The Prom

Snapshots In My Time, Of My Time.....Hauntings.

1978. Senior prom.

I had already been to a prom my freshman year and had gone to my prom my junior year and the prom of my boyfriend--also my junior year. I really was prommed out by the time senior year came around. I had not planned to go at all and had decided I was not going. I was not dating anyone at the time but that had nothing to do with my decision. Even if I was dating someone I was not going. Prom time came and lots of girls were all abuzz with plans and dates and who to ask and not who to ask.

One day one of the guys on the football team asked me to go to the senior prom with him. I immediately told him no as I had already decided I was not going. This guy was a guy who was not the most attractive. He was very large with rolls and rolls of fat everywhere. He was very obese. He had been that size all the 4 years of school. Even if I was going I surely would not go with him. He and I barely knew each other, did not travel in the same circles and did not really speak in all the 4 years. Well because he was on the football team he was considered a jock and was in with the jock crowd. Within 2 days of my "no" his friends began to pressure me to go with him. They told me things like this was the senior prom and I needed to go and the main thing I heard was that he had never been to any prom in the 4 years and he really wanted to go. And that he really wanted to go with me. I told all of them "NO". The pressure kept coming my way. The next thing I heard was I would have a good time, it would be a group setting, blah, blah, blah, blah.

Well after about 2 weeks of that I went back to him and told him that if he wanted to go I would go with him. I was going only as a favor to his friends as he had never been to any prom. Needless to say that date was doomed from the second he decided to ask me 2 weeks before I bowed to the pressure of his friends to go.

I wanted to wear a black dress with spaghetti straps, my mother wanted mint green with ruffles and lace. Who won? Not me. I was in an absolutely hideous mint green dress with ruffles and lace. I wanted my h air with loose flowing curls. What did my mother want? Lots of small curls and riglets all over and up. Who won? Not me. So there I was all dressed up in an outfit I hated. My hair was too curly and I felt like I looked horrible. I was not happy but what could I do? Mom had the money bags.

My date arrived and he had on a dark tux. I could not see the color until later at the restaurant. His tux was navy blue. Once we got to the restaurant, he said our clothes did not match. I felt very subconscious as all the dates did try to coordinate colors. I had even done that in past years with my past proms. Dinner was fine and we then arrived at the prom. We did dance a few times and we did have our pictures taken. He paid for dinner but we had agreed that we would split the cost of the pictures. I coughed up my 8 dollars for pictures.

The guys on the football team had rented a room or several rooms at the Best Western to have a party afterwards. A big group of us left to go to the hotel. I was not happy with that but I went with the group that I was with. There were 8 couples al together. I had a curfew of 12 midnight and we got to the hotel at about 10pm. We were not drinking any sort of alcohol. We had sodas and punch in the room. Soon I noticed that couples were disappearing..they had other rooms that were rented. I did not know about this. I began to get nervous as I was not going to be alone with my date in any sort of hotel room..no how no way! I was there just to do this guy a favor as he had never been to a prom. At about 11:15, 3 couples were left and I then said I needed to be home at midnight as I had a curfew. I of course had my emergency dime if I needed to call my father to get me.

He said we would go in a few minutes. Another couple left and then there were 2. I again mentioned that I needed to go home as I had a curfew. The last couple was about to leave and they were all going to other rooms. It was about 11:30pm. As they made a move to the door so did I. I went to the hall with my purse and told my date he needed to take me home immediately.

What the hell was he thinking????? I was not going to loose my virginity to him...a guy I was really repulsed by and had no interest in. And he was not going to loose his either. He actually then got mad. He said that he had rented that room for nothing and it had cost him money. I told him I knew nothing of renting these rooms in advance as to who and why they were rented. I thought the group had rented this 1 room to meet in after to be social. AND I needed to go home immediately and if he did not take me right now I would go to the lobby and call my father. He took me home and when I got the the driveway he did attempt to kiss me. I told him no..no kiss. I thanked him for dinner. He did not even walk me to the door. Just dropped me off and left. I never saw those prom pictures. I did ask him over and over for them as I had paid for 1/2 of them. He never did give me those pictures. Luckily I had taken my little kodak 110 camera with me and I did have some pictures of the night.

I never saw him again after we graduated until our 5 year high school reunion. We did not speak ...we never spoke in school. Just a hello. He was there at the reunion for 2 days of activities. Still huge and very obese. We had a picnic day at one of the local parks. The guys who were on the team and who were there were playing football...throwing it back and forth. I was sitting on the grass in a group of girls talking. We were not too very near where the guys were playing ball. We were off to the right of where they were. All of a sudden I was hit in the left shoulder blade with the football. I looked around and I did not know who threw it but I knew. Any normal man would have been saying how sorry they were and maybe say something like how rusty there arm has gotten since school. There was nothing like that so I knew my senior prom date had thrown the ball and most likely on purpose. One of the girls did yell that that was some bad throwing and it was throwing like that that caused us to loose the homecoming game in 1975. That was the end of that incident. Clearly he still had some resentment left.

We recently had our 25th year reunion. I did not make that one. I had made all of the others. I heard that my prom date did attend that one. He had never been to another since the 5 year. I heard that he is still very obese and is in very poor health, has had heart attacks and all sorts of health problems/surgeries due to his weight. He does not work consistently due to his health problems. No wife and no girlfriends in all these years either. Around this same time a cousin of mine was ill and I went to see him in the hospital. He was a year behind me in school.

He out of the blue brought up my prom date. I was very surprised. He told me that wanted to tell me something about him. He said that in school when I first told him no to the prom he became very upset then because I had told him that I was not going to attend the senior prom. My cousin was also on the football team. My date was so mad that he wanted to fight me. I was flabbergasted. I asked "fight me?" My cousin said yes..fight..because I did not want to go. My cousin said he had to jack him up and readjust his attitude for him in high school and told him that if anything happened to me something would be happening to him.

I always knew he had to have some sort of issue with all that weight. I am just so glad I had a guardian angel cousin looking out for me. That situation could have turned out much worse than it did. When you are young sometimes it is hard to resist peer pressure. Since that date I learned to always go with your instincts. If something seems wrong....something is wrong.