Chapter 15: Chapter 15 – Save and Continue?

There was a knock on Zoey’s bedroom door but she was ignoring it. She wanted to sleep.

“Zo, come on!” Mack yelled. “You overslept your alarm. It’s Monday!”

“I just want to sleep,” Zoey groaned from under the covers. “I’m not going to school today.”

Mack opened the door and stuck her head inside so she didn’t have to yell. “Just because he’s not answering your calls doesn’t mean you get to stay home and mope.”

Zoey rolled over, trying to block out her sister’s voice.

“That's it. I’m going back to the kitchen and spitting in your orange juice.”

“Fine,” Zoey conceded, sitting up. “You wouldn’t really spit in my glass, would you?”

Mack got an evil grin. “Just get up on time and you won’t have to worry about that.”

“Nerd.” Zoey sent a stuffed animal flying towards Mack.

Mack ducked out of the room before it could hit its target, calling out, “Bimbo!”

Zoey then followed her normal routine. Well, her normal routine before having met Simone… er Lance. She had tried calling him all day Sunday, but nobody answered. Not even Lance’s dad. She left a message on their answering machine. “Hi Lance, I’m really sorry about last night. I need to talk to you. Please call me back.” 

Lance never called back.

She considered meeting Lance at his house to pick him up, but figured that was the last thing he wanted.

Zoey got out of her car and started walking to the school when she ran into Peggy. “Hey girl, what’s up?”

“I’m good,” Peggy said with a smile. “The house is cleaned up. My parents didn’t suspect a thing. How is Simone?”

Zoey sighed. “I tried calling her all day yesterday. And leaving messages. No response.”

“I’m sorry, Zo. Do you think she’s coming to school?”

“I hope so. Normally I pick her up. Where’s Dee?”

Peggy grimaced. “You don’t want to know.”

* * *

“Why do you want me to drop you off in the back of the school?” asked Lance’s dad.

“I don’t want to accidentally run into Zoey,” Lance replied.

“I get it. But you have to face her at some point. Be a man and show her-”

“Dad, please. Not now.” 

Dad nodded as Lance got out of the car. Lance’s actions tugged at his heartstrings.

Lance waited until his dad drove away before running quickly into the shed to get dressed. He had spent most of Sunday in his room crying. His dad just assumed it was from his breakup with Zoey and didn’t question it. What Dad didn't know was that a drunken Lance, impersonating Simone, was held down by a guy and forced to make out with him in front of a crowd. It was the most humiliated Lance had ever felt. And Zoey was nowhere to be found until it was over. He didn’t think he could face the school as Simone anymore. 

His plan was to walk into the main office, explain the situation, and hopefully get re-enrolled as Lance. Maybe he’d face detention for pulling an identity fraud prank. Today would be the last day he would have to be Simone. Hopefully his dad would never find out about him impersonating his sister.

As he rounded the school, he could see the normal clusters of students hanging around waiting for the first bell. As he got closer, he noticed some students were looking at him and smiling.

“Hi, Simone!” one girl shouted, giving him a big smile.

“Hi,” Lance replied, sheepishly. That was weird. He was expecting public taunting.

“OMG, Simone,” another girl gushed. “Tyler Valentine is such a dick. You’re awesome.”

“That bitch, Deanna, is going down!” another cheered.

Lance nodded and smiled and looked around. “What is going on here?” he wondered.

He quickly made his way into the school and stood outside the main office. “Here we go,” he told himself.

Just then someone came to stand beside him. It was Christopher.

“Good Morning, Simone,” he greeted her. “How’d the party go?”

Lance shook his head, remembering the night. “It was bad.”

“I’m sorry. I thought maybe with Zoey and Olivia it would’ve been a fun time for you.”

“You’d think.”

“What happened?”

Lance cringed. “Can we talk about something else please?”

“Sorry.”

Another girl passed them. “Simone, you go girl!”

“Well, you’re popular today,” Christopher chuckled. “Did you dance on a table or something?”

“No,” Lance said, looking around, bewildered. "At least, I don't remember doing that." 

“I’m voting for you Simone!” another girl called as she passed.

“Voting for me?” Lance mumbled.

“Maybe they’re talking about that.” Christopher pointed at a big poster hung up near the office that read, “Prom Court Nominations.”

