” he read. “That’s man’s sizing. I think my dad wears a 16-32. No, he wears 16½.”

“What about a tie?” I asked.

Bob waved a powder blue silk bowtie and matching cummerbund.

“It’s got everything,” he said proudly. “All I need is shoes. Seventeen fifty! Olshan is a scam.”

I watched in morbid fascination as he scanned the shoe racks. He picked up a pair of blue platforms, and I shuddered. I sighed with relief when he put them back down. He bent to pick up a pair of white slip-ons and grinned at me. “Three bucks! And they’re my size!” He sat down on a box to try them on.

I glanced through the suit racks one more time and went over to where Bob was shuffling around in the white shoes. He had the blue jacket on again, with the sleeves pushed up, and was admiring himself in the mirror.

“Are you sure about that color?” I asked. “My sister said it was classier to go with black, so the color doesn’t clash with your date’s outfit.”

“Oh, blue goes with everything. Like jeans,” Bob said.

He gathered up his discoveries and we threaded our way to the cash register. Sally put down her novel and languidly got to her feet. The 50¢ tag stayed on the pillow, and her leg moved exceptionally well for an artificial one. “Did you find everything you need?” she asked.

“Everything,” Bob said smugly.

Sally rang his purchase up slowly and stuffed the garments into a couple of paper grocery sacks. “Remember, there’s no return on purchases,” she said. “Thank you for your business.” She sat down on the sofa and reached for her novel.

“You’re welcome,” Bob said.

“Just $21.76 for the whole outfit!” he gloated as we boarded our bikes. “Now I just need to get it altered.”

“Where are you going to do that?” I asked. “Olshan’s?”

“No way!” Bob snorted. “That den of thieves! I think I’ll go to the laundry. They do altering there, and they can dry-clean it for me, too. What are you going to do?”

“I’m going to keep shopping,” I said. “How about if we meet at the florist’s in about an hour?”

“Sure,” Bob said. “See you there.”

His bike jerked forward, the rear tire spinning. Bob bounced from foot to foot a couple of times, then settled into a straight line and disappeared down the street.

I pedaled slowly back to Olshan’s, and with the help of the clerk, chose a black tux with satin lapels, a pleated white shirt, black satin cummerbund, shiny black shoes, and a white bowtie. I put the whole outfit on, and the clerk marked it with pins for altering.

The total came to just over $48. Paying the extra six dollars for shoes bothered me, but I tried to picture my down-in-the-heel black Sunday loafers with the tux. Even with a good polishing, they would look scruffy. I regretfully counted the money out, and headed for the florist’s shop.

Bob was sitting on his bike, sipping a lemonade from the drugstore. The white shoes were in one of his bike baskets. He grinned. “The altering and cleaning is only twelve bucks,” he said proudly. “So I got my whole outfit, tailored to fit me, for less than 35 dollars. Did you find something reasonable?”

“Well, I found a tux I like,” I said.

We went into Coombs’ florist shop. The florist, a nice lady with Gladys on her nametag, looked over the counter at us and said, “Well, good afternoon! Are you here for prom flowers?”

“Yes, ma’am,” Bob said.

“All right. Here are the corsages we have designed for this year.” She flipped open a book to show us a bewildering array of pictures of flowers of all hues and shapes.

As I scanned the pages, Bob said, “Do any of them have roses?”

Gladys smiled. “We have a variety of elegant rose corsages. What did you have in mind?”

Bob shrugged. “I don’t know. Red is nice. Yellow roses are cool, too, like in the song.”

“Was your date born in Texas?” Gladys asked, flipping to a page in the middle.

“I don’t think so,” Bob said. “I don’t even know what planet she’s from, or whether she was born, hatched, or cloned. What colors of roses do you have?”

Gladys pointed to a several elaborate arrangements. “We have roses in red, white, pink, yellow, lavender, and sometimes we get some lovely black velvet roses.”

“Black?” I asked, perking up. “What do they look like?”

Gladys went to a refrigerated case in the corner and brought back a vase with a single large rose in it. The petals were black and crinkly, like crepe paper, and had deep red tips.

“Whoa! That is nice,” I said, very impressed.

“They’re rare, though, so we don’t get very many of them,” Gladys said. “They’re a special order item.”

Bob said, “Humph. Not very bright colored. How many roses come in the corsage?”

“Three or four,” Gladys said. She gave the prices.

“I’d like one with four,” Bob said. “Red, yellow, pink, and lavender.”

Gladys looked at him askance, and said, “Are you sure you want to mix the colors? Usually people go with one color, or white and one other color.”

“Positive,” Bob said. “All four colors.”

Gladys made some notes on a card. “Would you like a matching boutonniere? The man’s arrangement usually has two or three buds or small open roses.”

“What’s the difference between the buds and the open roses?” Bob asked.

Gladys led him to the refrigerated case in the corner and pointed. “These up here are buds. They’re still closed, and you can see the tight round shape. These over here are open. They’re a different variety from the bigger roses we use for the corsages, quite a bit smaller, but they’re matched for color.”

“Open,” Bob said promptly. “I guess I want three, in red, yellow, and white. No pink or lavender. The white will match my suit.”

Gladys opened her mouth to say something, then closed it, shook her head slightly, and returned to the counter. She finished writing up Bob’s selection, and turned to me. “How about you, young man? Are you ready to order?”

I was overwhelmed by the choices in the catalog. “Go ahead and pay, Bob. I need more time,” I said.

Bob paid his bill without grumbling. “I saved ten dollars on my tux by going to the thrift store,” he cheerfully informed Gladys. “That makes it easier to handle the cost of these flowers.”

Gladys smiled politely and rang up his order. “You can come by any time the day of the prom,” she said. “Be sure to keep the flowers refrigerated after you pick them up.”

Bob tucked his receipt into a pocket and said, “I’m going to head on home, Mike. See you tomorrow.”

“Yeah. Take it easy,” I said.

After he left, I cleared my throat and said, “I really don’t know what to order. I’ve never done this before, and I have no idea what color of dress my date will have.”

“Well, tell me a little about her. What does she look like?” Gladys asked.

I racked my brain. “Well, she’s maybe four inches shorter than I am. She has shortish red hair, kind of curly, and freckles, and has an okay face, not gorgeous but nice. Especially when she smiles,” I added, then blushed.

“All right. How does she usually dress?”

I thought a while. “Jeans,” I said. “T-shirts or polo shirts. White Adidas. She has a green backpack.”

“Does she wear any particular color of shirt more often?” Gladys pursued.

“Well, today…” I dug around for a memory. “Green,” I finally said. “She has this one green polo shirt that she wears at least once a week. I think it’s Kelly green.”

Gladys smiled. “Good choice for a redhead. I would guess, if she’s getting good advice, she might have a green prom dress, but of course, it’s not the only color a redhead might wear. She might wear white or black or some shades of blue, or even a burgundy.”

Gladys thumbed through the catalog. “These orchids look good with almost anything.” She turned the book to show me a page of exotic flowers in several shades. “White roses are also versatile. We could skip the ribbon and go with more greenery, or provide several colors of ribbon.”

We spent several minutes talking over all the different arrangements that might work. However, my eyes kept straying to the black velvet rose still on the counter beside Gladys’s elbow. I had never seen a more beautiful flower.

Suddenly, I blurted out, “I’ve made up my mind. I’d like a corsage with four of the black velvet roses, and a matching boutonniere with three buds, please.”

Gladys’s right eyebrow rose about an inch. “Okay….” she said slowly. “Those will be lovely arrangements. Are you sure about the color?”

“Yes,” I said. “Can you put some green ferns or something with them, and maybe a little of those white flowers?” I pointed to a corsage on the right-hand page of the catalog.

Gladys nodded. “Sure. Baby’s breath and ferns will make a nice complement. What about a ribbon?”

I thought a minute. “Do you have a red like the tips of the rose?” I asked.

Gladys bent over and pulled a roll of ribbon from under the counter. “This color here is called blood red. It’s the closest match,” she said.

“That’s perfect,” I said. “And some black ribbon, to go with it.”

Gladys did something funny with her lips and bent under the counter again. She unrolled a few inches of shiny black ribbon and layered it with the red. “Like this?” she asked.

I looked at the two ribbons and thought a moment. “It doesn’t look quite right,” I said. “What if you put the black one underneath?”

Gladys moved the red ribbon out and put it on top of the black, overlapping it part way.

“That’s not quite right either,” I said, frowning. “Too much red.” I scratched my head. “And the black is too shiny.”

Gladys stared at the ribbons a minute, then pulled another roll of black from under the counter. It wasn’t shiny. She took a pair of scissors from a drawer and snipped two short lengths of it. Then she sandwiched the red ribbon between the two scraps of black ribbon.

“Yes! Perfect! That’s what I want,” I said. “How much is it?”

Gladys made some notes on her pad. “Well, you need to remember that these roses cost more because they’re special order. You said four roses for the corsage, and three buds for you, right?” She added some figures on the adding machine and quoted me a total about eight dollars more than Bob’s. “We can bring it down a little if you go with three flowers for the corsage or two buds for the boutonniere,” she said.

I gulped. “No, that’s fine,” I said. I fished into my pocket and pulled out the last of my cash, including loose change. After I paid my bill, I had 37 cents left over. I’d have to drain my bank account completely to afford a haircut.

I got home just in time for supper. Nancy looked over at me at supper, and said, “Well, how’d your shopping go?”

“Not bad,” I mumbled. “Got most of it squared away.”

“What did Bob choose for a tux?” she asked inquisitively.

I grinned. “You’d like it. We found it at Recycle Sally’s. I think it belonged to some kind of circus performer.” I described the electric blue tux in detail, including the ruffled shirt and white shoes. My folks and Nancy were quite amused.

