The Prayers in Rossford

Dancing

Conclusion

“Oh my… Oh my….” Nell waved frantically, and Adele crossed the kitchen toward her.

“Shit,” said Adele. “You have mail.”

“Well… What do I do?”

“You check it.”

Nell flapped her hands over the computer screen and Adele, leaning across her, opened it.

“Adele!”

“You were getting on my nerves.”

Nell looked in her mailbox.

“Um…”

“He’s cute,” Adele said.

“Who’s cute?” Dena came into the kitchen followed by Layla.

“I’m cute,” Layla said “But that’s probably not your point.”

“This guy right here. Who wrote your mother.”

“Mom, you got business!” Dena ran over to the laptop.

“I’m not a business, Dena,” Nell said.

“You are to him,” her daughter said. “Wow, he’s…”

“Cute,” Adele said.

“Actually, I was going to say young.”

“Well, your mother’s young,” Adele said.

“Oh, my God,” Nell read the message by the man’s face.

“He sent his e-mail address, and he wants to know if he could call and… what should I say? Do you think he’s safe?”

“He’s the weatherman on News 22. You know. The young one,” Layla said.

“Are you sure?” Nell looked up at her.

“Um hum. Grandma calls him the Weatherbaby.”

“Go for it, Mom,” Dena said. “This is a great way to get back on the horse.”

“I don’t… want to ride a horse.”

Adele was about to say it was high time she rode something, when she remembered her daughter was in the room.

“Should I call or…?”

“Write him back,” Layla jumped in, “and tell him he can call here. Leave your number. He should call.”

“But then he’d have my number.”

“Well, if you call his cell, he’ll still have your number,” Layla told her.

“Good point.”

Nell made a little scream and clutched her head.

“What the hell was that?” Adele said.

“That,” Dena said, “was my mom getting excited for the first time in a long time.”

“But his age days twenty-seven.”

“Does he like long walks by the beach?” Adele asked.

“Doesn’t say that.”

Dena said: “What about candlelit dinners and carriage rides?”

“None of that foolishness either.”

“Then go for it, Mom.”

“He’s so young, though.”

“So are you,” Layla said, looking over Nell’s profile. “Apparently, you’re thirty.”

There was a tap on her door and Dena called, “Come in.”

Nell slid into the room.

“You look… ecstatic, Mom.”

“I feel ecstatic. I haven’t heard from him yet. I mean, I just wrote back. But to think… I’m going to have a love life. Or at least a life! I mean, Dena, I really need a life,” Nell sat down on her daughter’s bed.

“Do you still have the receipt for that dress?”

“The prom dress?”

“Um hum.”

“Yeah, Mom.”

“Well, I was thinking, why don’t we just take that back and get something a little… livelier?”

Dena thought for a moment and then said, “Well, okay. That’s a good idea.”

“Well, then you could have two dresses!”

“That’s a terrible idea,” Claire said. “Here, what we’ll do is just take that dress back and return the money to Layla, and then you and your mom can go back and buy it.”

“Why couldn’t I just tell her I had the dress?” Dena wondered. “Why couldn’t I have just said that?”

“Cause you’re a kickass daughter,” Claire said.

“Well,” Dena said walking around the dorm suite, “It’s a good thing you came up with this.”

“Well, that’s because we’re kickass friends.”

“He’s Layla’s ex-boyfriend.”

“I know who he is,” Annalise said to her brother. “I just don’t want him.”

She looked at Layla, “And I can’t believe you did, either.”

“Look,” Aidan said before Layla could open her mouth, “we’re not asking you to spend the rest of your life with the guy. And I don’t know what’s so wrong with him, anyway.”

“Well,” Annalise gestured to Layla, “something must have been wrong with him. Right?”

Layla shrugged and said, “The girl’s got a point.”

“It’s just one night, Annie!”

“No.”

“I’ll pay you.”

“What?” Layla said, frowning at him.

Annalise looked at her brother, strangely, “Are you serious?”

“Aidan—” Layla began, but Aidan put up a hand, “Yeah,” he said. “I’m serious.”

Annalise cleared her throat and said, “In that case, I’ll think about it.”

She picked up the peanut butter, the crackers, and the knife, and walked out of the kitchen.

“Why did you do that?”

“Do what?”

“Buy Will a date?”

“We don’t know that I did, yet. Annie’s a hard sell.”

Layla smiled and shook her head.

“I like you,” he said, simply. “I’m in love with you. It makes me do crazy things.”

“Like pay for my ex-boyfriend to get a date?”

“Apparently,” said Aidan. “You’ve just seen it.”

“You know…” Layla began. “A more suspicious girl would think you were trying to get into my pants.”

“Would it work?”

Layla looked at him, then smacked him on the side of the head.

“Ouch,” Aidan said.

“Um,” Layla gave him something between a frown and a smile.

“That,” Aidan told her, “is not an answer to my question.”

“Well, the quickest way to get into my pants is to ask.”

Aidan opened his mouth.

“But not tonight,” said Layla. “Because I gotta take Dena Reardon’s prom dress back to the store.”

“What for?”

“Well because tomorrow her mother’s taking her prom dress back, and she’s gotta get a new one.”

Aidan looked at her.

“I know. It’s confusing, but it’ll all make sense in the end.”

“Since I’ve started seeing you that’s an ongoing theme.”

“How do you like it so far?”

Aidan smiled to himself, looked at Layla, and discovered he liked it a lot.

Annalise Michaelson madeherself stumble into Will Klasko, just to see what was up.

“I’m sorry!” Will said.

She did not intend to spill all of his and her books. That was overkill.

“No,” Annalise said. “I’m sorry. That was… just me being stupid.”