Lance slowly walked towards the poster. “It couldn’t be. Could it?” he whispered.

Below the title were two columns, “Prom King”, and “Prom Queen”. The “Queen” column contained three names: “Olivia Jones, Deanna Scott, Simone Biggs.”

“Well, I suppose congratulations are in order,” Christopher said.

Lance felt his anxiety rise. He was conflicted. He wanted to be done with this charade. He was on his way to set the record straight. Could he really keep this going? But, on the other hand, somewhere deep inside him he was excited to see his name on this poster and was excited by these random students congratulating him. “Well… I mean… I haven't won. Yet.”

“But you have my vote,” he smiled. “Anyway, I need to head to homeroom. Have a good day.”

“Bye, Christopher,” Lance said, then turned back to the poster and stared at it. Maybe he’d wait until tomorrow to end this game. All around him were other students smiling at him, and offering him affirming statements. For today, though, he’d just bask in what it felt like to actually be a girl nominated for prom queen. What harm could one more day do?

* * *

Zoey and Peggy found Deanna near the cafeteria handing out pieces of candy and saying, “Vote Dee for Prom Queen”

“Dee, what the fuck?” an irate Zoey hissed at her.

Dee flashed a devilish smile. “What's the matter, Zo?”

“You’re interfering with the bet.”

“Am I?” Deanna played innocent. “I thought the bet was over. After all, Simone is no more, right?”

“You bitch. She’s not even returning my calls after that scene you caused.”

“He. Besides we never said we couldn’t run for prom queen too.”

“This is so unfair.”

“Are you salty that nobody nominated you? Stop being such a narcissist.”

“No. I don’t care about being prom queen. You’re just interfering with a fair bet.”

“You didn’t think Simone would run unopposed, did you? Oh, you did?” Deanna snickered. “Besides, I don’t know who nominated a boy for prom queen anyway.”

“I did,” Peggy spoke up.

Zoey and Deanna looked at their friend.

“Whose side are you on anyway?” Deanna chided Peggy.

“I’m on Team Simone,” Peggy replied defensively. “You both are being bitches to her.”

“You’re both hung up on him,” Deanna replied. “As if that boy could actually be prom queen.” 

“He will be prom queen,” Zoey predicted.

Dee gestured with her arm as if she was reading a theater marquee. “The boy who would be prom queen,” she taunted. “You’re both out of your minds. You know what - whatever.” Deanna edged closer to Zoey. “Maybe I’ll just sic your ex-boyfriend on your girlfriend again.” She got right in Zoey’s face and whispered seductively, “He can make her a real girl.”

“Don’t you dare!” Zoey yelled, slapping Deanna across the face.

“Hey! Calm down, both of you,” Peggy intervened, getting between the two girls and pushing them apart.

“Fuck you, Zoey!” Deanna cried, cradling her throbbing cheek. “You deserve everything that’s about to come to you. You used to be a real person who cared about other people. You-you were my best friend. But for the last four years I’ve watched you step on everyone in your path to become miss popular and fool everyone into thinking you’re a fucking goddess. Including me. Now, you don’t even know anyone’s name. Well, you’re going to lose everything, Zoey Sellers. The bet is just the beginning.” 

Zoey was angry but there was nothing she could do about it. She grunted in frustration, turned and walked down the hall.

* * *

While Lance spent the day avoiding Zoey, he couldn’t avoid people genuinely being nice to him. It was like an intoxicating drug or a comfortable blank he wanted to surround himself with forever. He was disappointed when the school day was over and he changed back into Lance to go home.

When Lance got home he went straight to his room, tossed his duffle bag aside and fell onto the bed in exhaustion.

Dad poked his head into the room. “Hey, If you’re gonna sit around and mope all afternoon, at least unpack all of the boxes in his room.”

Lance groaned and got off the bed looking at the boxes of Simone’s stuff next to his bed. He picked up each box and carried it over to Simone’s future room.

When he was done with that he looked at his own girl clothes that used to be hidden by those boxes. He quickly scooped them up and brought them to Simone’s room so Dad wouldn’t notice.

After a few minutes of staring at the pile of feminine clothes in Simone’s room, he decided to hang them up in the empty closet. 

