Pink is my new favorite color|| Cynthia Zdunowski

Stranded at the Drive In

Ella's POV

"You have to come! It's the last day of summer, everyone's gonna be there"

I was on the phone with Dot, her trying to convince me to go to the drive-in with everyone. I haven't gotten out much this summer, stayed inside, kept my head down, my only socialization has been weekly phone calls with Dot. She continues after a moment of waiting for my answer, "Everyone really misses you! It's like we haven't seen you since my school's out party, but you left that early to-"

"I'll go."

I don't even know why I said it, I just wanted her to stop talking.

"Perfect! We're all driving in together. We'll pick you up at 7:30. Neil's driving."

Neil. The name I've been avoiding seeing, hearing, or thinking about all summer. I look at the clock: 7. I need to do anything and everything I can to distract myself and get out of my head for 30 minutes. I do everything I can think of: Change my outfit four ties until finding the perfect one, curling my hair, focusing on getting the perfect eyeliner and color of lipstick. As I finish, almost on cue, a car beeps outside my window. I run out of my room as fast as I can yelling "I'm going to the drive-in before shutting the door.

I walk out and there they all are: Dot, Rosmary, Peg, and... Neil. "Hey princess, I was starting to think I'd never see you again." Why would he ever think it's okay to call me that?! I couldn't think of a comeback so I just went to get in the car. Everyone else had taken a seat in the back so I had no choice but to sit up front. With him. I tried pressing myself as close to the door as I could but Neil still put his hand on my thigh, at least it was over my skirt this time. I couldn't say anything so I simply had to sit there and try and think about absolutely anything else.

Finally we arrived at the drive-in. We all climbed out and started walking around. Thankfully Neil left to go find some friends, but not before telling me to find him hen the movie started so we could be alone, which made me want to throw up. After walking around for a while, the girls got distracted by seeing Jane Facciano wearing Buddy Aldridge's letterman jacket and they went to go find Susan to check on her. All I wanted to do was find a spot to watch the movie that wasn't Neil's car. I told Dot I ws going to find a spot to sit and went on my way. But I forgot the most important rule: There's safety in numbers.