“What did you get for yourself, Mike?” my mom asked.

“I got a black tux at Olshan’s, with black shoes,” I said. “White shirt. Pleats,” I said, grinning at Nancy.

“Good choice,” she said. “What did you get for flowers?”

I gulped. “Well, Bob got a corsage with four different colors of roses. I think they were red, yellow, pink, and purple or something. He got red, yellow, and white for himself.”

My family discussed that for a while. Then Nancy asked, “What did you get for Junia, Mike?”

“Oh, roses,” I said. “Hey, I’ve got some serious homework to do tonight. Excuse me, please.”

I woke up at three in the morning in a cold sweat. Black velvet roses! What was I thinking of? They wouldn’t match anything! Black ribbon! This wasn’t a funeral! I tried unsuccessfully to picture Junia in a black dress. She just wasn’t the black dress type. Was she? Would the roses work with white? Would Junia wear white? Had I ever seen her in white? Sometimes she wore a white polo shirt. She had light skin with freckles. Her freckles showed more when she wore a white t-shirt. Blood red. Now that would be a gorgeous color, but no one wore a blood red dress, especially not someone with orangey-red hair. Did they? Blood red and black would not go with green. Kelly green, Kermit green, emerald green. She would wear green, and the black roses would look horrendous. We would get laughed out of the Civic Center, and she would throw the corsage in my face and call her dad to take her home.

I tossed and turned the rest of the night. At school the next morning, Bob said, “You look like they dragged you to school behind the station wagon. Are you sick?”

“Hmmph,” I said. “Didn’t sleep too good.”

“Was it the homework? I could have helped you, if you’d called.”

“No, it wasn’t the homework,” I said grumpily. “I just couldn’t sleep, that’s all. I’ll be fine.”

The bell rang, and we shoved our way into the school. “Had you made any arrangements for getting to and from the prom? Because I have a great idea,” Bob said.

“My sister said she’d take us,” I said.

“My idea’s better than that. Come over tomorrow and I’ll show you,” Bob said. “Cheerio.” He turned down the hall for his chemistry class, and I shuffled gloomily into Spanish.

Junia and Nora were in their usual seats near the windows. I nodded briefly to them and sat down at the back, avoiding any further eye contact.

Bob was sitting on the floor in the middle of his shop with his welding helmet flipped back on his head. He was surrounded by pieces of alloy tubing, half a dozen bicycle frames, a green patio glider lying on its back, and several 26” bike wheels. He was scribbling something in chalk on the floor and muttering to himself.

“Hey,” I said unenthusiastically.

He continued scribbling for a couple of minutes, then looked up and said, “Hey!”

Bob was the picture of good cheer. He had gray smudges on both cheeks, probably from his filthy scorched welder’s gloves. His eyes glowed with the fire of a creator.

“What are you working on?” I asked, trying to see his sketch.

“Transportation,” Bob said. “Trying to figure a way to get four of us to and from the prom at night.” He whistled tunelessly and selected a piece of pipe, sighting down it to see how straight it was.

“Nancy offered to drive us,” I ventured.

“Pfaah! Getting driven on dates is junior high stuff,” Bob snorted.

“We never went on dates in junior high,” I pointed out. “Matter of fact, we haven’t gone on dates in high school, either.”

“That’s beside the point,” Bob said. “Neither of us has a driver’s license, and it’s tacky to be driven to a date. So I’m designing something to get us all there.”

“What have you come up with?” I asked.

“Watch and be utterly amazed,” Bob said cheerily. “Oh you of little faith. I’m designing a rickshaw, only instead of being pulled by a coolie, it will be pulled by Ethel here.” Bob reached out to pat his bike, then realized it was six feet away across a pile of bike frames.

“Since when are you calling your bike Ethel?” I asked grumpily. “You’re making a trailer to be pulled by your bike?”

“Exactly,” Bob said smugly. “Upholstered seats, adjustable footrest. Stereo music for your listening enjoyment. Cupholders and ice chest for your beverage of choice. In the unlikely event of a sudden loss of cabin pressure, a Halloween mask will fall from overhead. Please place it over your mouth and nose and breathe normally.”

He pushed pipes and junk out of his way and got to his feet, gesturing dramatically at a smudged chalk drawing partly obscured by a bike wheel.

I examined it dubiously from the edge of the circle of debris. “Can your bike pull that much weight?”

Bob drew himself up to his full 5’10”. “Sir! You impugn my inventive genius! With the proper gearing, Ethel is capable of pulling the average family station wagon.”

“Yeah, right. At 12½ miles an hour,” I said wearily. It had been another bad night of obsessing about black roses.

“We shall see,” Bob said briskly. “First thing to do is get the frame built. Then we build the structure onto that. Help me out of here, will you?”

He picked up a bike frame and tossed it carelessly to one side, while I dragged a tangle of bike wheels and pipe out of the ring.

“The heart of the rickshaw is this glider,” Bob said, wading through the opening. He tugged on it fruitlessly. It was embedded in a tangle of pipe and bike parts. I worked my way around to the other end of it and began pulling junk off of it.

When we finally had it upright, Bob said, “I was thinking, we take the seat off the glider and weld it to a frame of tubing. We can put a bike wheel on each side, either with one long axle, or a short one welded onto each end. The frame will be V-shaped and attach to the trailer hitch on the back of the bike.”

We set to disassembling the glider with wrenches and screwdrivers. It was slow going. After a while, Bob ran into a rusted screw. “This stinking thing! The head is stripped, and it’s so rusted I can’t get it loose!” He threw down his hand tools and said, “This is ridiculous!”

He stomped around the pile of junk and rummaged in a corner until he came up with an old red grinder with a cut-off wheel. “Let’s do this the quick way.” He grabbed a pair of safety glasses from his desk, and an extension cord from a coil hanging from the ceiling.

The grinder made short work of the remaining bolts holding the glider together. In about five minutes, the seat was sitting free on the floor, surrounded by the remains of the base.

“That’s better,” Bob said, flipping up his glasses. “Now, let’s get the frame built.”

We argued a little about the best shape for the frame. Finally Bob said, “Let’s just get started. If we don’t like it, we’ll cut it and redo it.”

He picked up a piece of tubing, laid it alongside the glider seat to get a length, and cut it with the grinder. He cut another one just like it, then took two real long pieces of pipe and lay them perpendicular to the two cut pieces. Then he started welding.

In a short time, we had a frame built that was square at the back, about as wide as the glider. It was triangular at the front. The glider seat was then set onto the frame so we could figure out how to weld it into place.

We had a long argument about whether the seat should face forward or backward. We also argued about whether the frame should sit on top of the axle, or should hang under it so the seat would be closer to the ground. I was also worried about how bumpy the ride would be.

Finally we broke for lunch. We biked over to Bob’s house in silence.

“Man, you’re in a bad mood today,” Bob said, as we began assembling sandwiches.

“Sorry, man. I’m just tired. Haven’t slept well for a couple of days.” I moodily bit into a dill wedge.

“Lovesick or what?” Bob asked.

“Pfaah!” I snorted, nearly spitting out my bite of pickle. “I don’t think so!”

“Well, you’ve been awfully moody the last few days. You shouldn’t take things so seriously. You were the same way when we were doing our blues performance, and when we did the science fair with our centrifuge. It’s not like anyone’s going to notice you more than anyone else,” Bob said.

“Humph!” I said. “We always seem to get noticed. And look at the kind of stuff that happens to us. Yogurt and ink all over the place, singing in front of the whole school, you hanging from the stage ceiling, both of us getting pounded on by thousands of irate Girl Scouts.”

“Well, yeah,” Bob said. “We have created a lot of good memories, haven’t we? I wonder, Master Frodo, if we shall ever be put into words told by the fireside or read out of a great big book with red and black letters years and years afterwards.”

I thought back to Bob in sunglasses and his blue guitar with the dots on the neck. “Yeah, I guess we’re a little part of Rogersville history, for better or for worse.”

“I just want to spread cheer and sunshine wherever I go,” Bob said. “Leave the world a better place than I found it.”

“Yeah, right!” I snorted. “Cheer and sunshine, that’s you to a T.”

“Look,” said Bob, setting down his sandwich. “What I’m good at is building stuff. Coming up with cool ideas and turning them into machines. You’re pretty good at making them easier to use and smoother to operate. Neither of us is the suave,” (he pronounced the word “swave”) “debonair type, and we’re not studly jock types, either. But you aren’t going to make a total fool of yourself with Junior, and even if you do, well, so what? You’ll both get over it. She wouldn’t even be going if you didn’t invite her. So let’s focus on what we do pretty well, and don’t sweat the other stuff. If we can build this trailer and make it work, who else is going to be able to say that they rode to their first prom in an electric rickshaw?”

I looked at Bob with grudging admiration. “Whoa! Where’d you get all this wisdom all of a sudden, Mr. Electric Blue Tux?”

“Never underestimate the depths of the Nelson intellect,” Bob said. “Pass the pickles. My mom was talking just last night about going to a party with my dad for their first date. Dad had mismatched socks because he got dressed in the dark because he had forgotten to pay his apartment electric bill, and his electric shaver wouldn’t work for the same reason, so he had stubble all over his chin. Then at the party, some idiot spilled beer on both of them. A couple years later, they got married, and soon produced the greatest genius Rogersville has ever known.”

“I didn’t know you had any siblings,” I said. “Hand me that mustard, will you?”

When we got back to the junkyard, things went a little more smoothly. “Look,” I said. “If we put the trailer up on the wheel axles, that makes it fourteen inches off the ground. Then the bench on top of that… that puts the bench up about thirty inches off the ground. If we hang it lower….”