Dad came by, saw him hanging up skirts and dresses, and commented, “You’re such a good brother. Simone is gonna be grateful for you hanging up her clothes.” 

Lance nodded, and when he was done hanging up his girl clothes, started emptying Simone’s boxes. He hung her clothes next to his own, keeping a mental tally of outfit ideas he could make from Simone’s stuff - should he decide to keep going with this prom queen scheme, that is.

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Each time he pulled out an article of clothing from Simone’s boxes, he felt that feeling from earlier again. He wanted more and more. Before he knew it, he had emptied all of Simone’s boxes.

He stood back with a smile and thought to himself that he should’ve done this weeks ago.

He then returned to his room, and got out his Game Boy. He was on a roll, he conquered level after level. He was on the verge of conquering the fourth then he died right at the end. He groaned in frustration. The prompt on the screen asked. “Save and Continue?”

“Of course,” he told himself. “I’ve come too far to quit now.”

* * *

Zoey spent the entire school day trying to meet up with Lance. During chemistry, he sat with a stranger. Zoey tried to make eye contact, but Lance never looked her way. For the rest of the day, every time she tried to catch up with him, he would elude her and disappear to his next class.

After school, she decided to meet him at home. She pulled up in front of the Biggs’ house, took a deep breath and walked to the door, knocking on it.

Lance’s dad opened the door and stood there at the threshold. He seemed a lot taller as he looked down on Zoey.

“Um, hi Mr. Biggs,” Zoey said timidly. “I came to see Lance.”

“Oh?”

“I came to apologize.”

“He doesn’t want to see you anymore. You broke that boy’s heart.”

Zoey sighed. She wondered if Lance’s dad knew what really went down Saturday. How could she apologize if she didn’t know what version of the story he knew. “I let him down. He trusted me. And I failed.”

“You also promised me you would never hurt him, Zoey.”

“I know, sir, and I need to apologize to you too. Please believe me - I never meant for any of this to happen.”

Dad paused for a long moment, filling Zoey with dread. “Well, go ahead and talk to Lance.” He stood aside to let her pass. “But remember, Lance is my son and I love him dearly. He’s very fragile and I don’t want to see him hurt any worse.”

“I understand, sir. I’ll be gentle.”

Zoey walked into the house and down the hall to Lance’s room. He was sitting on his bed with his back to the wall playing his game boy. Zoey knocked on the bedroom’s door frame.

“Go away,” Lance directed, not taking his focus off the game.

“Wow, you cleaned your room,” Zoey remarked. She invited herself inside and closed the door so Dad wouldn’t hear the conversation. “No more boxes.”

Lance didn’t respond and continued playing the Game Boy.

“You didn’t return my calls.” 

No response..

“And you wouldn’t see me at school.”

Silence.

“Mack is worried about you. You weren’t at lunch.”

More silence.

“I’m worried about you.”

Lance paused the game and put it down. “I was humiliated.” He turned around to face Zoey. “I’ve been bullied, made fun of, and ignored my entire life. But never like that.”

“I should’ve been there for you. I got scared.”

“You got scared?” Lance asked, tears welling up in his eyes. “You’ve dated people before. I haven’t. I hadn’t even kissed a girl until Olivia at the carnival. Then to have Tyler…” His voice trailed off into sobs.

“You kissed Olivia?”

“Yeah, at the carnival.” Lance closed his eyes, remembering his first kiss. Then he remembered the humiliation of Tyler’s kiss. “Don’t change the subject.”

Zoey sighed, then sat down on the bed next to Lance and hugged him. “I wish I could fix what happened with Tyler. I should’ve made the first move. Not him. Nothing I can do can change that. I should’ve stepped in earlier when I saw him on you. And I should’ve slapped Dee earlier. Lance, I’m so sorry.”

“Wait - you slapped Dee?”

Zoey nodded. “Today, before school.”

A chuckle escaped through Lance’s sobs. “Bitch.”

“I know, right.”

Zoey took Lance’s hand and started gently caressing it. She looked down and saw the nail polish was gone. “You removed your nail polish.”

“Yesterday. I don't know what to do. I, I’m not sure I can keep doing this, Zoey.”

