Crashing the Prom is a missing chapter from Feasting with a Silver Spoon. Somehow, in the process of editing, re-writing, and then publishing that story, I simply lost it. In subsequent stories I’ve made several references to that night. I re-wrote it, which was a lot of fun, and posted it in a revised version of Feasting with a Silver Spoon, Chapter 38. If you have the time, read that instead of this. It’s a pretty good chapter, overall.

It’s a pretty serious flashback. At that point in time, Jack was a freshman and Kim was a sophomore. Jack had recently started taking boxing lessons, his friendship with Vince was just beginning, and Kim’s parents were still trying to figure out just who Jack Pierce was.

Crashing the Prom takes place on a Friday night in the spring of 1981.

“How do I look?” I asked.

“Nice. What are you all dressed up for, Buddy?” Mom asked. I had on a black tux with a deep blue vest, white shirt, and black bow tie.

“Date night.”

“Uh-huh. Must be something special.”

Franklin was behind Mom and he mouthed, “She doesn’t know.”

“I’m running a little late,” I said, although it wasn’t true. “I’ll tell you about it later.”

“And you have chauffeur duties?” she asked Franklin.

“Yes, ma’am. I’ll make sure they get home safely.”

We walked out to his BMW and slid in. “You’re nuts, you know?”

“Thanks. This is going to be great. I really appreciate it.”

“It’s going to be a short evening. How are you even going to get in?”

“I have tickets.”

“Of course you do. Those are only going to get you in. Chaperones, which probably means half the teachers, the principal, coaching staff, and cafeteria lady are all going to be on the lookout for anything strange. What are you going to do when one of the teachers asks who you are?”

“I’ll think of something.”

We pulled into the driveway and I walked up to get Kim. Crap. I didn’t have a corsage. Oh, well. It wasn’t our prom, anyway. Still, it would have been nice. Kim answered the door and hollered ‘goodbye’ to her dad. Her mom was right there with her.

“I thought the prom was just for seniors and sometimes juniors. I’m not sure how ... my, don’t you look handsome. And you’re just a freshman. I smell something fishy, young lady. What’s going on.”

I held up our tickets. “Mrs. McTighe, we are going to crash Bishop England’s prom,” I said, smiling. “I loved your story about crashing weddings and I thought it would work for proms, too.”

Her eyes twinkled and she covered her smile with her hand. “Well, I hope you don’t get caught. You’re going to get caught, aren’t you?”

“Probably. Your daughter looks amazing.”

“She does. Be careful. Is Franklin going to stay, or do you plan on getting a ride from the police?”

“Mom! Don’t tell Dad, okay?”

“You can tell him yourself, tomorrow,” she said and winked.

Kim looked amazing in a dress with black accents. Her dress had large, frilly shoulders, and decorative black lace in front. Her hair was fluffed up in front and it looked great. She had black and white earrings and a pearl necklace. She looked great.

On the way to Bishop England, we brainstormed how we would answer the questions we knew we’d be asked. I thought we had some pretty good answers. They probably wouldn’t last us until midnight, though. Bishop England was larger than Porter-Gaud but it wasn’t that big. I guessed there might be a hundred kids. Franklin guessed there would be twenty chaperones. Those odds weren’t in our favor.

It wasn’t hard to figure out where the dance was. Franklin dropped us off in front and told us where he’d be parked. I escorted Kim to the door and handed our tickets to a lady who wasn’t paying much attention.

Inside, the lights were low and Steppin’ Out by Kool and the Gang was blasting. With low lights, a disco ball, and a bunch of kids dancing, we thought we would be able to go undiscovered for a while.

We danced to Wonderful Tonight by Clapton and for our first dance together. It was perfect. Then, they played Shake Your Booty by K.C. & The Sunshine Band. After dancing to Just Can’t Get Enough, by Depeche Mode, Genius of Love by Tom Tom Club, and Let’s Work, by Prince, Kim thought we should mingle. I spotted a girl by herself just as Call Me by Skyy came on. I asked her to dance. She was super shy but I gave her my most charming smile and we danced. She was way too pretty to be sitting by herself.

Never Too Much came on, and a guy tapped me on my shoulder, cutting in. Perfect. I danced with three other girls and then decided to do something really crazy. I asked one of the teachers to dance. She might have been thirty and was really pretty. She looked at one of the other teachers, smiled, and walked out to the dance floor with me as She’s a Super Lady by Luther Vandross came on.

“I don’t recognize you,” she said when the song ended.

“No?”

“No,” she said, smiling. “You don’t go here, do you?”

“Shhhh.” I said, holding a finger up to my lips.

“Behave yourself and your secret’s safe with me. Thank you for the dance.”

“My pleasure. Who should I ask?”

“Oh, you’re too much. See the lady in the light blue dress. That’s Lucy Simmons. She does not want to be here and you’d make her night if you asked her to dance.”

“Will my secret be safe with her, too?”

“Only one way to find out, Champ.”