Bob butted in. “How about if we use A-frames of bent tubing to hang the frame about eight inches off the ground?” he said. “We set the bench on it, so it’s about two feet off the ground. The footrest will be the back edge of the frame, about sixteen inches below the seat. If we face the seat backward, no one will have to climb over anything. You just step up eight inches, turn around, and sit.”

“Now you’re talking,” I said enthusiastically. “I think looking backwards will be all right. It’s like riding on the back during a hay ride. At the speed we’ll be going, no one will get dizzy.”

Bob quickly cut and bent the tubing and we hung the trailer between two bike wheels. We chose trail bike wheels because of the fatter tires, to make the ride smoother. The bike axles took a little engineering, but Bob had experience from making the trailer for the submersible, so it didn’t take very long. The triangular yoke took the same kind of trailer hitch as the other trailer. By midafternoon, we had a simple, fairly elegant trailer frame.

“Now to put the bench on it,” Bob said.

“We don’t want it too upright,” I said. “It needs to lean back a little to be comfortable.”

Bob took a couple of boards and propped up the front edge of the bench. “Try that,” he said.

By trial and error, we settled on an angle that felt pretty comfortable. Bob measured the distances from the front and back edges of the seat to the floor and jotted it down with chalk. Then we set about attaching the bench to the trailer frame.

It was trickier than it sounds, because I was adamant that we not just end-weld the base of the bench to the frame pieces. “It’s likely to snap off!” I insisted. “Just think about the whiplash your neck goes through every time you accelerate.”

“Pfaah!” Bob snorted. “I’d be in a collar if it was as bad as you say. The submersible trailer has held up, hasn’t it?”

“Yeah, but it doesn’t have a tall load of three people holding on for dear life.”

We finally worked it out that the bench base would stand on one piece of framing and then another piece of metal would be welded to the sides of the base for additional support. Bob set the seat into the frame and began figuring out the lengths and angles. Before too long, he had bench up in place. The base was welded onto a couple of pieces of square tubing that were in turn attached to the frame.

“Now for the reinforcements,” he said, picking up a length of angle iron.

“Hold on a minute,” I said. “Let me check it out first. We don’t have the trailer attached to the bike.”

“Good point,” Bob said.

He hooked the front of the trailer to the hitch on the bike. I climbed up into the bench. “How’s it feel?” Bob asked.

“Like I’m going to pitch off on my face,” I said. “Lifting the front of the trailer changed the angle completely.”

Bob whipped out his tape measure and checked the heights. He grunted. “No kidding.” He made some marks on the frame pieces, then lit into them with the grinder.

After a few minutes of cutting and welding, he said, “Try that on for size.”

I climbed back into the throne. “Very comfy,” I said. “Sew her down.”

Bob cut some lengths of angle iron and finished securing the bench. “All right!” he said as he finished. “Ready for a test run.”

We cranked open the garage-door end of the shed and turned the bike so it was facing the right direction. I climbed back into the seat, and Bob straddled the bike. He turned to look at me. I gave him the thumbs up.

The bike snapped forward, the back wheel skidding on the slick concrete. Bob struggled to keep it upright, and I lurched on the trailer seat, nearly falling on my face. Then we were rolling through the parking lot towards the gate.

A scrap truck chose that moment to enter the gate, which was only wide enough for one truck, so Bob made a quick left. The weight of the trailer yanked his back wheel sideways. It skidded, spitting up gravel, and I was sure Bob was going to wipe out. He put his left foot down and bounced along a ways, slewing back and forth, until we were going in a straight line again. Then he turned more gradually back into his shed and cut the power. We lurched to a stop, the trailer’s momentum pushing the bike sideways again.

“Well, it certainly has the power,” I said. “But twelve and a half miles an hour is too fast for this kind of rig. How come you took the rheostat off, anyway?”

“It was hard on the motor,” Bob said. “It made it heat up when it wasn’t at full speed. I started smelling smoke, so I took it off and went back to the switch.”

“Humph. What about gearing it down?” I asked.

Bob looked at the bike a while, then snapped his fingers. “I’ve got it,” he announced. “Sprockets. Get one of those ten-speeds and take the crank off. I’ll take off the sprockets I already have.”

He took the back wheel off the bike and the sprocket off the motor, while I struggled to take the crank off an old, heavy ten-speed from the pile.

“I’m probably going to need more chain, too,” Bob said. “Get me a couple that are the same size, while I dig up my chain tool.”

I already had one chain lying at my feet, so I compared it to the one from his bike. It was slightly different. I checked around through the pile of junk and finally found two chains that matched.

Meanwhile, Bob rummaged through toolboxes, muttering more and more audibly to himself as he found everything but the chain tool. He had just reached the level of intelligible swearing when he suddenly said, “There you are, you stupid….” His voice dropped to a calm, quiet murmur, and he returned to where I had laid the matching chains side by side.

By suppertime, we had a smaller sprocket on the motor shaft, and a wheel with five sprockets on the back of the bike. The chain was on the biggest of these.

“Time for another test drive,” I said.

Bob looked at his watch. “Man, I’ve got to go! I’ll drive it home, and we’ll work on the trailer thing tomorrow.”

I helped him close up the shop. He hopped onto his bike, waved to me, and flipped the power switch on, steeling himself against the usual whiplash.

It was really funny to watch. His head actually went forward, because the bike made a much gentler lunge than usual. It immediately settled into a plodding gait. Bob rolled slowly across the parking lot and out the gate.

I hopped onto my bike and pedaled in pursuit. I caught up with him just a hundred yards down the road. He was plodding along at a geezer’s pace, fuming and muttering.

“Seven miles an hour!” he shouted at me. “Seven stinking miles an hour! I could walk this fast!”

I grinned. “I guess it’s my turn to leave you in the dust,” I said. “See you Monday.”

I settled into a comfortable rhythm and soon left him far behind.

Monday morning I was at the bike rack when Bob rolled up. “I bet you had to leave half an hour early to get here in time, didn’t you?” I said.

He grunted. “No way. I hit eighteen miles an hour coming over here. Look.” He gestured to the back of his bike, and I saw that it now had two sprockets of different sizes on the motor shaft, with a shifter from a ten-speed bike crank to move between them. The back wheel still had five sprockets, and there was now a derailleur to keep tension on the chain and shift gears.

“I should have done this a long time ago,” Bob said. “Now I can start in low if I want, as long as I remember to shift down before I stop. It took a couple of hours to fine-tune it yesterday, though. It’s a little jumpy.”

“Awesome,” I said. “That should make a huge difference. Did you try it with the trailer?”

“With the trailer on, it still tops out at 12 ½ miles an hour,” said Bob. “It acts up in the higher gears.”

We pushed into the throng and went to our classes. Junia smiled wanly at me. She looked miserable, like she hadn’t slept. Nora came in as I sat down, and they held a whispered conversation as class began. Nora glanced back at me once. Were they talking about me? Was Junia having second thoughts?

In English class, I overheard some girls talking about dresses and flowers, and my stomach began to sink again. Black velvet roses! What was I thinking of? Was it too late to change my order? I should have gone with an orchid, or white roses. The trailer seemed like a pretty stupid idea, too. What a geek I was, showing up on a rattletrap trailer behind a junky electric bike, with black flowers!

By noon I was under a cloud of gloom. I poked at my cafeteria beanie-weenies while Bob rambled cheerfully about the trailer and the gearing. Finally he looked at me, and said, “What’s your problem, anyhow? You look like you’re coming down with something.”

“Humph,” I said.

Bob scrutinized me for a while, and shook his head. “It’s fear,” he pronounced. “I can see it in your eyes. Ladies and gentlemen, Michael Smith is a coward. He is terrified of girls, of doing something stupid, and of failure. Hecklers, form a line on the right. Scoffers on the left.”

“Shut up,” I said, throwing a biscuit at him.

One of the monitors saw what I did and came over. Bob smiled at her and said, “Isn’t he nice? He’s sharing his lunch with me.”

We listened to her lecture, me grimly, Bob amiably. When she had left, Bob said, “I don’t think it’s Junia you’re scared of, is it? You’re really afraid of making a fool of yourself. That’s what it is.”

“Humph,” I said noncommittally.

He stuffed his mouth with apple cake. With his cheeks full, he said, “Mike, this isn’t like a test. It doesn’t go on your record, and unless you do something really remarkable like light methane on the stage or fall into the punchbowl, you aren’t going to stand out. So get over it. Everyone else will. Do you really think you’re that much more important than everyone else?”

“Blah,” I said as the bell rang for our next class.

After school, I said to Bob, “I have to do something. I’ll see you in a little while.”

I hurried home and dialed the florist shop.

“Coombs Flowers. This is Gladys,” she said.

“Uh, hi. This is Mike Smith. I was wondering if it would be possible to change my flower order.”

There was a pause. “I’m sorry, what was your name again?”

“Mike Smith. I ordered flowers on Friday.”

“Oh, okay. Just a minute, let me look that up.”

I heard rustling in the background. After several minutes, she came back to the phone.

“You ordered the black velvet roses, is that correct? For the prom this Friday?”

“Uh, yes. That’s right.”

“Well, I’m sorry, Mr. Smith, but that order went in on Saturday, and there’s no way we can change it now. The flowers are already on their way here.”

My heart sank down into my stomach. “Thank you,” I said.

I put the receiver down and shambled out to my bike. For better or for worse, I would be getting the black velvet roses.

During that afternoon and the next, Bob and I rigged the trailer with taillights and changed out the little bike headlight for a big spotlight. Bob welded a rack behind the bench. We put a boombox on it, powered by a truck battery set underneath it. Bob made a cradle for an ice chest, and swiped a package of plastic cups and a couple of six-packs of soft drinks and mineral water from his mom’s pantry.

“I’ll get a bag of ice on Friday when I run my other errands,” he said. “You can bring snacks if you want.”

