Free Prom Date by Diane Hoh Page B

me. Hid it upstairs in the Sweatbox." Margaret didn't add that Adrienne was also saving the turquoise for Caroline, just in case. She could ask Scott, she told herself in an effort to ease the pain she felt for Caroline. She could.
    Not one of them had said it was wonderful that she was going to the prom.
    "I wonder why he's not going with Liza," Lacey said lazily.
    "She asked someone from her brother Brandon's college." Margaret pushed her sandwich aside.
    "Mitch must have been really upset," Caroline said, shoving her own uneaten sandwich to the side. "Everyone just assumed Liza was going with him."
    frritated by the implication that she was second choice, Margaret said, "He hadn't planned on going at all." She had no intention of agreeing that she was Mitch's consolation prize because Liza Buffet had chosen someone else. "No money. But his grandmother sent him a check."
    "Never mind Mitch McGill," Lacey said impatiently. "We all thought he was already taken, anyway. It's Michael we need to concentrate on."
    Margaret shook her head in disbelief. They had not said one word about the news release from the police department that morning. "I can't believe we're even discussing the prom. You don't find it utterly terrifying," she asked quietly, "that Stephanie's death wasn't an accident? That someone kicked her hand away from that railing?"
    Lacey looked up in surprise. "What's that got to do with us? Stephanie's a Pop. We're not. Whoever had it in for her probably doesn't even know we exist." A dreamy look appeared in her eyes. "I wonder," she mused aloud, "if your mother still has that gorgeous pale pink dress, the one with the long, full skirt."
    "You're too short for a dress like that." Jeannine thought for a minute, then added with hope in her voice, "Michael's in my calculus class, I've helped him solve more than one
    really horrendous problem. I wonder if he remembers."
    Annoyed that they weren't happier for her and repulsed by the talk about Michael Danz, Margaret stood up. "I can't deal with this." She picked up her books. "Well, don't lose hope, any of you," she added sarcastically. "There's always a chance that at the funeral tomorrow, maybe right in the middle of the service, Michael will walk up to one of you and invite you to the prom. Just in case, you might want to run over to Quartet after school today and grab yourself a dress. Mom has a few left. Just don't tell her who you hope to be going with, or she'll be as repulsed as I am."
    "Easy for you to talk," Jeannine retorted. "You already have a date. Which you can thank Liza for, if you ask me."
    "I didn't ask you." Margaret turned to leave.
    "Besides, Margaret," Caroline said quietly, "it's not like Michael was always faithful to Stephanie. Everyone knows he fooled around sometimes. So maybe he's not as shattered as you think he should be."
    "I'm outa here," Margaret snapped. Five seconds later, she was striding down the main hallway, her cheeks high with color. She was angry that her very best friends for years now.
    hadn't shared her happiness at being invited to the prom. And she couldn't believe they were all, even Caroline, hoping to be invited themselves by someone whose girlfriend of several years had just been killed. Revolting.
    Later, as she and Caroline worked together at Quartet, there was an uneasy, strained silence between them. During a lull in customer activity, Margaret went up to the Sweatbox to iron fabric, switching on the portable tape deck on a shelf behind her, for company.
    Caroline followed her. She stood in the doorway, cracking her knuckles nervously. Margaret ignored her, concentrating instead on keeping the wobbly old board steady on its wooden legs.
    "You don't think someone like Michael Danz would ever ask someone like me out, do you?" Caroline finally asked, her voice low.
    Margaret reached out to turn down the stereo. She set the iron on its heel. "Caroline, Stephanie was killed yesterday! No one's talking about that. You all