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The bell rang and Damon joined his classmates in exiting the gym. He quickly scanned the halls for his friends and spotted Sharon heading towards her locker. He braced himself and took a step in her direction. Before he could take another though, he felt an arm link with his and steer him the opposite way. Startled, he looked down found himself looking into Kari's face. "Kari, hi! What's up?"
"Oh, you know. Not much. I was wondering though what you were doing tomorrow after the game."
"I'm probably just going to Marty's and hang out with everyone else, why?"
"Oh, come on, Damon! Tomorrow's the big game! That's not enough!"
He couldn't help but give her a look. "What's not great about spending time with my friends and family? You know they're important to me."
"Oh, I know that," she said, brushing his comment away with a wave of her hand and not understanding truly what that meant to him. "But I thought you'd want to do something else for a change."
"And you have a suggestion." Damon wasn't really asking.
A sparkle came into her eyes as she flashed him a dazzling smile. "Of course I do! I was thinking that we could go to the city and celebrate."
"The city? It's almost an hour away! I'll be too tired to party by the time we get there."
"Oh come on! It'll be fun!"
"Sorry, Kari. I don't think I can do it," he said, disengaging his arm from hers and stepping away. "Besides, I don't know if anyone else would want to go."
"No one else has to go. It'd just be you and me."
Damon raised an eyebrow with that comment but politely shook his head. "Sorry. Anyway, I better get going. I'll see you later though, okay?" He gave a half-hearted smile and turned to go back in the other direction. A quick scan down the hall, however, showed him that Sharon was already gone from her locker and nowhere in sight. He sighed and started to walk to his next class, oblivious to the angry look on Kari's face for just having been brushed off.
The next hour sped by for Kari as she worked on her English exam. A glance at the clock let her know that she was making pretty good time, so she sat back in her seat and closed her eyes for a moment. She took in a few breaths and rolled her head a little bit before sitting forward again to continue her essay.
When the bell rang twenty minutes later, she quickly grabbed her stuff and joined the crowd leaving the classroom. "What'd you think of that one?"
Sharon turned toward her classmate and smiled. "Well, it wasn't my worst timed-write ever, I can tell you that, but neither was it my best. What do you think Andrea?"
"I don't know, really. What I do know is that my hand hurts from all that writing and I think I am officially tired of poetry."
Sharon laughed in agreement. "Too true. I don't think I could take anymore of "The Dawn" or anything like it. How sad, I think I'm almost looking forward to starting plays next semester."
"Sharon! Just the person I wanted to see!"
She felt her heart skip a beat as an arm wrapped around her shoulders. "Hey Damon, what's up?"
"I want to talk to you. Is now a good time?"
"Sure. I'll see you later Andrea, all right?" She waved bye and let herself be led to their next destination.
"Do you need anything from your locker?" he asked her.
"Nope. I'll just grab my stuff after lunch."
"Okay. Would you mind if I grab my lunch first then?"
"Not at all," she smiled and headed a little further down the hall. "So what do you want to talk to me about?"
"Well, I was just wondering," he started slowly, suddenly unsure of himself. He'd been steeling himself for this moment for so long now, he suddenly didn't know what to say.
"Yes?" she prompted, still smiling. They had reached his locker and he looked to be devoting an unusual amount of concentration towards his lock. "Is everything all right?"
"Yeah, sure, fine," he answered quickly, finally getting the combination right. "Look, Sharon, I was just wondering if you'd like to go to winter ball with me."
Time stood still for a moment as his question registered in her mind. "Are you serious?"
He nodded, trying to read the expression on her face.
"Oh Damon, I'd love to," she broke out into a smile. "But I can't go with you."
One moment, his heart had been soaring and he had felt on top of the world. Then the last part of her sentence hit him, dropping him back down to earth with a sudden jolt and leaving him suddenly a little sick. "Oh." Damon suddenly found the inside of his locker to be quite interesting.
"Damon, it's not you."
"Right…" he said, not quite believing her and still not quite sure what had just happened to him.
After she realized he wasn't going to say anything more, she tried again, wanting to make him understand. "Really Da-"
"Did Vin ask you already?" he found himself interrupting her and asking before he could stop himself.
"Huh? Vin? No, he didn't." A puzzled look settled on her face. "Why?"
"Well, he asked you for Homecoming, didn't he? And you said yes to him then."
"Yeah, but he didn't ask me this time. Didn't you hear? He's already asked Heather and they're going to go together."
"No, I hadn't heard." He looked genuinely surprised and smiled for a brief moment as he thought about congratulating Ana for her work before frowning again. "Then who else asked you to go to the ball with them?"
"No one else asked me. Just you. I'm actually flattered you asked."
"Then why won't you go with me?" He couldn't help the little bit of whining that came with that last question.
She smiled but didn't find it in her heart to tease at that moment. "Because I'm supposed to be boarding a plane right around the time the dance is supposed to start."
"Plane?"
"Yeah, a plane. You know, it's a big type of machine that flies people through the skies-"
"Very funny, Sharon. I know what a plane is."
She chuckled. "Yeah, all right. Anyway, the dance is the day after we get out for winter break, right?"
"Yeah…"
"So yeah, I can't make it. It's tradition for my family to go skiing with Kelly and her family over winter break. We made these plans months ago, and I didn't know there was going to be a dance that night."
It took a few moments, but as soon as he was able to understand what she had just revealed to him, relief visibly came across Damon's features and she found herself smiling with him.
"If it helps any," she continued, letting herself be bold and linking her arm through his as they turned to walk out to lunch. "I would have said yes."
"Really?"
"Of course. Is mine a face that would lie to you?"
"I sure hope not."
She laughed. "That sure sounded confident. Fine, I'll let you know when I'm lying to you."
"Oh now you're really not serious. How can I believe that one?"
"Honors code."
"You're not even in any honors classes here."
"Oh, you did not just say that! That was a really low blow Damon!" she laughed, hitting him with her free hand.
"Sorry," he apologized, but laughed as well.
They were still teasing each other when they approached their usual lunch table. Ana shot him with an inquisitive glance at Sharon's arm, which was still linked with his, but he just smiled and shrugged, thankful that Sharon hadn't noticed the interchange. 'Nothing can bring me down from feeling as happy as I feel right now with Sharon here at my side,' he thought. Damon glanced over at Sharon, who was still beaming. 'Nope. Absolutely nothing.'