We wired cupholders scavenged from junked cars to the two arms of the bench, and bolted a board across the back of the frame for a footrest. Bob cut fenders for his bike from sheet metal, in case there were any puddles. The metal came from a big blue sign advertising feed or something. We made fenders for the trailer wheels too, because it was easy to rub your arm on them or catch dirt thrown up from the road if you were on either end of the bench. After Bob had welded all the fenders in place, I went over them with the grinder to try to make them the same size and shape, and to round the corners a little.

“Looks like a Volkswagen Thing now,” Bob observed, admiring my handiwork.

I rolled up a clean tarp and bungeed it behind the bench, just in case. Bob had a rain poncho on his desk, still in the package, so I tucked that in with the tarp.

“The forecast says we aren’t going to get rain for weeks,” Bob said.

I grinned. “No telling what could happen when you’ve been dancing. Remember when we were building drama sets last fall?”

Bob flung a welder’s glove at me, and I ducked.

When we were done with all the improvements we could think of, we sat on the floor and contemplated our chariot. “Not much to look at,” Bob observed.

I cast my eyes over the gray tubing, the green seat, the pine board, the blue fenders, and the rusty chrome bike wheels. “No,” I said. “A paint job would help.”

Bob snapped his fingers and jumped to his feet. He ran to one corner of the shop and began burrowing through piles and boxes. He turned triumphantly with a can of spray paint in his hand. “Someone left two cases of these cans in a junked car,” he said.

“What color are they?” I asked.

He looked at the can. “This one is matte black,” he said. He rummaged some more, then held up the other can. “Wine red,” he said.

I felt a shiver run up my back. “Oh, man! I know just the color scheme,” I said.

I noticed that Junia seemed quiet and depressed all week, and I wondered if she was having second thoughts about going with me. On Thursday I approached her at lunch and said, “Hey, we’ll be by to pick you up tomorrow night at around 6:45, after we get Nora. Is that all right?”

She smiled mechanically and said, “That will be fine.”

She didn’t say anything else, so I said, “All right then. I’ll see you tomorrow.”

Friday was a blur. I was numb through my classes. School ended early that afternoon. I rode into town and sat in line at Fantastic Sam’s for a haircut. Jim and several other football players were there, too. I did my best to ignore their banter, and stared sightlessly at a celebrity magazine. They paid no attention to me, fortunately.

I finally got into one of the chairs. A girl named Judy wrapped a plastic sheet around my neck, and said, “What kind of cut do you want, hon?” She had bright red lipstick, and was chewing gum. At least she didn’t pop it while she chewed.

“Uh, I don’t know,” I said. “Not too short. I just want it to look good.”

“Okay, hon,” she smiled. Her perfume reminded me of Thanksgiving dinner. Cloves or something.  “I’ll see what I can do. Do you want a shampoo and blowdry?”

“Uh… I guess so,” I said.

She led me over to a corner and sat me in a deep recliner. My head hung uncomfortably into a ceramic sink, or was it a toilet? She zapped my head with scorching water out of an attachment like the one in the school cafeteria for blasting the dirty food off the plates. Then she rubbed shampoo that smelled like beer and vinegar into my hair, scrubbed it into a lather, and vigorously worked my scalp over with her sharp fingertips. She rinsed the shampoo off again with the sprayer, then rubbed conditioner in. The conditioner smelled comforting, like my mom’s Sunday perfume, and the final rinse was done with lower water pressure.

My neck was sore when I went back over to the barber’s chair. Judy rubbed my head and neck with a fluffy towel. She combed out my hair and divided it into quadrants, each held with a big clip. Then she set to with scissors and comb, humming to herself and chewing her gum. I closed my eyes and tried to relax.

Comb and snip, snip and comb, one quadrant after another. Then she combed everything together and combed and snipped some more.

Finally, she took a buzzer and trimmed the hair off my neck and squared up my sideburns. Then she took a blowdryer and directed a hurricane of scorching air at my face. She rolled my hair around a weird round brush and blasted it with the hot air, and pushed it this way and that. Finally she set the dryer back in its holster, spun me around to face the mirror, and said, “Well, hon, there you go. What do you think?”

I stared at the unfamiliar head in the mirror. My hair looked like it had been lifted off of one of the posters on the wall and set on my head. It was parted about where I usually parted it, but everything was smooth, flowing lines and curves.

“Whoa. It’s great,” I said. I started to get up.

“Would you like hairspray?” Judy asked.

“Oh. Yeah, that would be good,” I said, thinking about riding in the rickshaw.

She zapped my hair all around, pushed it a little more with the brush, whisked my neck and collar with a little brush, and whipped off the plastic sheet. “That’ll be fourteen dollars.”

I delved into my wallet and paid without comment. There was one lone dollar left in my billfold. I stared at it a bit gloomily and started to put the wallet back in my pocket. Then, on impulse, I took the dollar out and tucked it into Judy’s tip jar.

She beamed. “Thanks, hon. You have a really nice time at the prom, okay?”

I biked over to Olshan’s and tried on my tux. It fit perfectly. I stared at myself in the mirror. I looked a lot like the dude on the GQ magazine on the counter, down to the glum expression. I took the garments back off, pulled my jeans on again, and gave everything to the clerk, who folded and hung and bagged it all.

I rode over to the florist’s with the outfit slung over my shoulder. There were several people picking up orders, so I waited until they cleared out, then approached the counter.

Gladys smiled at me. She looked tired. There was a young lady helping her, who had slumped onto a stool as soon as the other people left.

“You’re here for the velvet roses, aren’t you?” Gladys said. “Mr. Smith, right?”

I nodded abjectly.

She leafed through the invoices and pulled one out. “Four roses on the corsage, three buds on the boutonniere, black and red ribbon.” She went over to a big refrigerated case and pulled out a couple of boxes.

As she brought them back to the counter, she said, “I must say, they are absolutely stunning. Out of all the flowers we have put together this week, I think we’ve gone back to look at these more than any others. They’re just lovely.” She smiled at me and glanced at the girl on the stool, who nodded.

Gladys set the boxes down and opened the little one. “This is yours,” she said.

I glanced inside. The buds were tiny, nearly all black, tied tightly together, the stems wrapped in something green. There was a sprig of baby’s breath and a few fern leaves bundled with them.  The stem was tucked into a little plastic vial, and there was a wicked-looking pin with a round black head tucked into the padding.

“And this corsage… well, it’s breathtaking,” Gladys said, opening the big box.

I looked, swallowing the lump in my throat. There they were, four roses, with crinkly black petals with blood-red tips. They were indeed stunning, and I forgot my fears while I looked at them. They were the prettiest flowers I had ever seen. The ribbons were layered just like we had agreed, and the roses were framed with sprigs of baby’s breath and fern leaves.

“Do you know what color your date is wearing?” the girl asked.

I shook my head. “No idea,” I said, clearing my throat. “I’ve been worried that I made a terrible mistake choosing black roses. What if they don’t match her dress?”

The girl smiled. “It won’t matter,” she said. “She’ll be thrilled getting a corsage like that, even if it doesn’t match.”

I felt much better as I signed my invoice and left. I pedaled home, thinking about my hair that felt stiff in the breeze, and the beautiful roses in the boxes in my bike rack.

When I got home, I put the flowers in the fridge in the garage. I ate a few bites, ignoring my family’s comments about my haircut, and then shaved and took a shower, careful not to mess up my hair. I splashed on a generous dash of cologne.

It took a while to get dressed. Finally I came downstairs, resplendent in the black tux.

My dad made an incoherent exclamation, and Nancy whistled. “Whoo, boy, Junia’s going to be impressed!” she exclaimed. “What a remarkable transformation. From Supernerd Sidekick to Joe Cool in two hours.”

“Impressive indeed,” Mom said.

“Thank you, thank you,” I said, bowing to my minions.

“Are you sure you guys don’t want me to chauffeur you?” Nancy asked. “I don’t have anything going on, and I’m curious to see Bob’s blue outfit. Not to mention the archrival female nerds.”

“Well, you could drive me to Bob’s,” I said. “We can handle it from there.”

“Sure,” Nancy said. “Are your flowers in the fridge? I didn’t see them there.”

“No, they’re in the garage,” I said. “I’ll get them on our way out.”

“Could I see them?” Mom asked curiously.

“Well….” I hesitated. “I guess so.”

I brought the flowers in, and opened the bigger box on the coffee table.

There was silence for several seconds. Then Mom said, “Oh! I’ve never seen such beautiful roses!”

Nancy said, “They’re incredible! Mike, they’re just gorgeous!”

Dad didn’t say anything, just beamed at me.

I swallowed. “It was kind of an impulse decision. I don’t know if they’ll go with her dress or anything. I tried to get my order changed, but it was too late.”

Mom said, “They’re just lovely. She’ll love them. It’s a beautiful corsage.”

Nancy opened the little box and they exclaimed over the buds. Then Nancy pinned it onto my lapel and adjusted the angle. “It goes great with your tux,” she commented.

I said, “Nancy, we need to get going. I told Bob I’d be there by now.”

We gathered the boxes and bustled out to the car. When we got to Bob’s, he had the chariot in the driveway and was making final adjustments to the seat cushions.

Nancy pulled up beside him and stuck her head out the window. “Well, now, there’s something we don’t see every day!” she exclaimed.

Bob turned and bowed. “The new and improved Nerd Chariot,” he said proudly.

Nancy glanced down at the trailer. “I was talking about Bob the Nerd in tails,” she said. “Blue tails. Very impressive.” Then she looked at the trailer and Bob’s bike more carefully. They had been repainted in matte black, with the bottom edges and wheel rims highlighted in blood red. “Are you really going to pick up your dates in that?” she asked, aghast.

