1 month earlier - Melanie's POV
I wake up with a groan, stretching my arms out to the window to cover the sun that's beaming right into my eyes. I turn to my right and check the time that read 8:07am. After realising it's Saturday and we have no school, obviously, I quickly jump out of bed, going straight into the bathroom.
I don't know why, but I feel like today's is the best day of my life, maybe it's because of the weather being really really nice, or the fact that I'm going to pick up my prom dress this afternoon. Yep, I'm betting on the second one more.
Turning my shower on and twisting the temperature dial to a decent temperature, I take my clothes off. Taking my shaving foam, my razor and my toothbrush along with my toothpaste from the cabinet underneath the sink, I step into my shower, instantly relaxing under the water.
I can't believe that principal Lane let us join Merlyn Hill High for prom this year. Two schools joining for prom never really happened, until now, I bet this is going into the schools history book. But thinking about it now, we do have good connections with them because they are in fact the most sophisticated school, with best education, etc. BUT we have the best football team so it makes us even I guess. I'm really glad I'll get to be with Eve for prom though.
I hope that the store we went to last time brought some new arrivals of prom dresses or just formal dresses or just anything! Me, Eve and Alicia searched in every store there is and we couldn't find anything that looked a bit vintage, Eve just screwed the theme because she got very impatient and ordered a black dress that looks like she could wear it to a Quinceañera if we were Spanish, now she just has to pick it up because last time they didn't have her size.
Meanwhile, me and Alicia are still going to be looking. However, the shop assistant did tell us they were going to order some vintage dresses for us anyways so we're not completely lost here. Everyone told us that it was the best store for prom dresses, I just hope my opinion about the store changes after they show me their new arrivals. Besides that, I'm just really excited to have my best friend and my cousin with me for prom.
After about 45 minutes of spending time in the shower, shaving my legs, arms and just my whole body basically, I get out of the shower with towel on my head and a towel around my body. I peek through the door checking if my dad's around and when I see that there's no one to be seen I quickly tip toe to my bedroom and lock my door.
I walk to my night stand to check my phone for any notifications and see a message from Eve and Alicia on our Facebook group chat called "Bad Bitches". I read the message What time are we meeting bitches? I can't wait to try my badass dress (Eve) and start typing away with my fingers as another notification appears on the top of the screen and then disappears after a couple of seconds, I check my iMessages and see a new text message from Dylan, without knowing a smile automatically plasters on my face.
He asked if he can see me today, I'm going to the mall with Alicia and Eve to pick our dresses up for prom, but I should be free at around 6pm ;) I click send and put my phone down after replying to Eve's message on our group chat.
I start rummaging through my clothes, trying to pick the best outfit for today's weather. I then decide to go with some baby blue denim shorts, a white lace vest with cute collars and no sleeves with some white converse shoes to match. I'll probably make a messy bun for a change and accessorise it with a baby blue bow to match it to my shorts. And I obviously need my favourite brown leather over shoulder bag.
"Hey, guys, are you good to go?" I say into the phone because I decided to call the group chat over messenger, "Yup, are you?" I heard Alicia from the other line. "Hold up bitches, I'm still doing my makeup, I haven't even blow-dryed my hair yet!" Eve screams after us, making me take the phone away from my ear, "Oh my god Eve, you had like two hours to get ready, what have you been doing?" I sigh and then ask, she was probably sleeping because she doesn't set alarms on the weekends, even when she knows she has something important to do the next morning, like picking up her prom dress.
"You guys don't wear makeup, that's why you're always so early" she complains, "Well why don't you get ready, no need to rush and you'll just meet us there, besides you already ordered your dress, all you have to do now is pay for it" Alicia makes a suggestions which is actually very smart.
"Yeah, okay, I'll meet you guys in an hour, don't go anywhere else other than that shop without me, you heard me?" she warns us and we both laugh, "Sir, yes sir!" I respond.
