Restless Hope

Chapter 3 - Part 2

Isaac

If I'd know what Polly was doing, or more pointedly who, I would have kissed Beth in the cave, snatched my moment before my world shattered. I don't know how many times I wished I could rewind that moment and do it over.

The night of the prom and in the aftermath of Polly's murder, I was an anxious wreck, but the moment Beth entered the room, I relaxed. There's just something about her that calms me. I remember her walking down the stairs, biting her lip nervously because she wasn't sure if I would like her dress, which seemed ridiculous to me because she could have worn a burlap sack and I would have thought her beautiful in it. The dress she was wearing was way better than burlap. She wore a gown that seemed to be made of liquid silver that flowed over her hips and glimmered in the light. Her shiny, dark hair was half up, half down and curled loosely around her shoulders. She wore diamond stud earrings and a diamond necklace that settled at the hollow of her throat. She told me later they were her mother's jewels.

I couldn't help myself. I actually kissed her hand. Cheesy, I know. I used to wonder why guys did that in the old movies, but now I know. Your feelings are so overwhelming, you have to do something to show her. It's not that you want to only kiss her hand, but it is all you dare do, at least that's all I dared do in the presence of her father and sister. But my eyes silently told her so much more. That look in the cave was magnified one hundred times, and she glowed under my gaze.

We had probably been at the prom for only twenty minutes when trouble found us. We had danced a song or two, and let me tell you, feeling the silky material of her dress in my hands and holding her close was heaven. I left her for just a minute to grab us a drink.

When I returned, she was boxed in by four guys. They were weaving back and forth, clearly drunk, and clearly jackasses. One of them was holding Beth tightly at the waist and undressing her with his eyes.

"You're awful brave," he leered, "dating that bastard."

"Isn't that your date over there?" Beth said coolly. She nodded at a girl in a fluffy purple dress who was too busy chatting with her friends to notice what her stud of a guy was up to. "She's awful brave, dating a douchebag."

He wrapped Beth's hair in his hand and yanked her head close to his.

"Aww, don't be like that. I don't think she'd mind if I got a little taste of what the son of the whore's drinking."

Then he leaned in. This was not happening. That jerkwad was not going to steal my kiss! As he tried to kiss her, I saw red. But before I could punch the guy, Beth kneed him hard in the cojones and sent him crashing to the ground. Then with a beauty and majesty I can't even describe, she placed one of her dainty heels on his chest and looked down at the guy.

"Don't you dare call my boyfriend a bastard again!"

Then she actually spit on the guy. The other guys backed away, covering their precious family jewels with their hands as my queen glided toward me. I don't know exactly what we were before that point, but you better believe I was latching onto the title of Beth's boyfriend and never letting go.

We got kicked out of Beth's first and only prom. They might have let the self defense ride, but they couldn't condone the spitting. I felt a little guilty, knowing how much she'd looked forward to it, but I was also walking on air. The whole town could be against me, hell, the whole world could be against me, but if I had Beth at my side, we'd be fine.

She may have been born high and me low, but it didn't matter. We were just a couple of screwed up kids there for each other when we needed it the most. We were meant for each other.