Her Name in the Sky (23 page)

What are you looking at?
Baker asks.

Nothing
, Hannah smiles.

She stands up and walks into her bathroom and stares at herself in the mirror. Her bloodshot eyes stare back at her. She turns around and lifts her shirt up, searching for the rug burn she knows will be there. Her upper back has scratchy pink marks all over it. She presses her fingers against her raw skin and watches the flesh shine white.

“So what do you want to do about prom pictures?” Wally asks her during Monday’s unassigned period.

“What about them?”

“Do you still want to go to the picture party at Clay’s house?”

“Oh. I didn’t think about that.”

“I think we should still go. I’d like to be with Clay and Baker. And I know Clay would want you to come.”

“Is Luke still going?”

Wally frowns. “Luke’s not going to prom.”

“He’s not?”
“No. Now that he and Joanie aren’t going together, he doesn’t want to go at all. Haven’t you talked to him?”

Guilt sweeps over Hannah. She breaks eye contact from Wally, feeling embarrassed, and admits, “No, I haven’t.”

“Have you tried apologizing to Joanie again?”

“No,” Hannah mumbles.

Wally sets down his pencil. “Really?”

“She won’t talk to me.”

Wally stares hard at her. Then he picks up his pencil and starts filling in his Calculus homework again. Hannah watches him, feeling both stubborn and shamed. “I don’t know how to say sorry for what I did,” she tells him. “I mean, I basically ruined their relationship. I broke Joanie’s trust. I really hurt them both. How do you say sorry for that?”

“I can’t tell you how to apologize, Han.”

“But it’s like the wrong is too big to be forgiven, you know?”

“No,” Wally says, looking up from his textbook. “You just have to keep trying. You

might have to work at it, especially when it comes to Joanie—I mean, you might have to sit down and
really
talk to her, you know, not like she’s your little sister but like she’s your friend. Like she’s Baker.”

“Joanie could never be Baker.”

“See, there you go,” Wally says, throwing his hand up to prove the point. “You’re not trying, Han. You’re not. They can forgive you if you try. Anyone can forgive you if you try. Christ, I’d probably even forgive my own father if he—” Wally stops abruptly, bites his lips into his mouth, takes a long breath. “Anyway, you need to keep trying.”

He looks back down to his Calculus textbook. Hannah pulls at the pleats on her skirt while the silence fills up around them. Finally she says, “Thanks.”

“No problem,” Wally says, his voice much lighter now.

“Wally—I’m really lucky I have you. I’m really lucky you haven’t left, too.”

Wally raises his head again, his eyebrows knit together in seriousness, his jaw firm. “I’d never leave you,” he says, and then, after checking her grateful expression, he goes back to his homework.

That afternoon, when Hannah and Joanie get home from school, Hannah follows Joanie into the kitchen. She leans against the counter and presses random applications on her phone while Joanie stands in front of the fridge, scanning her snack options.

“We could heat up that leftover meatloaf,” Hannah offers.

Joanie ignores her.

“Joanie,” Hannah says exasperatedly, “I’m sorry.”

Still Joanie ignores her, moving the egg carton aside to see what’s behind it. Hannah waits for about 15 seconds before she tries again.

“I know I was an asshole. I didn’t mean to screw things up for you and Luke.”

Finally Joanie turns around. Her eyes blaze with anger. “Are you kidding me?” she says bitterly. “You ‘didn’t mean to’? Is that a joke?”

“I wasn’t thinking—”

“Luke hasn’t spoken to me in six days,” Joanie says. “Not a single word. He won’t return my calls or my texts. He won’t even look at me. And this is the guy who was my best friend. The only person in our group who ever made me feel like he absolutely wanted me to be there, even though I didn’t always get that vibe from everyone else, and especially not from you, who always made me feel like I was stupid and a nuisance. But I tried so hard to be your friend anyway because I—” her voice starts to break—“I thought maybe if I was just a little bit funnier, or a little bit less annoying, then you’d let me in. And I trusted you because you’re my sister. But I guess that was really fucking stupid of me, wasn’t it? The only friend I truly had was Luke. He made me feel special and wanted and included, and now he can’t even look at me. And you know whose fault that is, Hannah? It’s yours.”