With that I end the call and walk downstairs, my mom greeting me like always, "Where are you going so early?" she asks taking a look at my outfit, "Early? We were suppose to be in that shop like right now" I take a look at my phone to check the time, "She told us, new dresses were coming in at ten, which is right now, I can't believe Eve made us late" I whine and I see my mums lips curve into a smile.
"Well, you know your cousin, she likes to take her time" she informs me while opening the waffle maker, "Like I don't know that" I sigh and start sipping on my orange juice that I just poured myself.
"Want a waffle?" my mom offers me, "I'll take that to go, Alicia's probably on her way already, thanks mom!" I kiss her on the cheek before I grab my brown bag and put it over my shoulder, taking the waffle with me whilst biting into it.
* * *
"Hey, sorry I'm late" I greet Alicia with a hug when I see her standing outside Starbucks with my ice coffee in her hand and her ice tea in the other, "It's okay, I didn't wait long" she says after I let go of our tight hug, "Caramel flavoured ice coffee, just how you like it" she says giving me the see through cup, "Thanks, I owe you"
We start walking towards the shop which is only like two blocks away from here, but then stop when we hear our names being shouted behind us. We turn around and see Eve running towards us, wearing all black, again.
We're all pretty much dressed the same, shorts and vests. Alicia's wearing white adidas shorts, white yeezy nike shoes, a black adidas crop top and a white nike cap, she's a sporty girl, her figure is unbelievable. And Eve is wearing a black two piece set with some black vans and shades, she's probably not done her makeup properly that's why she's wearing them.
"You little bitches, did you seriously get a Starbucks without me?" she shouts as soon as she comes closer to us and then gives us both a hug. "We can still go in" I laugh and she pulls me inside instantly, so I drag Alicia behind me.
She orders a chocolate frappuccino. Weird how some things never change, that was her favourite since the age of 15. "How come you're so early? We were expecting you to come in an hour" Alicia asks and I laugh to myself again, Eve just sighs and then decides to speak, "My mom was throwing me outside, she had to be somewhere apparently"
"Is your hair wet?" I say in surprise as I touch the bottoms of her hair, she just nods and gives us a very sarcastic smile, "I didn't have time, why do you think am wearing these shades?" she rhetorically asks us because we both know that the answer is 'my eye-liner didn't work today' or 'my eye-shadow wouldn't blend'.
"Thank you" she takes her Starbucks cup from the lady in the green apron and we're set to go to the little prom dress boutique.
On our way there, something clicks in my mind and I make a casual conversation, "How did Josh even ask you to prom? You never told me" I ask Alicia, "Neither have you, now that I'm thinking about it" I motion towards Eve as I take a sip of my caramel ice coffee through the green straw.
"You go first, best ones to the last" Eve smirks and we both nudge her with our elbows, "Well, he asked me outside my house actually" she started off, me and Eve were already fully listening to the gossip, "You know how I always run in the mornings on the weekends? Well somehow, he knew it and he waited for me on my street. You know the part where all of the garages are and then at the end of the street there's my house, he was waiting there, just leaning against the garage, waiting for me" she told us and we had smirks plastered all over our faces, while she had a genuine smile.
"Okay and?..." Eve asked being impatient, wanting to know more. "Well, I was really surprised to see him, I didn't know what to say, so I said hi" we immediately burst out into laughter and Alicia gladly joined us, "You do realise you're telling us all the irrelevant stuff" Eve commented and we laughed again.
"Okay, so basically it happened like this, but don't laugh" she gave us a serious look, Eve just sipped on her frappuccino and I simply nodded.
"Well, he waited for me, I said hi, blah blah blah, then he backed me up against the garage door and it took me back so much, like... I literally didn't know what to do" she started mumbling, probably because she had the image in front of her eyes, it happens to me all the time.
"Oh my god, was he checking you out?" Eve cut straight to the point and we both squinted our eyes at her, "He backed her up against a garage for gods sake Eve, of course he was checking her out" after I said that Alicia choked on her ice tea and we started laughing, I feel sorry for her, she looks uncomfortable talking about it, "If you don't feel like telling us, it's okay" I say.