“That’s right,” Bob said. “We built it this past week. It’s quite a luxury ride. I would offer you a road test, but we’ve got to get going. Come on, Mike!”

Nancy stared as we finished our preparations. Bob’s corsage box was on the bench, so I put mine with it. There was ice around the soft drinks in the ice chest. I had forgotten to get snacks, but it was too late now. Bob had several cassettes in a plastic bin screwed down beside the stereo, and he put in a tape of Vivaldi’s Four Seasons.

I sat down next to the boxes, and said, “Right ho, Jeeves. To the Nerd Queen’s castle, and make it snappy.”

Bob flipped on the power, and we took off remarkably smoothly. He shifted up as we turned into the road. By the time Nancy passed us, we were going 12 ½ miles an hour.

“So how does the suit fit?” I asked Bob after she was gone.

“Oh, okay. A little snug in the seat and the waist,” Bob said. I noticed he was sitting rather stiffly on the bike seat.

“Did they do a good job with the alterations?” I asked.

Bob said, “I’m not sure. I don’t know much about those kinds of things. On the sleeves and the cuffs, it looks like they folded all the extra back inside instead of cutting it off. I’ve got about six inches of blue going up the insides of my sleeves, and about a foot going up the pants legs. It feels like I’m wearing a stovepipe around my calf. It’s a good thing they weren’t bell-bottoms.” He looked at his ankle. “They didn’t put many stitches in, either. I hope they hold up.”

“What did they do with the shirt?”

Bob held out one hand and grimaced at his coat sleeve. “I thought they would cut the sleeve off and reattach the cuff, but they didn’t. They just folded a section just above the wrist to the inside and stitched it off, kind of down inside the cuff. It looks pretty bad. I can’t take my coat off or it’ll show.”

He straightened up and grinned back at me. “But first impressions are everything, and I look good!”

“Right you are, Sergeant Pepper.”

Nora’s family lived in a big white house at the end of a long, straight driveway. Bob drove up the driveway and came to a stop. He scratched his head. “How shall we turn around?” he asked.

“I’ll take care of it,” I said. “Did you remember to downshift?”

“I did before I turned into the driveway,” he said.

As Bob bounded up the porch steps, I took hold of the bike handlebars and pushed. It was very heavy, with the weight of the trailer added to its own mass. I struggled to move it in a tight circle in the little turnaround the Slattens used for their cars. I let the bike lean sideways a bit too much and almost dropped it, but it finally started to roll.

Bob pushed the doorbell and stood patiently, his corsage box under his arm. He straightened his tie with the reflection in the storm door and glanced at his sleeves. After a minute, he pushed the button again, and this time we heard deep chimes resonate: “Bong, bong, bong, bong...” like Big Ben on the quarter hour.

Somewhere in the depths of the house, we heard Nora’s voice: “I’ve got it! Stay in the living room, Dad.”

I had the bike halfway turned when the front door opened. I turned to watch. The storm door opened, and Nora stepped out.

Bob goggled at her, his mouth open. Nora’s glasses were gone. Her brown hair was up on the back of her head, and she actually had on lipstick and eye shadow! She wore a beautiful shiny white dress that left her shoulders bare. I could see a fancy gold necklace and earrings from where I was. I looked at her feet. White pumps.

Nora stared back. She ran her eyes over Bob’s electric blue suit with the tails and the ruffled silk shirt. She looked down at his white shoes.

Suddenly she smiled. Bob struggled to regain his composure. His jaw snapped shut. “Uh, hi,” he said.

Nora chuckled. “Hi,” she said.

Bob shuffled his feet. “Um, you look very nice,” he said. “You smell good, too.” He blushed red.

Nora laughed. “Thank you. I don’t think I’ve ever seen you self-conscious before, Bob.”

Bob grinned. “Well, I thought for a minute that I had the wrong house.”

Nora looked him over again. “That’s a remarkable suit,” she said, then laughed. “Positively spectacular, actually. Can you turn around so I can see the tails?”

Bob obligingly spun around on his heel. His tails flew in a circle around him.

Nora chuckled again. “Very cool,” she said admiringly. “Do you mind if I share this moment with my parents?”

Without waiting for an answer, she turned and went back inside. I pushed the bike the rest of the way around and pulled it onto its stand. I heard her call, “Mom! Dad! You’ve got to see this! Go ahead and bring the camera, Dad.”

Bob scuffed his white shoes together. He caught me looking at him and shrugged wryly. I leaned on a fender of the chariot and watched.

Nora emerged again, followed by her folks. “Mom, Dad, I believe you know Bob already?”

Bob politely shook hands. I could see Nora’s parents discreetly surveying his attire, Mr. Slatten in admiration and Mrs. Slatten with tactfully concealed amusement.

“How about a picture?” suggested Mr. Slatten.

“Where?” Bob said. “Oh, Nora, by the way, here are your flowers.” He proffered the box.

Nora opened it. “Oh, my! Thank you! They’re gorgeous! Look how colorful, Mom!”

She held the box out to her mother, who admired the roses. “Let’s put them on you. They are a nice splash of color, aren’t they?” Mrs. Slatten took the corsage carefully out of the box and pinned it on Nora’s dress.

Nora looked really happy. Her dad said, “You guys stand together and I’ll get a picture.”

Bob obligingly turned to face him. Nora stood next to him and took his elbow. Her dad snapped a couple of pictures. Then Bob said, “Well, are we ready to go?”

“I guess so.” Nora stepped down off the porch, then stopped short. “Whoa. Is that what we’re going in?”

“Yep.” Bob walked proudly over to the bench and said, “Just hop up here and make yourself comfortable.”

Nora walked a circle around the black and red chariot. She caught my eye and smiled. “Hi, Mike.”

“Hey, Nora,” I said.

Her dad followed her. “Did you build this?” he asked Bob.

“Yes, specifically for the occasion,” Bob said.

Nora laughed. “I can’t believe it. When did you do it?”

“Last weekend,” Bob said. “We finished it Wednesday.”

Mr. Slatten examined the hitch and looked at the lights. “Looks sturdy. I’m glad to see you have good lights on it,” he said. “I’m a little concerned about you all being on the road in this after dark. But with these taillights and the headlight, you should be in good shape. Does it have turn signals?”

Bob flipped a switch, and the right tail light began blinking. Mr. Slatten smiled and said, “All right. Just drive carefully.”

Nora said, “Cool paint job.” She chuckled, then laughed as she examined the bench. “Did this come from a porch swing or something?”

“A glider,” I said. “Used to be green.”

She stepped up on the footrest and sat down. “It’s comfy. Is that Vivaldi you’re playing?”

“Summer, I think,” I said. “Would you like a drink?” I flipped open the ice chest.

“Maybe later, thank you,” Nora said. “I just had dinner.”

Nora’s dad snapped a couple of pictures as we rolled down the driveway. Bob killed the power at the street, waiting for a car to go by, then pulled out and pointed us in the direction of Junia’s house.

Junia lived in a big white farmhouse just outside of town. It took ten or fifteen minutes to get there, even at 12 ½ miles an hour. Nora chattered cheerfully to me and occasionally called up to Bob, whose tails fluttered in the breeze.

“I was really afraid he would bring an all-white corsage,” she confided to me. “I really like this dress, but if I had white flowers, it would look totally blah. These colors are so bright!” She looked down and touched the yellow rose.

She turned to call out to Bob. “Hey, Supernerd! What happens if your tails get into the chain and sprocket?”

They were flapping dangerously close to that equipment. Bob looked back. “I guess we would make a sudden stop.” He grabbed one of the tails and tucked it under his leg.

“Where are your glasses?” I asked.

“I got contacts,” Nora said. “I’ve been getting used to them after school. Nice haircut, by the way.”

“Thanks,” I said.

Nora chuckled. “I wonder what Junia will think of the chariot.”

Mention of Junia put butterflies in my stomach. I started worrying about the black flowers again. I stewed in silence the last five minutes to her house.

A gravel driveway made a big loop across the front of the Schmidt’s house, so Bob stopped right in front of the porch steps. I grabbed my box and trudged up to the front door.

It opened as I knocked. Junia’s dad said, “Come in, come in, Mike! Junia will be just a moment.”

“Hi, Mr. Schmidt,” I said, following him into the foyer.

Mr. Schmidt was short and round, nearly bald. He had a fringe of reddish hair around his dome, and a ruddy face. He and Mrs. Schmidt made quite a pair. She was taller than he, and had the poise of a classical musician. They always seemed quite happy together.

Mrs. Schmidt came down the big staircase. “Hi, Mike. Junia will be a couple of minutes. Fred, take him into the living room and sit down. She’ll be right down.” She whisked off into the kitchen.

Mr. Schmidt cocked a wry eyebrow and gestured in the direction of the living room. We went in, and I sat on the sofa while he sank into an overstuffed chair. “Can I get you anything? Cigar? A whisky to steady your nerves?” he asked.

“No thanks,” I said. “I just ate, and there’ll be refreshments at the prom.”

I miserably pondered the possible reactions to the black rose corsage. Well, it was finally time to find out. Maybe I should have taken him up on the whisky. How would Junia react if she came in and found us smoking cigars? Black flowers. Mom and Nancy seemed to like them. Were they just being nice? Blah.

Mr. Schmidt asked me a few questions about school. I answered unenthusiastically, looking around the room. There was a spinet in the corner, a cello in its case on the floor, a couple of clarinets on the end table, sheet music in piles along one wall. Mrs. Schmidt’s baby grand piano must be in a different room. There a big family room at the back of the house, wasn’t there?

Mrs. Schmidt came bustling in and immediately set to straightening up. “Spring recital is almost here,” she said with a smile. “All the little prodigies getting ready for Symphony auditions.” She gathered the sheet music into tidier stacks.

