Chapter 5 - Not Your Good Deed
For several seconds, the only sound inside the limousine was the quiet hum of the road beneath us.
The photograph showed Noah offering me his arm beneath the porch light. From a distance, it looked gentle and ordinary.
The caption turned it into something else.
CHRISTINA TAYLOR’S CHARITY PROM DATE—WAIT UNTIL YOU SEE WHAT SHE’S PLANNING ONSTAGE.
“I’m not planning anything onstage,” I said.
Noah read the caption again.
“Maybe they are.”
“Who posted it?”
The account belonged to PromTruth2026, created that afternoon. It had no profile photograph and only three posts. The newest claimed I planned to have Noah crowned honorary prom king as part of a “senior kindness project.”
My stomach twisted.
“It’s a lie.”
“I know.”
“I never called this charity.”
“I know.”
“I would never use you for attention.”
Noah locked his phone.
“I know, Christina.”
But his voice had changed.
The wound was not that he believed the post. The wound was that other people might.
I called our friend Maya.
She answered immediately.
“Please tell me you’re still coming.”
“Do you know who made that account?”
“No, but everyone has seen it. Jake Collins shared the post in the senior group.”
Jake was the same boy who laughed at one of my paintings during sophomore year. He had spent most of high school treating cruelty like a form of entertainment.
“What is the onstage plan?”
“There isn’t one. The prom committee arranged a video montage of childhood photographs. Someone added the picture of you and Noah from first grade.”
The image Mom kept on our refrigerator showed Noah holding a purple dinosaur while I hugged him from the side.
Someone must have taken it from my public art account, where I posted it months earlier for Noah’s birthday.
“They’re going to use it to make us look like a joke.”
“I already told Ms. Alvarez,” Maya said. “She’s trying to remove it.”
I looked at Noah.
“We can turn around.”
“No.”
“We could go somewhere else. Dinner, the museum, anywhere.”
“No.”
His answer was sharper this time.
“I bought this bow tie in November.”
Despite my fear, I smiled.
“I remember.”
“I practiced dancing.”
“I know.”
“I passed the school’s stupid review.”
My smile disappeared.
“And I promised you.”
He reached across the seat and held out his pinkie.
This time, I hooked mine around his immediately.
“Prom,” I said.
“Prom.”
When we arrived at the hotel ballroom, camera flashes filled the entrance.
Not professional cameras—phones.
Students stood near the doors pretending to photograph one another while aiming their screens at us. Whispers traveled through the crowd.
Noah’s hand tightened around mine.
“Do you want to leave?” I asked.
“No. Do you?”
“No.”
“Then stop asking.”
Fair enough.
We entered together.
The ballroom ceiling glittered with suspended lights. Silver stars hung over the dance floor. Round tables surrounded a raised stage, and the band played beside a backdrop reading ONE NIGHT AMONG THE STARS.
For half an hour, things were almost normal.
We found Maya and our friends. We posed for photographs. Noah drank three cups of punch and delivered an unnecessarily detailed critique of the playlist.
Then Jake approached.
He wore a white dinner jacket and the smile of someone expecting an audience.
“Hey, Christina. Nice campaign.”
“What campaign?”
He gestured toward Noah. “You know. The whole inspirational prom thing.”
Noah answered before I could.
“I’m not inspirational. I complain too much.”
Several students laughed—not at him, but with him.
Jake’s smile weakened.
“I just think it’s cool. You taking him and everything.”
“Taking me where?” Noah asked.
“To prom.”
“We arrived together. She didn’t carry me.”
More laughter.
Jake looked at me.
“You know what I mean.”
“Yes,” I said. “That’s why it’s offensive.”
His face hardened.
“Relax. Everyone thinks it’s sweet.”
“I don’t care what everyone thinks.”
“That’s funny, considering all the pictures.”
“You’re the one sharing them.”
For a moment, guilt flashed across his face.
That was enough.
“You made the account,” I said.
“I didn’t say that.”
“You didn’t have to.”
Noah stepped between us.
“Delete it.”
Jake shrugged. “It’s already everywhere.”
“Delete it anyway.”
“What are you going to do if I don’t?”
Noah looked him directly in the eyes.
“I will tell Principal Harris you used my picture without permission and lied about me. Then my mother will call the advocate who helped with my ticket. She likes paperwork.”
Jake glanced around. The audience he had hoped to impress was no longer smiling.
He pulled out his phone.
“Fine.”
“Show me.”
Jake deleted the post.
“You happy now?”
“No,” Noah said. “But you can go.”
Jake left.
I stared at Noah.
“That was incredible.”
“I practiced that too.”
“With whom?”
“Lillian.”
Of course he had.
The music softened, and couples began moving toward the dance floor.
Noah held out his hand.
“This one is slow.”
“I noticed.”
“I step on fewer feet during slow songs.”
“Reassuring.”
We walked beneath the hanging stars.
His hand rested carefully at my waist. Mine settled on his shoulder. For the first few measures, he counted under his breath.
“One, two, three, four.”
“You’re doing fine.”
“I know. Stop distracting me.”
I laughed and rested my head near his shoulder.
Around us, phones lowered.
Perhaps people finally became bored. Perhaps they realized nothing extraordinary was happening.
We were just two eighteen-year-olds at prom.
Noah stumbled once.
I stepped on him twice.
Neither of us cared.
When the song ended, applause rose near the stage.
Principal Harris walked to the microphone.
My body tensed.
“The senior committee has prepared a short video celebrating friendships that shaped this graduating class.”
The screen behind him illuminated.
Childhood photographs appeared: teammates in Little League uniforms, friends wearing braces, students on field trips.
Then the photograph of six-year-old Noah and me filled the screen.
A soft “aw” moved through the room.
Noah went rigid.
The next image showed us that evening, taken outside my house.
Across the bottom, someone had added the words:
A PROMISE KEPT FOR TWELVE YEARS.
The room applauded.
I turned to Noah, expecting him to smile.
He didn’t.
He released my hand and walked out of the ballroom.
I followed him into the quiet hotel corridor.
“Noah.”
He stopped beside a window overlooking the city.
“What happened?”
“They did it again.”
“Did what?”
“Made me a story.”
I stood silently.
“They didn’t ask me about the video,” he said. “Everyone clapped because you kept a promise to me. They think you’re good.”
“You are my best friend.”
“I know.”
“I didn’t ask them to show those pictures.”
“I know.”
“Then why are you angry with me?”
He turned around.
“Because you keep talking about what you didn’t do.”
The words hurt because they were true.
I had spent the entire evening defending my intentions.
I hadn’t asked what he wanted.
“What do you need?” I said.
“I need people to stop treating my life like it exists to teach them something.”
“I understand.”
“No, you don’t.”
He was right again.
“I’m trying to.”
He looked through the glass.
“I wanted to go to prom with you because I like you.”
“I like you too.”
“No. I like you.”
The difference settled between us.
My heartbeat changed.
Noah continued before I could answer.
“Not because of first grade. Not because of a promise. I wanted this to be a real date.”
I thought about every moment we had shared, every joke, every silence, every time his presence had felt more like home than friendship alone.
“Why didn’t you tell me?”
“Because everyone already thinks I don’t understand feelings. If you said no, they would say I was confused.”
“I wouldn’t say that.”
“They would.”
He looked back toward the ballroom.
“And if you said yes, people would call you kind.”
I stepped closer.
“What do you want me to call it?”
“The truth.”
“And what’s the truth?”
May you like
“I love you,” Noah said. “But I don’t want to be your promise if I can’t be your choice.”
Then he walked toward the hotel exit, leaving me beneath the cold corridor lights with the most important question of my life unanswered.