"Erm- Hell no, it ain't! You gotta tell us everythang" she put emphasis on the everything.
"He just kissed me" Alicia blurted out faster before we could both make out what she said, "Oh my god, he did?" I asked in shock and she just lightly nodded, "He sure does look like his brother but certainly doesn't act like him, wow, well that's new" I say being taken back by what she said.
"I would have been alright if it was Johnny, but Josh? Damn, never thought he could be sexy and flirtatious" Eve bluntly says and we both give her a look, "Heeeey, I didn't mean it in a bad way, he just doesn't seem like that kind of a guy" she's right.
"I know, I found it hard to believe it too" Alicia admits and throws her empty Starbucks cup into the trash that we just went past.
"Well is that all? I mean did he ask you?" Eve asks wanting to know more.
"He kissed me, then he said 'Will you be my date for prom?'." she told us without even looking at us, her cheeks getting pinkier.
"Awww that's so cute, what did you say?" I ask, "Yeah, obviously" she says as if her life depended on it, they're really cute.
"Um, better question is, how did he ask you, like was he sexy, did he wink or something?" Eve asked wanting to know the details, of course she would.
"He whispered it into my ear?" she answered her, being unsure if it's "sexy" or not, "Ohhhhh myyyy, stop right there. I don't know how anyone can keep a straight face when answering a question like this, my panties would be all the way up in New Zealand if Michael asked me like that"
"Was it your first kiss?" Eve shoots another question, "Not my first ever kiss, but my first kiss with him, yes"
"Awww, that's way too cute, I bet it was romantic, I'm surprised he hasn't kissed you already though, all these months and he kisses you now" I say.
"It was... um... yeah, sexy" we all started giggling at Alicia's response, "It was worth the wait though" I bet it was, I think to myself.
Before entering the store, Eve throws the remaining frappuccino into the bin because we can't go into the store with food or drinks and I already finished mine. I'm really glad we decided to do this, I haven't had this much fun in ages. "Hello, girls, remember me? Dinah." We get greeted as soon as we lay foot into the store.
"Yeah, you're the shop assistant who promised to get us our dresses" Eve says but it comes out a little rude, which I don't think was intended but because of the person she is, everything she says sounds rude.
"Yep, that would be me. So I got your dress in the fitting room already, I was expecting you, so if you want you can go try it on right now" she says in a cheerful tone, her face lit up like a christmas tree, she's looks no older than five years from us.
"And for you two, I have something very special -well I have a few special things to show you" she says and her eyes sparkle in the dim lighting. Me and Alicia look at each other and smile to ourselves, biting back laughter.
"I never got a chance to go to prom, so whenever someone comes here to buy prom dresses I get a little too excited, so excuse my hyper body, I had too much caffeine this morning" she says making us both laugh, then we see Eve sticking her head out from behind the fitting room curtain, laughing with us.
Dinah then brings out a rack with six dresses in black cover bags, so we can't actually see them, but I'm already excited. We both go into the fitting room, Alicia takes the one next to me and Eve is right next to Alicia. We both close the red curtain and I start getting undressed, good thing I shaved my legs, that would have been awful if I didn't.
As I start taking my sleeveless lace t-shirt off, Dinah's hand peeks inside the fitting room along with one of the dresses that's still inside the black cover bag. I start opening the bag to see a true red dress, it goes just above my knees, strapless and completely covered in red glitter. I can imagine how much this dress would be shining from the disco lights.
I put it on and check myself out before opening the curtain and walking out, "Guys, what do you think?" I ask them and as if on cue, Eve peeks her head out from the curtain, she looks me up and down, her mouth opened wide, "That looks sexy as fuck" she comments and I giggle.
"How are you doing with that dress?" I ask her in return, "Well, it's kinda hard to say. I'm kinda stuck" she says after she gets back inside her fitting room, "I'll go help her" Dinah looks at me before going into the fitting room with Eve.
Right after I walk into my cabin, Alicia tells me to come outside, but since I'm already naked and there's people in the store, I just do what Eve does, I peek my head out through the curtain. As I open the curtain, I see Alicia checking herself out in the big mirror outside the fitting rooms, I check her figure from bottom to top and then she notices me, "So?"