She slams the refrigerator door shut and storms out of the kitchen. Hannah stands frozen in place. She hears Joanie pound up the stairs to her bedroom and slam the door. Then the house is absolutely silent but for the tick of the grandfather clock in the family room.

Hannah slides down the counter, her back bruising against the wood. She slides until she’s sitting on the cold white tile of the kitchen floor, her elbows digging into her thighs and her sinuses pounding beneath her skin. And for the first time in months, she lets herself cry.

On Friday, the day before prom, Hannah trudges to her locker just before the first warning bell rings. She trades her French workbook for her Calculus binder and ignores the flurry of students around her, who are all buzzing with excitement and stored up energy as they talk about their plans for tomorrow night. Hannah hears words like “limo” and “pictures” and “afterparty,” but she tries to block it all out.

But then, out of the corner of her eye, she catches a burst of bright color. She turns to her left and sees Baker and Clay, just a few yards down at Baker’s locker, trading smiles as they look down at the bouquet of flowers in Baker’s hands.

Roses. Clay has brought Baker a dozen roses. And they are a brilliant, cheerful, perfect yellow.

Chapter Nine: The Prom Queen

Wally looks handsome, in a classic all-American boy way, as he stands there in a tuxedo in Hannah’s front hallway. Hannah watches him fidget with the corsage box in his hands while they wait for Hannah’s mom to stop fussing over her dress and hair.

“Let’s get some pictures here before we leave for the party,” Hannah’s mom says. “How about one with Wally giving Hannah the corsage?”

“Where’s Joanie?” Hannah’s dad asks. “Shouldn’t she be in some of these?”

“Shhh,” Hannah’s mom says, swatting at his arm. “She’s in her room. She wants to be left alone.”

Hannah’s mom snaps several photos on an outdated disposable Kodak while Hannah’s dad stands quietly off to the side, a gentle smile playing on his face. Hannah smiles hard when Wally wraps his arm around her.

“You two look great together,” Hannah’s mom says, and when they all walk out to the cars to drive to Clay’s house, she whispers, “He’s the perfect boy for you, Han,” right into Hannah’s ear.

Hannah’s sweating when she and Wally walk up the Landry’s driveway. Her mom and dad walk behind them, hand in hand, two proud parents ready to see their daughter off to the dance. Wally leads them around to the backyard, from which they can already hear chatter and laughter, and Hannah’s heart pounds hard when she sees the prom party and dozens of parents gathered on the back porch.

She spots Baker right away. She stands in the middle of the group, clutching Clay’s arm, a big smile on her face as she talks to Mrs. Landry. She wears a long midnight blue halter dress that makes her shoulders look even more slender than they already are. She wears her hair in a fancy updo, thick strands of it weaving back past her ears like delicate rivulets. When she turns around to say something to Dr. Landry, the sun shines on the bare skin of her neck and her upper back, and Hannah is suddenly awash in the tactile memory of kissing her there.

When Wally pulls Hannah over to the porch, Baker meets her eyes for the quickest of seconds—almost like she did it by accident—but then tears her gaze away. Hannah’s heart pounds faster. She greets several of the people around her, both classmates and parents, until Clay comes over to say hi.

“Hey,” Clay says, sounding genuinely happy to see her. “I’m so pumped you came.”

“I’ve missed you,” Hannah says, hugging him hard.

He pulls away and gives her a very packed look, his eyes begging for her to understand. She smiles and holds onto his arm for a few seconds, and he smiles back. Several feet behind him, Baker looks pointedly away.