Jus then, Junia came into the room. I stood up, and my jaw dropped. She looked back at me, smiling uncertainly. Her hair and face looked prettier than I had seen them before. She had carefully styled red curls, a hint of green eye shadow, lip gloss… but it was her dress that made my head spin. It was crumpled black velvet, with a deep wine-red undertone.

“Hi, Mike,” she said. “Nice tux.”

“Uh, thanks,” I croaked. “Your dress is beautiful!”

She blushed and looked down at it. “It’s not really my color, but when I saw it, I liked it so much that I just had to have it. Kind of an impulse decision. Probably a mistake. I’ve been regretting it ever since.”

I wordlessly held out the corsage box, still feeling stunned. Junia stepped forward, took the box, and opened it.

Her eyes opened wide. She stared at the corsage and said, “Oh….” She glanced up at me, then looked back at the corsage. “Oh my. How did you know? Did Nora say something, or Mom?”

I shook my head. “Just an impulse decision. I’ve been regretting it ever since. Until now.” I grinned crookedly.

Junia held the box out. “Mom. Look.”

Mrs. Schmidt looked in, and her eyes opened as wide as Junia’s. “Oh, my,” she echoed. “Well. There are unexpected depths in you, Mr. Smith.”

She reverently lifted the black velvet roses out of the box and pinned them on Junia’s shoulder.

Mr. Schmidt chuckled. “Well, now. That’s something. What a match. Just goes to show, here you were wearing those rosebuds on your lapel and it didn’t even register with me.”

Junia and Mrs. Schmidt turned and looked at my boutonniere. “Sure enough!” Mrs. S. exclaimed. “Well, well.”

Junia and I stood and looked at each other for a moment. She had a nice face, especially with lip gloss, and she smelled a little bit like vanilla. “Shall we?” I said, proffering my elbow.

She grinned and took it, and we walked out the front door.

Nora and Bob were engrossed in conversation. I led Junia up to the rickshaw. She stared down at it. “Interesting!” was her first reaction. Then, “Oh, I like the color scheme!”

“Sit down, Junia,” ordered Nora. “Wow, that dress looks gorgeous on you.”

Junia gestured to her corsage, and Nora examined it, her eyebrows rising. “Hmm. Very nice! Is he clairvoyant, do you think, or did someone tip him off?”

Junia sank into the middle of the bench and waved to her parents. “Well, I didn’t tell him, and my mom says she didn’t. Did you?”

“You know better than that,” Nora said.

“Tally ho, Jeeves,” I called to Bob as I squeezed into the remaining space on the bench. “Is there anything I can get you ladies? Soft drink? Mineral water?”

Bob flipped the switch, and we rolled down the drive.

Junia grinned at me. “I’ll bet you had something to do with the paint job, didn’t you?”

“Well, believe it or not, they were the only two colors Bob happened to have,” I said. “But yeah, the roses gave the inspiration.”

The Civic Center parking lot was packed. Bob drove a circuit around, ignoring the stares, and finally settled on a spot way back in the corner. “I don’t want to attract pranksters,” he explained as he came around to help the girls off the trailer.

We ambled across the parking lot, greeting the other late arrivals and chatting. Bob was the soul of amiability. He seemed to have put it on his with swallow-tailed coat. He made it most of the way to the entrance of the Civic Center before he got into an argument with Nora.

As we mounted the steps, he said, “I apologize, Nora. I’m right, but I apologize anyway. We can argue some other time.”

Nora laughed. “I’m sure we will. I accept your apology, and cheerfully dismiss your initial assertion. Do give the nice gentleman the tickets and let’s go inside.”

A big guy in a dark brown tux approached us. I recognized him from the football team. I fished my tickets out of my inside pocket.

Bob turned pale. “Tickets!” he whispered. He patted his pockets and searched his coat frantically.

“No ticky, no entry,” growled the ticket collector.

There was a table behind him, with a girl sitting at it. I went around the ticket guy and approached her. “Hi, Katie,” I said. “Here’s my tickets. Bob forgot his, but I’m sure you remember Bob. We bought ours at the same time.”

Katie took my tickets and grinned. “We have a guest list, just in case. Shall I tell him, or shall we give him a hard time?”

Bob was already having a hard time. He was arguing vociferously with the ticket guy.

Katie laughed and said, “Oh, Biff, lighten up and come look at the guest list.”

Biff backed away from Bob, never taking his eyes off him. “What about the guest list?” he muttered.

“Bob Nelson and date. Right here. Let them by,” Katie said.

Biff grunted. Bob straightened up his coat and offered Nora his elbow again. “I guess we showed him,” he said, turning toward the door.

Nora snickered. Junia laughed, and Bob grinned. “Thanks, buddy,” he said as I rejoined them.

The Civic Center was decorated with swaths of tulle, vases of flowers, garlands of greenery. There was a long refreshment table along one wall. Ahead of us was the stage, where a small jazz ensemble was playing. Several couples were dancing. Most people were milling around, talking animatedly. Nora waved to a girl with a camera, who came over.

“I see you’re on duty tonight, Cammie,” Nora said.

Cammie pushed some hair back from her face and smiled. “Yeah. I’m supposed to get the highlights, and pictures of all the bands. Jerry is here someplace, too. Are you going to write about it?”

Nora shook her head. “I don’t have an assignment. I think Kitty and Chris are handling it.”

“Good. Well, have a good time.” Cammie smiled and walked away.

We stood and looked around. “Hey! There’s Hiroshi!” Bob observed.

We pushed our way over and said hi to him and his date. Both were dressed in black. She was a petite Asian girl, a member of the Youth Symphony, so Nora and Junia and she struck up a conversation while Hiroshi and Bob and I looked at each other and tried to think of something to say.

Hiroshi looked Bob over. “Cool outfit.”

“I wish there had been a top hat with it,” Bob said. “I looked for one. Spats would have been nice, too.”

“And a white cane,” Hiroshi said. He glanced at the girls, then started and said, “Whoa! Was that Nora that came in with you?” He stared in fascination at the girl in the elegant white dress who was talking animatedly to his date. “I thought you must have invited someone from out of town. Wow, she looks great!” He laughed.

“She got contacts,” I said.

“Junia looks good, too. That dress is a knockout,” Hiroshi said.

Just then, the student body president got on stage and announced a band change. “Thank you, Wizards of Jazz. Now, let’s give a warm welcome to Ollie Gustavson and his Punk Polka and Perloo Society!”

We stared in fascination as a chubby guy in Bavarian leather shorts and a Tyrolean hat sprang onto the stage, carrying a shiny red accordion. He was followed by a tall, morose looking guy with waist-length hair and a black bass guitar, a tuba player (mostly obscured by his tuba), and a tiny guy who looked about four feet tall and carried an assortment of drumsticks.

“Wonder what rock they crawled out from under?” Hiroshi said.

The performers set up quickly. Then Ollie shouted into the microphone: “One! Two! One two three four!” and lit into a wild and breathtaking tune on his squeezebox. His fingers flew over the keys. The tuba player huffed and puffed to keep up. The drummer bounced around like Animal from the Muppets.

It was gripping music. I found myself tapping my foot. I felt a tug at my elbow and looked down. It was Junia.

“Do you polka?” she asked.

“A little,” I said.

We pushed our way out onto the dance floor. No one seemed to know what to do. Most people were staring in stunned silence at the stage.

I took Junia’s right hand in my left and put my left hand on her waist. She grinned and said, “Ready?”

I nodded, and we took off. It was a lot faster than the polkas I had danced with Nancy, so I shortened my steps to compensate. Junia seemed to know exactly what to do.

We bounced around in a little circle. I say “bounced” because it was a lot like a mosh pit; people were still staring at the stage and each other, so we bumped into a good number of them. However, in a minute another couple joined us, and then I saw Hiroshi and his friend nearby. Hiroshi spun around and decked a guy about half his size. As we whirled, I saw him stop to help the guy to his feet.

Then I saw Bob and Nora shuffling around behind us. Bob was having some trouble with his feet, and Nora was laughing and trying to give him instructions.

By the end of the song, the floor was a mass of bobbing couples. The song ended, and we laughed and clapped, and then another one started before we could catch our breath. This one was slower, kind of a punk country polka, if such a thing exists, and featured vocals by the tall, melancholy bass player, who complained about the indignities inflicted on him by his baby before she left.

“Sounds like one of your songs!” shouted Junia. Her face was pink from exertion. She looked like she was having a blast.

After the next song, Nora wanted to trade with Junia. I gathered that Bob had accidentally steered her into a couple of painful collisions, and she needed a break.

We swapped back after that song. Ollie launched into a Jerry Lee Lewis rockabilly tune, singing into a microphone over his squeezebox. It was quite bizarre on that instrument, and very lively. We wore ourselves out dancing to it. Then the band did three or four more sedate songs. After that Ollie said, “Thank you all. Thank you,” and his band left the stage amidst loud applause.

A country swing band came on as Hiroshi ran interference for us to the refreshment table. We made sure the girls had drinks, and then I drank five cups of punch in a row.

“Bob, I need to talk to coach about you. Did you know you almost decked Jim out there a couple of times?” Hiroshi said.

Bob sniffed the air and looked around. “Oh, is he here? Sure enough.”

Hiroshi grinned. “Yeah. You sent him into Moose the first time, and then the next time, you pushed him into me. I moved out of the way. He would have fallen on his can if Lisa hadn’t held him up.”

I looked at Bob. “I dare you to ask Lisa to dance.”

“Pfaah!” snorted Bob. “She’s not my type.”

“Come on. I double-dog dare you,” I said.

“What’s the matter? You chicken?” asked Hiroshi. He tucked his hands into his armpits and flapped his elbows. “Moo! Moo!”

