186: Prom
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It was junior prom. David stated ditched him and he wasn't doing so great. As he walked to get some cigarettes, he explained to me that the prom was the culmination of a three-year campaign on his part, to get him with a cool crowd, a mostly white crowd. It began when he arrived at Lincoln Park High School. See, this is the story between them, right? Since I was a freshman, when I first came to Lincoln Park, I was like, "Total nerd, Gico," right? So, of course, I see all these glamorous, beautiful girls, and I'm like, "Damn," which, I'm only a dream of having them, right? Or just even taking them out on a date and doing anything physical with them, right? Third year, first junior prom at Lincoln Park. The most gorgeous girl in school, I asked her a prom. She says, "Yes." So, "God damn." I changed a lot since the sophomore year I got into this crowd and stuff, and they just changed my speech, my dress, and all that stuff. I'm still the same person. I just changed it. This is a popular crowd. I'm just popular now. So, I end up going, right? I know she has a history of being incredibly moody. She's so gorgeous, take her anyway. I mean, if I go with her this year, and she's so gorgeous, then all these other girls will say, "Damn, I have to go with him now." If he's good enough for her, he's definitely good enough for me. I'm like, "Fine, that's going to boost my rep a little bit." And I'll tell you this, I wanted something physical. I wanted to either fool around with her, meeting Kisser, Kisser, feel her up, or whatever, or even more, you know, go all the way or whatever. But I wasn't counting on that. I was here to have fun. And that would be like a nice feature to it. That'd be a bonus, you know. I wasn't pushing anything. Sure enough, her and her alleged best friend get into a fight. And here I am alone with my drumming coke. The prom. We don't make kids go into the army in this country. We don't make them go to college. We don't make them get married. But if they're still in school when they're 18, they collide with the impenetrable fact that is the prom. If they go to a school with a junior prom, they get it twice. And then they have to take a stand. Go, not go. Have some kind of experience. Use it to try to climb to a new group of friends. Use it to try to get the girl. Just try to get through it. The stakes are weirdly high for a one night thing. Good luck. Good luck. As we get older, I think a lot of people tend to roll their eyes at the idea of prom. Because years later, there's something about it that just feels embarrassing. Especially if you went. The clothes and the corsage, the corny music, just the whole thing. I'll speak for myself. It's embarrassing to think how thrilled I was to go out that night. How the whole thing seemed fraught with possibility.
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