Decision Time

“Just to confirm Mr. Rodgers… that’s the luxury suite and two people will be checking in?”

Mark nodded away as the female voice on the other side of the phone confirmed his purchase, “Yes that’s correct.”

“And you’ll be picking up the keys tomorrow afternoon but not checking in until a later hour?” she asked again.

“Yep. Yep that’s right.”

“Excellent. Thank you again for choosing our hotel, you can leave us with you credit card details when you pick up the keys,” she explained.

“Thank you very much.”

Mark put down the phone after the conversation and walked over to his mirror. He stared at himself, aware that he had just recently made a decision that was extremely hard to make.

It was just a prom, he kept trying to tell himself.

As true as that may be, it didn’t help him feel a whole lot better, knowing he might be letting some girls down…

***

24 hours later…

Saturday Evening, Mark was once again staring at himself in the mirror.

This time, he was dressed up neatly in his formal wear. Traditional black suit, a nice tidy black bow tie, his hair was recently cut and styled to his preference.

Thinking about the night ahead, he smiled, trying not to stress so much about something that he didn’t need to.

Behind him, Matt lightly shoved him to the side so he could see himself. The brown hair boy began to straighten up his own bow tie and opening up his mouth to look at his own teeth.

“It’s still uneven,” Mark said, walking away from the mirror to leave his roommate to fix his bow tie up again.

“God dang it,” he exclaimed, just making it worse.

Mark began to pace around the room as he checked the time on his phone. He did a mental checklist, looking at his own body and checking his pockets. Phone, Wallet, Suit, Bow tie, belt, nice dress shoes… everything was sorted.

He pulled out one last important item from his right pocket, keys to the hotel room he had booked out in secret for himself and his date for the night.

“You meeting your date here first or what?” Matt then asked him.

Mark put the keys back in his pocket before looking up to answer, “She’ll meet me out in the common room in about five minutes… so in saying that, Cassidy better be ready soon otherwise I’m going to down there.”

“Who knows, she’s a chick, been getting ready for the last four bloody hours it feels like,” Matt replied, taking a seat on an empty desk chair.

Almost less than a minute after saying that, there was a polite knock on the door before it opened slightly, Cassidy’s head poking out from the side. Just seeing her face was enough to make Mark’s heart jump a little, her long brown hair curled, a fresh set of make up that looked like it had been done professionally, her pearly whites flashing them as she looked in, “You boys ready?”

They both looked at each other and then back at Cassidy before nodding.

The stunner then let the door swing all the way open, allowing the two boys to see the beautifully eloquent dark green formal dress. It was long, going all the way down her legs but showed a great deal of skin of one leg where the dress was split.

She looked divine.

Mark was about to tell her how beautiful she looked but he couldn’t steal the thunder from her actual boyfriend. It took Matt a few seconds to compose himself before he complimented her, “Wow, you look… amazing.”

Standing next to him, he nodded with a smile on his face too, super impressed by the way Cassidy was dolled up.

She pushed a strand of hair behind her ear, hiding her smirk, “Come on. Let’s go downstairs, we don’t want to keep Mark’s date waiting.”

Matt was quick to follow her move as Mark moved in behind, checking himself out in the mirror one last time to see if everything looked okay.

They then all walked down to the common room in East Hall, the trio together waiting for Mark’s date. Around them, there were a few people in suits and dresses, making their way out the front doors, en route to the prom.

Standing there with a couple, Mark started to get a bit fidgety. Minute after minute had passed and they were still standing in the middle of the common room.

“She wouldn’t have ditched me, would she?” Mark turned around to face Matt and Cassidy.

“Please,” Cassidy stopped him, “Stop being so paranoid, we’ve only been standing here for five minutes.”

“Sorry… I’m just nervous,” he repeated, “I don’t know why, it’s just a prom, just a college prom.”

He started to realise that he had lost the attention of both Matt and Cassidy who were smiling, looking behind him. It quickly sunk it that his date was at the top of the staircase behind him.

Mark turned around to see… his heart almost leapt out of his chest as his eyes widened…