Touchdown Boy

Chapter Nineteen

The following school week passed in a blur of classes and tests that no students paid any attention to since their minds were preoccupied with the dance on Saturday. It was difficult enough for teachers to encourage students to pay attention in class during a typical school week, let alone when something exciting was happening at the end of the week. Even students who didn't care about the homecoming game Friday night or the dance the following night used the occasion as an excuse to slack off. Eventually teachers gave up trying to teach their lessons since they couldn't give detentions to every single student that was daydreaming, and instead they let their students use the time to talk about their outfits and limousines and dinner reservations they had planned. Or in Addison's case, use the time to read her latest book, Graceling. Although she found it difficult to concentrate when everyone around her was chattering loudly and she realized she would much rather be learning right now so she wouldn't fail her AP exams come May. Although it was probably too early in the school year for her to be worrying about exams already.

Addison had been relieved when the final bell rung on Friday; now all she had to do was get through the weekend and school would be back to normal. Friday night was uneventful, seeing as her friends all elected not to go to the football game and decided to jam out in Tom's garage instead. Addison had declined the offer, wanting to spend some time at home since she would be out all night Saturday. She spent the night convincing her mom to let her sleep over at a friend's house after the dance.

"You're just staying at Noelle's?" her mom asked suspiciously.

"Yep," Addison lied, knowing that her mom wouldn't let her go if she told her she was actually going to Billie Joe's house. "Please, we always have sleepovers after homecoming; it's never been a problem before."

"I know," Mrs. Webb sighed. "You've just been going out so much more than usual lately. Are you seeing someone?"

"No, mom," Addison answered. It wasn't technically a lie since she and Tom weren't really dating. "I've just been hanging out with friends." This was technically true.

"So you're not going with anyone to the dance?" Her mom was not going to let this go.

"Mom, I'm going with friends. We go together as a group every year," Addison laughed, trying to make her mom's question seem ridiculous even though she was right about her suspicions.

"Okay, you can go to Noelle's. Just don't tell your father," her mom gave in. One of the perks of having a dad who was on a business trip was that you could get away with more during the week he was gone.

She spent the rest of Friday night with Alice who was stressing about the dance, or rather her first date with Mikey. Addison was surprised to find out that the couple was going to the dance with Mikey's friends rather than Alice's. But Alice was more outgoing than Mikey, based on what Alice had told Addison, so she most likely didn't want to make him uncomfortable by putting him out of his comfort zone. Addison did her best to reassure her sister that there was nothing to be nervous about, that Mikey liked her back otherwise he wouldn't have even asked her to the dance.

But her comforting seemed to do nothing as Alice was still hyperventilating Saturday afternoon when all the girls were getting ready for the dance at Noelle's house. Even though Alice wasn't going with them to the dance, she still wanted to get ready with Addison and her friends, so Mikey was going to pick Alice up from Noelle's house at 6:30.

"Alice, stop worrying so much," Skye said, pulling her hair up into a fancy bun that Addison had no idea what the name for was. "And hand me a bobby pin."