Hannah’s parents say hi to the Landry’s, Hannah’s mom grabbing Mrs. Landry’s arm as they laugh about something Hannah can’t hear. Clay joins them to tell Hannah’s parents hello, and Hannah’s mom exclaims over how handsome he is while Hannah’s dad shakes his hand. “And where’s your pretty date?” Hannah’s dad asks. “Yeah, where’s Baker?” Hannah’s mom says. Hannah’s stomach turns over with anxiety, but Baker comes to greet them without missing a beat, hugging Hannah’s mom as if nothing is wrong. Then Mr. and Mrs. Hadley join the group, Mrs. Hadley telling Hannah’s mom all about their process for getting Baker ready. Hannah’s mom pulls Hannah into the circle to say hi and talk about her own preparation process, and Hannah and Baker both act like everything’s normal, though they avoid each other’s eyes.

And then it’s time for pictures. Hannah and Wally line up with the rest of their classmates—a whole line of them, handsome and beautiful 17- and 18-year-olds, stacked boy-girl-boy-girl all the way across the yard. Their proud parents stand across from them, holding up iPhones and fancy Canon cameras and, in Hannah’s mom’s case, disposable Kodak’s, and the parents beg them all to smile, and to stand tall, and to remember this prom night forever. And in the midst of cameras clicking away, and of parents shouting out their ideas for clichéd photos, and of smelling Wally’s cologne and brushing up against the itchy material of his tuxedo—in the midst of it all, Hannah feels the gravity of Baker’s presence and aches to go stand next to her.

Clay’s mom requests a picture of Clay, Baker, Wally, and Hannah after the large group photos have ended. Hannah feels Wally look over at her, but she doesn’t look back, afraid she’ll betray her discomfort. In her peripheral vision, she sees Baker shift and look away toward Clay’s old swing set.

“Yeah, come on, you’ll all treasure this one day when you’re older,” Hannah’s mom says. “Go ahead, get together.”

Then the four of them are posing together, and only Wally separates Hannah and Baker, so that each of them has an arm around his back. For a brief second, when Wally leans forward in a laugh, Baker accidentally touches Hannah’s wrist, and an electrifying charge surges through Hannah. But then Baker jerks her hand away as if she had been burned, and it becomes even more difficult for Hannah to smile for the camera.

And then it’s time to go. Hannah hugs her mom and dad goodbye, and her mom whispers to be good and to have fun and to enjoy looking at Wally’s handsome face all night. Hannah’s dad shakes Wally’s hand and instructs him to drive carefully.

“I will, Mr. Eaden,” Wally says, sounding as serious as Hannah’s ever heard him.

Hannah hugs the Landry’s and Hadley’s goodbye, and Mrs. Hadley holds her at arm’s length and says, “Come by and see us soon, alright? Feels like it’s been forever.”

“I will,” Hannah fake laughs.

On the drive to dinner, Wally says, “That wasn’t as awkward as I thought it might be.”

Hannah says nothing. She thinks about how that was the first time Baker’s touched her since the beach.

The entryway to the ballroom at the Crowne Plaza is decorated with purple and yellow curtains. A hand painted sign—
Welcome to St. Mary’s Prom 2012!
—hangs above the double doors. Hannah and Wally step into the ballroom, which has already filled up with juniors, seniors, and the counted-upon teachers who linger along the walls, including Ms. Carpenter, who sips from a Diet Coke can while she chats with Mrs. Shackleford. Purple and yellow balloons, packed together like organisms under a microscope, cling to the pillars on the wings of the room. A few people sit at scattered tables, but most of the student body has already taken to the center dance floor. Father Simon weaves his way through the slow-dancing couples, stopping here and there to request that each boy and girl leave room for the Holy Spirit.

“So what do you think?” Wally asks. “Want to dance?”

They join their classmates on the dance floor. People all around them say hi, the girls mouthing
So pretty!
or
Love your dress!
to Hannah, the guys reaching over to clasp Wally’s hand in greeting. Wally loops his hands around Hannah’s waist, and Hannah reaches up to lace her hands around his neck, and they start to dance.

She tries hard to lose herself in the soft rock song, to not picture Joanie sitting at home in her bedroom, or Luke watching TV at his mom or dad’s house, or Baker and Clay taking their time at dinner before they arrive at the dance. She closes her eyes against Wally’s chest and concentrates on shifting her body from side to side, following his lead.