“Ah, hold on,” said Will. “I wanna get all of our books right. Uh… I believe I have your Shakespeare book. Um, Shakespeare. I should have paid more attention to Hamlet.”

“Hamlet’s overrated,” Annalise stated, tucking the book into her bookbag and pushing her hair back. “And so is Shakespeare. Greek tragedy is where it’s at.”

“Really?” Will said, raising an eyebrow.

“Yes,” Annalise said, detecting something. “Antigone over Juliet, Gertrude and all of Shakespeare’s pitiful bitches any day.

“Oh,” she said. “And this must be your physics book. It couldn’t possibly be mine.”

“Great,” Will nodded, taking it from her and dumping it into his book bag as students passed by. “Then I guess we’re all sorted out.”

“And I get home in time for GeneralHospital.”

“Well, GeneralHospital does have the golden spot.”

“What?” Annalise cocked her head.

“The Golden Spot,” Will said. “See, the worst spot is two o’clock, because One Life to Live is on ABC, As the World Turns is on CBS and the only soap left on NBC is Days, and so the whole soap watching world has to divide between those three. But at three, the only soap on, and the last one, when everyone’s coming home, so most folks could watch it easily, is GH. That makes it the golden spot.”

Annalise looked at him with an admiration that no explanation of a mathematical concept could have given her.

“I grew up with soaps,” Will said. “One might say… I’m a soap specialist.”

“What’s your favorite?” Annalise looked at him sharply.

“Truthfully…. One Life to Live.”

“Ouch! I’m an As the World Turns girl. I’ll like you anyway. Will Klasko, right?”

“Yeah… And you’re Annalise, right? I didn’t know you knew me.”

“Ditto on this end,” Annalise said. “I’ll see you soon, Will.”

And then, instead of leaving, she went in the opposite direction toward her brother’s locker where Aidan, Mark and their friends were herded.

“Aidan!”

He turned from them.

“Come here,” his sister said.

He shrugged and approached her as his friends hooted and snickered and Annalise casually flipped them a bird.

“Okay, I never really paid attention to him. But Will’s hot, I want him, and we can go out. Make it happen.”

Aidan grinned out of the side of his mouth.

“You’re making me a much richer man.”

“How?”

Aidan looked at his sister, uncomprehending, or comprehending all too well.

“Annie, you still want me to pay you?”

She looked at him, expressionless.

Aidan pulled out his wallet and started putting bills in his sister’s hand.

“How else are we gonna have money for afterprom? Or anything else before?”

“You’re a mercenary bitch,” he said closing his wallet.

“Um hum,” Annalise told him, stuffing the money into her breast pocket. “And you’re a cheap bastard.”

Then she kissed him, readjusted her bag and turned to go, adding, “But I love you.”

This day was the perfect day. Not that her life with Dena was a bad one. Nell had seen the movies. She’d watched Absolutely Fabulous, and she’d seen the stories about rebellious daughters and horrible mothers. They got on well, but they didn’t get on like best friends. Nell never felt like the great mother she had a feeling she was supposed to be.

“It’s all the movies,” Nell decided. And the books.

But all the same, this was the kind of mother she wanted to be, the one beloved and admired by Dena, who exchanged confidences with her, whom she went to lunches with.

“You hear anything from the weather guy?” Dena had asked her.

“Actually, yes,” Nell said. “Just a little e-mail. I haven’t read it yet.”

“Read it, Mom.”

“I will,” Nell had said primly, a small smile on her face.

She had waited until Dena was in bed, and there was no danger of her coming down to the kitchen to interrupt this, and then she had opened up the e-mail, staring at the boy, young man… he looked like a boy, with his of gold-brown thatch hair and his bright smile.

“I am too old,” she muttered, but then said, “Oh, hell.”

Hi, I’m Charlie. I called tonight. If you would like to call me,
here is my number below. I would love to meet up for drinks.
I’m free this weekend. How about you?

Charlie

“We can’t just keep sending back e-mails,” Nell muttered to herself. “He already called me. It’s too late to call.. Isn’t it? But how do I know?

She looked at his picture, and then she looked to the phone on the wall by the fridge.

The other side of the kitchen had never seemed so far away.

“Hello… I don’t know if I’m calling too late. I… Well, is this Charlie?”

“Nell?”

“Yes.”

“Oh, Nell, it’s good to hear from you.”

“I didn’t… I didn’t call too late?”

“No, not at all. I was really glad to get your number. I would really love to get to know you.”

“Thanks,” Nell said. And then she said, “I would like to know you too. I’m not good at this.”

“Oh, I know. This whole dating thing. Isn’t it horrible you have to go online?”

Nell was about to say, “In my day we met at the grocery store,” but at once she realized how old that made her sound, as well as the fact that it wasn’t true.

“I just get very shy,” she said.

“Oh, me too,” Charlie said in a very shy voice. “I don’t usually do this sort of thing. What are you up to tomorrow night?”

“I… uh… It’s Friday, right?”

“Yes. I get off work—”

“You are the weatherman, aren’t you?”

Adele saying Weatherbaby came into her head.

Charlie laughed for a very long, very nervous time and said, “Yes. I didn’t know how it would sound if I said, “I’m Charlie Palmer…”

“That’s the way you say it on the news.”

“Yes,” Charlie said. “Well, I’m free after six. We could… meet for drinks?”

“Yes.”

“Where would you…? There’s this place downtown.”

“I don’t know anything about bars.”

“Well,” Charlie made a sharp noise. “Bars are sort of seedy. How about The Pub?”

“I know it. Across from the church.”

“Yeah.”

“Well… I guess I’ll see you tonight—I mean tomorrow night!” Nell heard the distinct rise in her voice.

“Yeah,” Charlie said. He cleared his throat. “Yes!”