“I’ll support you in your decision. If you want to stop, you can. If you want to keep going, I'll be in your corner. Lance, our friendship means more to me than this stupid bet. I know it’s overwhelming. If it’s too much, we can stop.”

Lance looked at Zoey and wiped his tears away. “I’m trying to be more like Simone. More like you. When you’re overwhelmed, you don’t stop. You push forward. You told me how overwhelmed you are with the whole college application thing. I don't see you quitting.”

Zoey sighed out of annoyance at the mention of her college aspirations.

“What?” Lance raised his eyebrow. “You haven’t picked a college yet?”

“Ugh,” Zoey grunted. “You too?”

“I remember you hadn’t a few weeks ago, I assumed-”

“Like I said before. I put in all of this work, but I’m not even sure why I’m doing it.”

“You don’t want to go to college?”

“I do. But, I dunno. My parents - especially my dad - have been putting me under immense pressure to get into a good business school. It’s been like that for the last four years. My entire self image is based upon what they want. All of the volunteer work I do. The yearbook, the student council. None of this stuff is what I wanted to do.”

“What do you want?” Lance placed his hand on her shoulder. “What does Zoey want?”

“I don’t know,” she let out a long sigh. “This is so hard.”

“Listen to yourself. You think you have it hard? I’ve been living in my sister’s shadow since we were kids. Hell, now I’m actually pretending to be her. I don’t know who I am anymore.”

“I don’t know who I am either.”

Lance chuckled.

She looked up at him. “What?”

“It’s crazy. We have the same problem but from different perspectives. You have the world. I have nothing. Yet, neither of us know who we truly are.”

“You have a good family. Your dad cares. I’m sure your mom and sister are the same.”

“You have a good family too. Mack is awesome. I haven’t met your parents.”

“Careful, if you meet them, my dad will try to get you to go to a business university.”

They both chucked. There was silence for a few seconds before Zoey smiled. “I want to dance.”

“You want to dance? Right now?”

“Yes. No. In general. I used to take dance classes when I was little.”

“Really? That sounds like fun. Why did you stop?”

“It was fun. It was my… passion. But there just wasn’t time once I had to start my parents’ college prep boot camp. I miss just… dancing.”

“Then you should dance.”

“You’re right. I should.”

“Zoey the dancer can teach me some new moves.”

“You had pretty good moves the other night.”

“I learned it all by watching TV.”

They both giggled.

“So, did you accept my apology?” Zoey asked.

“I guess so,” Lance teased. “Despite what happened over the weekend I had a pretty good day at school. Oh - I was curious. So, who did you get to clean the kitchen? Dad complimented me several times on how clean it looked. The JV Soccer team?”

“Who did I get?” Zoey laughed. “I did it all by myself. On my hands and knees.”

Lance laughed too. “Wait - Zoey Sellers - manual Labor?”

Zoey smiled at Lance. She looked at his smile. She missed seeing that. “Yeah, go ahead and laugh. I would get down on my hands and knees for…” Lance’s lips reminded her of how close they got at the party. How close they were to kissing. “...my girlfriend.”

Lance stopped laughing as Zoey started leaning into him. As she got closer, Lance closed his eyes.

As Zoey got closer, she noticed something was wrong. His lips didn’t have lipstick. His eyes had no mascara or eye shadow. He wasn’t wearing a wig and was dressed in his boy clothes. Zoey realized she yearned for Simone - not Lance. But he wasn’t Simone. Simone was a fictional character Lance made up. Mack and Olivia were right. Zoey had fallen for a fictional girl. She was doing it again. She was leading Lance on, making him think she was into him.

Lance sat there, eyes closed waiting for the kiss. “Um, Zoey?”

“I’m sorry, I can’t,” Zoey sobbed, pulling away, tears in her eyes.

Lance’s eyes opened and he instantly felt confused and disappointed.

“I can’t ask you to be Simone anymore. It’s not fair to you. I’m sorry.” She got up from the bed and backed away from Lance.

“Wait. What about prom queen? I kinda wanted to talk about-”

“I’ll call you later,” she promised as she ran out of his room and out of the house.

Lance sat there dumbfounded. He was on the verge of kissing Zoey, but once again, he found himself all alone wondering what went wrong.

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