“Moo who?” asked Hiroshi’s date, turning around.

“Moo goo gai pan,” Hiroshi said. “Ancient Chinese dish, very popular in Japan.”

“I’m Korean,” said the girl.

“Sorry,” Hiroshi said. “Gentlemen, I should have introduced you before. This is Kim. Kim, this is Bob, and this is Mike.”

“Hi,” we chimed.

Kim’s eyes widened. “The Bob and Mike?”

Bob grinned. “I see our fame precedes us.”

Kim held out her hand. “Pleased to meet you. I’ve heard a lot about you. I’ve actually seen you before, Bob. You were in a play, and afterwards I guess it was Mike that had to rescue you from the stage ceiling.”

Bob turned pink. “Oh, you know how we method actors are. Anything for art,” he said modestly.

“Hiroshi also told me about the Great Perfume War,” Kim went on.

I looked over her shoulder and saw Jim and Lisa a few feet away, talking to Moose and another cheerleader. Hiroshi saw them too, and nudged Kim. “Shh,” he cautioned, gesturing with his head.

Bob cleared his throat. “I think I saw you in a symphony program one time,” he said. “Didn’t you play a flute solo?”

She looked at him, obviously impressed. “That must have been our Christmas concert. I’m surprised you remember,” she said.

“Well, Hiroshi broke one of my ribs with his elbow, nudging me,” Bob said. “And he got his finger tangled in the hair of the lady in front of us when he was pointing you out. It burned you into my memory.”

“What else happens at a prom, besides dancing and refreshments?” I wondered aloud.

Junia said, “They’re taking pictures over in that corner, where they have the bower set up. Later on there will be a dance contest, and they’ll make the freshmen dance the Bunny Hop, and there’s a special waltz for seniors, and some stuff like that.”

“How do you know all this?” I asked.

Junia looked up at me. “Student council, remember? We know everything because we plan it.”

“Powah. The lady has powah,” Bob intoned. “Shall we immortalize this moment, before we get any sweatier?”

“Sure,” I said. Then I swallowed as I thought about my empty wallet. “Do we have to pay up front?”

“I think you pay when you look at the proofs next week,” Junia said.

“What’s the Bunny Hop?” Bob asked.

No one answered. We made our way over to the improvised studio.

It took a while to get through the long line. The photographers were very creative, and when they saw Bob’s outfit, they insisted on several flamboyant poses. Nora was quite amused, and had no trouble smiling for the pictures. The challenge was to get her to stop laughing while Bob made dramatic, sweeping gestures and struck pretentious attitudes.

Then they made me and Junia pose in a very close, romantic huddle, to show off her roses. “Sheesh, you’d think it was a wedding picture or something,” I complained, as we had our heads and arms tilted this way and that.

“Ah, you like it, you like it,” said Hiroshi, grinning. “You’re going to buy a 10 x 12. It’ll be your favorite picture.”

Finally the ordeal was over. The country swing band was just wrapping up. We watched a group of teenage guys with long hair, eccentric clothes, and guitars in several hues ascend the stage.

“A rock band, finally,” Hiroshi said. “That’s more like it.”

“How did you manage to polka, anyway, Bob?” I asked. “I didn’t think you even knew any kind of dancing.”

“I’m a keen analytical observer,” said Bob. “I watched you and figured it out.”

“With a little help,” said Nora.

“With a little help,” conceded Bob, “and the usual scientific process of trial and error. The families of casualties will be duly compensated by the War Department.”

“But can the man rock and roll? That’s the real question,” Hiroshi said, his teeth gleaming.

“Rock and roll is easy,” Bob said. “Merely a rhythmic series of bodily movements, which may or may not be stylized. In the case of punk rock or New Wave, they can be completely random, as long as they follow the beat.”

The band struck up a country rock number, something by the Doobie Brothers, I think. Couples on the dance floor began gyrating and shuffling.

“See? You have everything out there from fancy disco moves to people bouncing up and down,” Bob said, gesturing. “Nothing to it.”

“Well, get out there, and let’s see you engage in stylized or random rhythmic bodily movements,” Hiroshi challenged.

“Just so long as they’re publicly acceptable,” put in Nora. “Ready?”

“Certainly,” Bob said.

As the others headed towards the dance floor, I looked over at Junia. “This I gotta see,” I said. “Do you dance to rock and roll?”

She shrugged. “A little. But I do want to watch what happens.” She grinned.

We followed the others. There was a little room on our end of the dance floor, so we crowded in. Hiroshi and Kim started dancing. They were both pretty good. Junia and I started shuffling, not very enthusiastically, not really looking at each other.

Then Bob started to dance. He shuffled right, twitched his shoulders, shuffled left, jumped a couple of times, shuffled again, spun around. Nora, who had begun to dance a little side-to-side shuffle, stopped and stared at him, mouth open. Bob shifted his feet around, shaking his head. He waved an arm in a big circle, slid sideways four times, swung the other arm, twitched his shoulders, slid back, hopped in place, raised a foot and hopped again. Nora was laughing by now. Hiroshi had danced up behind her and was also watching Bob.

“The dude’s got rhythm,” I observed to Junia.

Junia was enraptured. She forgot all about dancing and just stared in fascinated amusement.

Nora started to say something, then closed her mouth, grinned, and started to dance like Bob, shuffling, shaking her head, jumping, swinging her arms. Since Bob’s movements were  so unpredictable, she had a hard time following him, but she kept rhythm with the music and twitched and shuffled and moved as best she could.

Junia shook her head. “Can you believe Nora dancing like that?” she said. “Look at her go!”

Other people nearby noticed Bob’s dancing too. Most of the dancers close by stopped dancing and turned to look. Soon there was a circle around Bob and Nora, just watching them.

Bob had one foot in the air and was wiggling it around while he hopped on the other foot when the song ended abruptly. He brought his foot down slowly as the clapping started.

Then another song began. It was something I hadn’t heard before, very catchy. Bob started twitching and jumping. Nora joined him. Behind her, I saw Hiroshi dancing kind of like Bob, jumping around randomly as if it were a New Wave song. Kim was laughing at him. I looked at Junia. She looked back at me, smiling, and I started dancing, alternating shuffling and hopping and twitching. It was a lot of fun. Junia started bouncing around then, stomping her feet and shuffling and bobbing. Every now and then we would turn to see what Bob was doing. It was always something unusual. At one point it looked like he and Nora were doing an Indian war dance around Hiroshi and Kim.

The band transitioned into a New Wave number without stopping, and then everyone on the floor was bobbing and bouncing and jerking and twitching.

We took a break for a drink a couple of songs later. The girls went off to the restroom or somewhere. I took off my coat and hung it on a chair. Bob was sweating profusely.

“Why don’t you take your coat off?” I asked.

He looked around, then whispered, “I can’t!”

“Why not?” I asked.

He grinned. “Pants are split. Right down the back where they let them out for me. It started when I got back on the bike at Nora’s.”

“Whoa, baby,” I exclaimed. “That’s got to be distracting.”

Bob looked around. “Have you seen any of the other guys? Eddie, Doug, any of them?”

I shook my head. “Tony’s over there,” I said, gesturing. “I don’t think Eddie and Doug were coming. Mac’s here somewhere.”

When the girls came back, they pronounced themselves too tired to dance for a while, so we made a circuit of the hall, greeting people and chatting, nibbling on refreshments.

The rock band left, and the jazz band resumed the stage for some quiet background music. The student body president took the microphone and announced a series of games and contests. Some of them were fun, some hokey. We watched and laughed as people gathered on the stage or on the dance floor and did silly things.

Then the dance contest was announced. Everyone was urged to be good sports and participate, so we all joined the milling crowd on and around the dance floor, dancing to a long disco medley. A spotlight played over the dancers, controlled by one of the judges. When it settled on a couple, Neil and another tall basketball player, both wearing top hats and white tails, walked over and escorted them off to the side. I wasn’t very inspired, and neither was Junia, but we obediently danced until we were cut. Then we stood and watched.

When the floor had been thinned down to about eight couples, we were delighted to see that Bob and Nora were still out there. Watching Bob dance disco was pretty funny. I guess he had watched Saturday Night Fever, because he postured like John Travolta, pointing up and down, strutting in a circle, twitching his hips and shoulders. He did some Blues Brothers moves too, jogging with his knees up like Dan Aykroyd. He probably would have turned a handspring if he’d known how. He wore a look of intense concentration, like he was staring at the dots on his guitar neck. Nora actually knew some pretty good disco steps, so she tried to do stuff that worked with Bob’s capering. She was laughing a good part of the time, both from watching Bob and from self-consciousness.

Two of the couples were escorted off. The spotlight settled on Bob and Nora. Bob darted around in a circle, trying to avoid it. Nora followed close behind him. Neil approached him, then stopped and stared, a strange expression on his face.

Something weird was happening with Bob’s outfit. His right hand had disappeared, and his right arm appeared to be longer than the other one. He struck a Travolta pose with his back arched, pointing down and then up with his right sleeve, down and up, and the electric blue tube grew and grew, flopping with the movement. One of his white pant legs was longer than the other, too. The fabric was bunched up on his ankle. He did kind of a can-can kick, and the cuff slid slowly down over his shoe.

The other bouncer joined Neil, and also stared. I saw Cammie close by. Her camera flashed several times as Bob danced on one foot, waggling the cuff in the air as he spun around. It reminded me of the rain dance he did when the stage backdrop fell on his toes. Then he tried to strut in a circle, walking on his long pant leg, but he tripped and fell to his knees. He shuffled around on his knees in time with the music with his arms in the air, looking like a pathetic pilgrim in a moment of glory, while Nora stared at him in what looked like alarm. Finally Neil and the other bouncer took Bob by the arms, picked him up, and carried him off the dance floor. Nora followed behind, laughing.