That was fun. I asked Lucy Simmons to dance and she reluctantly joined me. We danced for three songs and she was having a great time, when Kim cut in.

“I knew it was too good to last,” Miss Simmons said, did a little curtsy, and walked back to her spot.

“I danced with the shop teacher,” Kim said. “He knows how to make things.”

“Oh, oh. I see trouble coming. I think that’s the principal coming this way.”

“Probably a good guess since everyone in the place is watching him walking toward us.” The next song came on before he got to us. We started dancing to Shake it Up by The Cars and tried to ignore him.

It didn’t work. He put a hand on each of our shoulders and turned us toward the door. I tried to keep dancing but he was a pretty big guy. When we got to the door, Kim turned and waved to everyone and they cheered. I turned to wave but he had a grip on my shoulder that wasn’t going to let that happen.

We cleared the door and started toward the parking lot. I heard Kim complain, “Ow! You’re hurting me. Let go!” I twisted loose from his grip and stepped in front of him, closer to Kim.

I had an episode of tachypsychia, where time seems to slow down. I’d had it before so it wasn’t really a surprise. Our escort was a little taller than me and probably forty-five years old. He was strong, but he had a bit of a belly. The feature that stood out to me was his angry face.

He had one of those, if-looks-could-kill, stern faces that said he meant business. He was big but I thought his hands were soft, as though he hadn’t done much manual labor. Thirty feet away, three teachers had followed us outside and were watching from the sidewalk. I knew Franklin could see what was going on and I could see that Kim wasn’t having fun.

In my mind’s eye, I could imagine throwing a jab with my left to set him up for a solid right cross to his jaw. He’d fold. I knew he would. I remembered how hard I’d hit Dillon James and I could hit a lot harder than that. He’d go down.

Man, I wanted to hit him and I wanted to hit him hard. “Let her go.”

“You’re in no position to make demands,” he said.

“Let her go, NOW! We’re leaving but you have no excuse to hurt someone. Let her go,” I said, again. I wasn’t going to say it again.

“Yeah?” He sounded juvenile. Just that one word.

“Ow. I said, you’re hurting me,” Kim complained, trying to pull free.

I tugged Kim’s arm free and took a half step back. “Go to the car, Baby. I’ll be right there.”

“What’s your name, young man?”

“What did you think you were doing?”

“You don’t get to ask the questions.”

“And you don’t get to hurt women. Is that how you treat your students? Wait until the principal finds out you’re beating up on women.”

“I am the principal! What’s your name?”

I shook my head and turned to leave. He grabbed my left shoulder and pulled hard. I turned toward him again, and his jaw made such a tempting target. Just one punch, I thought. Instead, I checked myself for the second time, pulled free, and walked away. “I don’t want to see you here again!” he hollered and I ignored him.

“What happened there, at the end?” Franklin asked as I got in beside Kim.

“Let’s just go. It was a lot of fun until that guy showed up.”

“Principal?”

“Yeah.”

“Well, it is his school.”

“Yeah. There’s that.” I was pretty pissed off and that’s not how I wanted to end the evening.

“Ice cream?” Franklin asked and my mood changed immediately.

“I really wanted to punch him but I didn’t.”

“Smart move.”

“He had it coming, Franklin. Jack was so good. It was fun while it lasted, anyway. Everyone will be wondering who we were. Oh, and when we were walking to the door, I waved at the crowd and they all cheered.”

“That’s too funny,” he said. “Worth it?”

“Definitely. Hey, when we tell the story, let’s leave out anything about their principal being a butt,” I said. I have no idea where that nugget of maturity came from. I was still pissed off.

“I think that’s wise. Ye Olde Fashioned?”

Here we were at nine o’clock, me in a tux, and Kim in a beautiful gown, sharing a banana split in a little ice cream shop. Franklin enjoyed our story and was ticked off about the principal and how he handled it.

“If he would have asked you to leave, would you have gone?”

“Of course. We knew we were going to be discovered when we went. Not knowing when was half the fun.”

“Maybe he’s always like that,” Kim said, “And they’re just used to it. Or, maybe he had a bad day. I’m just glad Mr. McClusky isn’t like that.”

We took Kim home, and Franklin waited in the car while the two of us went in to tell the story. We crowded into the sunroom and Kim told them about our plan and how it played out. When I said that I’d asked a teacher to dance, I thought Mr. McTighe was going to snort his drink out of his nose.

“Warn a fellow, would you? Sounds like you two went looking for trouble and found it. Did they take your tickets or do you still have them?”

I pulled them out of my jacket pocket and handed them over. He gave one to Mrs. McTighe. He put his reading glasses on and looked it over.

“This is an actual ticket. It’s not a fake. I don’t see anywhere on this that restricts its use to students at Bishop England. You certainly didn’t break any laws. What happened when you were discovered?”

I looked at Kim, and shrugged. We weren’t going to describe this but he’d asked a specific question. I let Kim answer. When she finished, he asked to see her arm. There was a bit of bruising but it wasn’t bad. Still, it was a bruise from where the principal had grabbed her.