"I'd turn gay for you" I mess about, "So would I" we hear Eve speaking up when she finally decided to come out of her cabin. "Oh my god, stop it guys, you're making me blush" she joked. She's wearing like a off gold strapless dress that goes just above her knees and has silver sparkles that creates lots of patterns, and on her body figure it looks amazing, I've never seen her wearing a dress yet.
"You know what I think about my dress? One word: Badass" Eve comments on her black dress, that shows her cleavage a lot, but I have to admit, it looks sexy and is very stylish. It goes right up to her neck, creating kinda like a choker. "I agree" we both say in unison and then smile at each other.
"I'm definitely taking this one, but I'm willing to try more on" Eve says and all of us go back into the little fitting rooms, waiting for Dinah to give us another dress.
This time when I open up the black cover bag, I see a baby pink dress with roses stuck onto the sweetheart neckline, it's like a massive Quinceanera dress that's also strapless, bbut looks quite heavy. I put it on, immediately spinning around like a princess, I've always wanted to know the feeling in this kind of dress.
I walk out from my cabin, seeing my best friend and my cousin with the same exact dress. We all look at each other and start laughing, "Dinah, you did this on purpose!" I say while still chuckling, she just smiles and shrugs her shoulders, hinting that she's guilty.
"I think you should all wear that one, you can match, that would be so cute- No, adorable" she corrects herself as she comes towards us, taking a closer look at the dresses. "As much as I like the dress, I wouldn't wear it even if you gave me a small loan of a million dollars" after she finished saying that, we burst out into laughter, except Eve.
"I would... Hell, I'd even dress up as a banana if you gave me a million dollars" she finishes her statement and we end up laughing again.
After a couple of minutes we settle down and I want to ask Alicia why she wouldn't wear it, but I think I already know the answer, "Because drama queen Tasha is probably going to turn up in a pink dress and there's no way I'm wearing the same colour as she is" Alicia explains and just as I predicted, she said it spot on. If there's anyone who hates Tasha more than me, it's Alicia.
"Who is this is Tasha girl?" Dinah asks, "Tasha? More like Trash-a" Alicia blurts out, making both me and Eve lose it and we end up laughing our asses off.
"Woah, sounds like you hate this Tasha girl"
"If only. Hate isn't a strong enough word for it" Alicia says again, this time I nod along though, "So what did she do to you guys?" Dinah carries on asking.
"Better question is what hasn't she done. She thinks she can get any guy she wants to, played with my brother, likes Melanie's boyfriend" Alicia tells her truthfully. Well, the mood definitely dropped.
"Hey, fuck that hoe, we're over here thinking about punk ass Tasha-Trasha, when we should be over here deciding on our dresses so that we can look fly af when we enter the building" I can't believe I swore again, but I had to, I'm trying to lighten up the mood.
"I can't believe you just swore" Both Eve and Alicia said at the same time, making us all smile, "Yeah well, Tasha made me do it" I said and heard a small giggle leave Alicia's lips.
"Guys, I hate to break it to you, but I haven't eaten from the morning, the only thing I had was a frappuccino. My ass is hungry" Eve whines and made me hungry as well now.
"Yeah me too, I'm craving a McDonald's meal, screw my healthy diet" Alicia says.
We all go into our fitting rooms again ready to try get dressed into our normal clothes now, but then I realised that I still haven't picked out my dress yet, not to forget it has to be in the style of the great gatsby which means it has to be at least a tiny bit vintage.
"Guys, I still haven't found the right dress yet" I say a little louder than normally so that they could hear me through the walls. Suddenly my curtain opens revealing the three girls staring at me, as I stumble back from shock.
"And we just realised we didn't even take a picture in those dresses, so put it back on" Alicia tells me while closing the curtain again. "And you better hurry your ass up with picking a dress because we're hungry as f" Eve notifies me.