There was a lot of cheering and booing by people who wanted to see more. Bob bowed and waved his floppy sleeve. Nora blew kisses. Then they came over to where we stood. Bob swung his right foot wide and shuffled to keep from tripping over the long cuff as he walked. He was panting and disheveled. His shirt ruffles were wilted, and the knees of his white pants were gray with sweat and dust. His one visible white shoe was covered with scuff marks.

“You should have had Olshan do the altering,” I said to Bob.

“Nah,” Bob said. He gazed absently at his long right sleeve. “It was worth every penny I paid. This has been quite a night.”

“Saturday Nerd Fever,” I said.

“It’s not over,” Junia said. “There’s still the Bunny Hop and the senior waltz.”

“What’s the Bunny Hop?” Bob asked.

Hiroshi came up and said, “They’re starting to serve an ice cream punch.”

“Just in time. I’m dying.” Nora fanned herself. Her hair was starting to come loose. She had a tendril hanging over her right ear, which she absently pushed back. Eye shadow was streaking on one side, and her eyes were starting to get bloodshot, probably from her new contacts. The corsage on her shoulder was hanging sideways.

“You’re having a blast, aren’t you?” Junia asked, straightening up the flowers.

Nora grinned. “I’ve never had so much fun.”

We pushed our way to the refreshments table and got cups of punch cooled with ice cream and sherbet. The dance contest was coming to a close. The winners were led onto the stage to receive their awards. We moved away from the table to make room for all the other thirsty people who now turned away from the dance floor.

An announcement was made, and Ollie and his punk polka band climbed onto the stage. Ollie was carrying a violin as well as his accordion.

“More polka,” Nora murmured. “I’m wiped out.”

“I think they’ll probably do the Bunny Hop now,” Junia said.

“What is the Bunny Hop?” Bob asked again. “Why won’t anybody tell me?”

“Shh!” said Nora, as the student body president started to speak.

“Ladies and gentlemen, we need all the ninth graders on the dance floor at this time,” she said. “All freshmen come forward. It’s time for… the Bunny Hop!”

We reluctantly went out on the dance floor. “What’s the Bunny Hop? Tell me!” Bob hissed to Nora.

“Watch and learn, Einstein,” she hissed back.

A motley group of freshmen, not quite two dozen of us, stood self-consciously on the floor while the spotlight played over us. Tony was there. He stayed well away from us. Then Ollie began to play the Bunny Hop on his accordion, with his band adding percussion, tuba, and bass accents.

We all looked at each other. Then Nora said, “Come on!”

She grabbed Bob’s empty sleeve and pulled him behind her. Junia and I crowded behind, with Hiroshi and Kim behind us. The other kids lined up behind Kim. Each of us put our hands on the waist or shoulders of the person in front, and we did the Bunny Hop.

Bob had no clue what was going on, but he watched Nora, and pretty soon he had the hang of it. We kicked right, kicked left, hopped forward, hopped back, and hopped forward three times. Bob began to kick enthusiastically, making his right cuff flap wildly. After a few kicks, the left cuff began to come undone, too, and by the end of the song, both of his shoes were covered by the legs of his formerly white pants. The cuffs flapped beyond his toes every time he kicked. We circled the dance floor, kicking, flapping, and hopping, with the spotlight playing over us, until the music finally ended.

After some cheering, jeering, and laughter, the senior waltz was announced. Ollie put down the squeezebox and picked up his violin. He began to play something by Strauss, which seemed pretty weird right after the Bunny Hop.

Bob pushed his sleeve up and bent over to tug his pant legs up over his shoes. He rolled them up several times, creating cloth sausages around his ankles. “What happens now?” he asked, straightening up.

“I think the band will be doing waltzes and slow dances for a while, and then that’s it,” Junia said.

“How late did you guys want to stay?” I asked.

Hiroshi looked at Kim. “Maybe for a waltz or two?”

“Do you want to waltz?” I asked Junia.

She looked up at me. Her hair was less tidy than at the beginning of the evening, but her cheeks were glowing, her eyes were a deep green, and the black roses still looked very elegant. “One or two,” she said.

Maybe Hiroshi was right about the 8 x 10 photo, I thought to myself.

When the seniors were done, Ollie started playing The Tennessee Waltz on the violin, with the bass player singing in his melancholy voice. We filed out onto the dance floor. The waltz was the first step Nancy had taught me, and I had it down pretty well. It was soothing and relaxing after all the earlier frenzy.

“Have you had a good time?” I asked Junia.

She smiled and nodded. “Funny to see people in a different environment. Nora’s having such a great time. I never would have imagined it. Even on campouts, she’s usually about the same as she is at school, but here…. And Bob is such a kick! He’s loony! Just plain nuts!” She laughed.

“Did you talk Nora into coming with him?” I asked.

Junia grinned. “Sort of. I felt pretty odd coming with you and without her.” She colored slightly. “She took pity on me.”

“I was impressed that she told Bob she would go with him, after telling him no so strongly,” I said. “That took guts.”

Junia nodded again. “She’s nicer than she comes across in class, for sure.”

Over Junia’s shoulder, I could see Bob and Nora having what appeared to be a good-natured argument while they waltzed. Bob’s sleeve was covering the hand he had on her waist. One of his ankle sausages was hanging lower than the other.

“Bob waltzing with Nora. Who’d a thunk it?” I mused.

“Nerds of a feather,” said Junia.

We danced another waltz without saying anything. When it was done, Hiroshi and Kim decided to stay a while longer. I went and found my jacket, and the four of us made our way out the door and across the parking lot.

“It’s cooled down a lot,” Nora observed. “The breeze has an edge to it.”

“Feels like rain coming,” Junia said. “It’s not supposed to.”

“You never know what will happen when Bob’s been dancing,” I said.

The bike and trailer appeared to be intact, but when I dug into the ice chest for some mineral water, I found that the drinks were gone. Bob dug out a pocket flashlight and we looked around. The cassettes were still in their case, the stereo in its perch, the tarp in its bungee cords. All the batteries were there.

“Everything else seems to be okay,” Bob said.

We backed and turned the chariot together until it was pointed the right direction. Then the girls and I clambered into the bench seat, and Bob straddled the bike. “Ready?” he called.

“Carry on,” I said.

He hit the switch, and we were off. It took a while to get out of the parking lot, because other people were leaving, too, but finally we were on the road, headed out to Junia’s house. A couple dozen cars whizzed past us, and then the traffic thinned out. The breeze was getting colder. I thought I heard a rumble of thunder in the distance.

“Do you smell that?” asked Nora, sniffing.

“What?” I asked. The air smelled fresh and crisp.

“Rain,” she said, settling back into the seat.

We heard it a minute later, a hiss in the distance. I felt a drop hit my hand, and another hit my cheek. I squirmed around in my seat and began fishing for the tarp.

“Bob, don’t forget there’s a poncho here,” I said, struggling to pull the tarp from its moorings.

Bob coasted to a stop by the roadside. I tossed him the poncho. He tore into its packaging while I unfolded the tarp. The girls and I spread it over ourselves. It was pretty big, so I made sure it hung over the stereo and tapes. I was glad to see that the fenders kept the tarp out of the wheels. We held it up so we could see out the back. Raindrops flashed red as they fell past the taillights.

Bob apparently managed to get the poncho unpacked, because a minute later, we felt a jerk as the motor started up. The trailer lurched, then jerked to one side. I heard an angry whine from the bicycle’s rear wheel for a couple of seconds, and then the motor stopped. Bob muttered something, and grunted. I stuck my head out from under the tarp and turned to look. The bike was leaning dangerously to one side, and Bob was struggling to right it. The big spotlight shone at a crazy angle into the ditch.

“Forgot to downshift,” Bob said. “Can you give me a hand?”

I scrambled out of the shelter of the tarp and ran to help Bob lift the bike upright.

“Pick up the back of the bike by the frame, here, and I’ll run it enough to shift it down,” Bob ordered.

I obediently hefted the bike an inch or so, gripping it by the metal frame that the motor sat on. Bob flipped the power on, and began fiddling with the derailleurs as the wheel spun. After a minute or so, he had the chain on the smaller motor sprocket and one of the larger ones on the wheel.

“Thanks,” he grunted.

I squeezed back under the tarp, quite soaked by now. “Sorry, girls,” I said. “Technical difficulties.”

“Merely to be expected,” Nora said.

“Don’t be mean, Nora,” Junia said.

“Sorry,” said Nora. She giggled. “At least he hasn’t gotten his tails into the sprocket.”

We began to move forward again, smoothly this time, and soon were moving at 12 ½ miles an hour through the splashing rain. I warmed up quickly. The tarp was keeping us out of the weather, except for our feet. I could faintly smell the girls’ perfumes. I knew I didn’t smell of cologne anymore. I wondered what it was like for Bob in his poncho, up front, with the rain in his face.

“Music, anyone?” I asked. “I can still reach the stereo.”

“The rain sounds nice on the tarp,” Junia said.

“Yeah. Reminds me of camping,” Nora said. “The kind of camping where your tent leaks on the edges of your sleeping bag and you have to curl up in a little ball to get any sleep at all.”

“Speaking of camping,” I said. “There’s something I’ve been wondering about for a long time.” I paused, thinking about bikes in a tree, wet clothes tied in knots, Bob floundering through a bonfire, a dim figure swinging a big stick.

After a while, Nora said, “Yes?”

“Uh….” I paused again. “Never mind,” I said finally.

We sat in silence, listening to the rain on the tarp, the hum of the bike motor, and the swish of the wheels.

“This has been one of the best evenings of my life,” said Nora, out of the blue.

After a minute, Junia said, “Who’d a thunk it?”