I come out with the same pink dress, we stand in front of the big mirror and take a picture of ourselves, then we take a selfie and lastly we ask if Dinah can take a picture of us, she then shows us and the picture looks amazing, I think I'm going to print that one out, frame it and put it into my bedroom. We take a one last picture with Dinah in it as well, some customer took it of us, and because of Eve we had to take a selfie with her as well, Eve's addicted to taking selfies.
"Hey try this, I left it last because I thought you'd like it the best" Dinah's hand appears in my changing room, so I take the black cover bag and hang it on the wooden wall connecting all the cubicles.
As soon as I start unzipping my back, my phone starts pinging relentlessly, it's probably my mom asking where I am, or when I'm coming home... or asking about the prom dresses. I start going through my bag that's hanged on the wooden wall too and find my phone in my small pocket. I take it out to see it still buzzing and my lips are already curing into a wide smile when I see who the messages are from.
DYLAN<3: melanie, are you still in town?
DYLAN<3: melanie??
DYLAN<3: meeeeeeel
DYLAN<3: are you ignoring me?
DYLAN<3: joking haha I know you're probably trying on hundreds of different dresses and am sure as hell you look beautiful in every single on of them
DYLAN<3: you really are ignoring me, aint you? ðð
me: I'm not ignoring you haha and yes, I was trying on dresses. And you haven't even seen me ð But thankyou for the false compliment, you little flirt
DYLAN<3: its not a false compliment. I dont need to see you to know your beautiful
me: you're* ðððð
DYLAN<3: send me a pic of you in YOUR dress, smartass ð
Without hesitation and a smile still plastered on my face, I zip the back of the dress again and pose for the picture. I send it to him over iMessage, which is where we've been texting just now and wait for a response while taking the dress off.
In the mean time, I unzip the black bag and see a beautiful diamond dress, that's full length and fades out into a very soft peachy colour. It has a a sweetheart neckline as well, but this dress is slim, I feel like if I had the right shoes and accessories, it would look vintage as well. Without second thoughts, I zip the bag up again, not bothering to try it on. I put my shorts and my lace vest on again and walk out of the changing room.
"Does it fit?" Dinah asks. I nod, "I didn't put it on because I'm really hungry and I promised my boyfriend that I'll meet him at 6pm, and I still haven't got my shoes and accessories, so I don't have much time left. But I love the dress and I'm sure it'll fit me by the looks of it, so don't worry" I tell her at the cash register.
"It's fine, if there's anything wrong with it, just come back and I'll give you another one, I've already saved you one that's very similar to this, a mermaid dress covered in silver jewels"
"Thank you so much Dinah, I don't know what to say" I truthfully tell her and she then comes out from behind the counter to hug me. "Okay, well see you whenever you're going to need another formal dress" she tells me a goodbye but I laugh because it's like we've known each other for much longer than an hour and half.
"Or you could just give me your number and we could hang out sometime" I suggest and she widens her eyes as if what I just said was an idea that nobody ever heard off, I smile to myself as she goes behind the counter again, writing her number on a piece of paper. She then gives me the white piece and I put it into my brown leather bag as I take my purse out and pay for the dress.
"Thank you again Dinah, see you soon" I take my dress from the counter that's inside the black bag to keep it from getting stained or dirty.
With that, I walked out of the store, seeing the girls already munching on a cheeseburger, "You took your time" Eve comments with a mouth full of food. I shake my head, "When did you manage to go to McDonald's and back?" these two girls are definitely something, I bet it was Eve's idea.
"Well you were in there with Dinah and McDonald's is only five minutes away from here, so we thought go and bring you a cheeseburger too-"
"Unless you want to go back to McDonald's to have an actual meal" Eve finished Alicia's sentence. She then gives me the cheeseburger they brought me and I gladly take it, all I had from 8 o'clock was one small waffle, that's it.
"Don't you think we should put our dresses somewhere safe before we accidentally manage to get them dirty?" Alicia says and I agree, so because Eve lives closets to the mall, we go to hers to drop our dresses off and then go straight back to the mall to buy finishing accessories but first we go to McDonald's.