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Victor huffed, trying and failing to button up his shirt. He flopped backwards onto his bed, his shirt halfway buttoned and hair a mess. He rolled onto his side, checking his phone to see if there were any messages from Henry or Justine. Fortunately, there weren't any. If they had texted him, it probably meant they were ready for the dance. Alphonse had agreed to pick up all their friends so they could all go together and not have to look around a dark gym for thirty minutes, struggling to find each other. He was grateful that his dad was being so nice, but he also wasn't a fan of riding in cramped cars but then again, who is?
Honestly, Victor wasn't a fan of a lot of things, including school dances. He had never gone to one before, they were always to bright and too loud for him. He assumed this one was going to be similar but it was the Valentine's Day dance and Henry asked and he couldn't just say no. If it was another other person, he probably would have declined. But this was Henry, and Henry had been his best friend since he could remember and Victor just might have had a crush on him since sixth grade. But Victor didn't talk about that.
Victor stood up once more, fiddling with the buttons of his shirt. He, once again, failed and decided to ask Elizabeth for help. He quickly re-adjusted his binder and headed down the hallway to Elizabeth's room and knocked on the door.
"One minute!" his cousins familiar voice called from deep inside her room. Sooner or later, Elizabeth popped her head around the corner of the door.
"What do you want?" she asked, a slightly annoyed tone covering her usually cheerful one.
"I can't get this shirt buttoned," Victor huffed. Elizabeth bit her lip and then quickly ushered him into her room. Victor noticed she was already ready for the dance, wearing a short sleeved purple dress. She started messing with the buttons and tried to create small talk, which Victor also wasn't a fan of.
"You excited for the dance?" she asked, securing the last button on his shirt in place.
"I guess," Victor replied, tucking his shirt into his Wal-Mart skinny jeans. He walked over to Elizabeth's dirty mirror, and made sure his raccontails were still clipped on nicely. When he stepped back Elizabeth was giving him the death glare, so he quickly excited.
Re-entering his room, he checked his phone again. There were two texts from Henry, saying he was ready. He quickly texted him back, saying he'd tell his dad. That being said, he texted his dad telling him Henry was ready. Soon, Elizabeth and him were sitting in the back of their dad's van. Just as they reached Henry's house, Elizabeth got a text from Justine saying she was ready, and Victor texted Henry that they were there. Henry bolted out of his house, wearing a white button up similar to Victor's purple one. He hopped into the car next to Victor and the group joked around until they reached Justine's.
Justine walked toward the car, sitting in the front seat. She was wearing a dress fairly similar to Elizabeth's except it was blue with some of kind of flower print on it. Victor couldn't really tell the difference. Justine plugged her phone into aux cord and started blasting some kind of 90s boyband. Victor groaned and Henry offered him an earbud. While Elizabeth sang along loudly to Justine's horrible music taste, Henry and Victor listened to My Chemical Romance in the back seat.
Before long, Alphonse was dropping off the group of thirteen year olds at their middle school. They all hopped out the car and quickly made their way to the gym, conversation full of useless topics and nervous laughter. Not that Victor was nervous about possibly having to dance with Henry or anything.
The group approached the gym, and Victor took a deep breath. He could do this. He'd be fine. He's going to ignore the fact that he's shaking.
The moment Victor stepped into the room, it was too much. The music was drowning out all other sound and the flashing lights were torture to this eyes. Victor shook his head and forced a smile. Henry led the rest of them to the back of the gym, where the music was quieter and there was a lot less sweaty pre-teens.
Everything was going great, at least for a while. Victor and Henry were dancing to some cheesy 2000s pop music and then something happened.
The music just became too loud, the lights were too bright, his binder was too tight, and the nervousness of making a fool of himself in front of Henry became a lot stronger. His head was swimming and his legs were shaking violently. He knew Henry was saying something, but he couldn't understand what is was.
The next thing he knew, he was sitting outside on the concrete with a Mountain Dew in his hand.
"You feeling better?" a voice asked. It took him a minute, but he looked around and realized that it was Henry. Victor nodded, unable to speak. He took another sip of the Mountain Dew and looked up at the night sky. Honestly, he loved stargazing more than he could admit. There was something so fascinating about ancient astronomers seeing such odd shapes in the sky.
Time passed like this, Victor looking for familiar constellations and Henry asking him if he was okay or not. Victor didn't understand why he was so worried. It's not like he almost died or anything. It was merely a small anxiety attack. Or maybe overstimulation? Honestly, Victor couldn't tell the difference half the time.
"Henry, who do you care so much?" he asked after Henry fussed over him once more, worrying if he was okay. Victor swore he heard Henry laugh at his question.
"I'm your friend, of course I care about you! Besides, you're my date to the dance, I couldn't let you pass out or die or something," Henry replied, mumbling the last bit of his sentence. Victor blushed at the fact Henry called him his date. But only a tiny bit. Instead, he was going to address the fact that Henry thought he was going to die.
"You really thought I was about to die?" the shorter boy asked.
"Well yeah! Elizabeth was freaking out too, but being the amazing friend I am, I offered to take care of you so she could hang out with Justine. And uh, are you gonna finish that?" he asked, pointing to Victor's Mountain Dew.
"Sure, I'm not that big of a fan anyways," Victor replied, throwing the half-empty bottle towards Henry.
"How could you not like Mountain Dew? You're a monster," he replied, his voice a mix of laughter, astonishment, and fake anger.
"See, that's what I prefer," Victor said, quickly stealing a glance at his friends face. One thing Victor was a fan of is the way Henry's face lights up whenever he makes a horrible joke.
"Those energy drinks? You really are disgusting," Henry joked, taking a sip of Mountain Dew in between sentences.
"No, that'd be you, with your Mountain Dew and face buried in those dumb plays," he replied.
"Oh Shakespeare isn't dumb you fool!" Henry said, giving Victor a small push. Victor stuck out his tongue in return, and Henry gasped and fell against the pavement as if he'd been wounded. Neither of the boys could stop laughing, but we rudely interrupted by Victor's cousin.
"You two are acting like little kids! Though, I didn't expect much more of you," she said, sitting down between the two of them.
"Where's Justine?" Henry asked.
"Oh, she had to go home. I'm afraid she ate too much pizza," Elizabeth replied while laughing at something someone had texted her. The someone was probably Justine.
"That does not sound fun," Victor said, peering over Elizabeth's shoulder to see what she was talking about.
"Victor will you stop that? You're so annoying!" she said, flicking his forehead.
"Bully," Victor muttered, his gaze turning to the concrete and pavement below him.
"Anyways, I'll ask what I came out here for. Are you feeling any better?" she asked, tucking her phone away into her purse and standing up, dusting whatever had gotten onto her dress.
"Well if you couldn't tell by my horrid laughing, I'm doing pretty good," he replied. Elizabeth nodded and turned to leave, probably to back to the gym and dance with her other friends. Henry and Victor sat in what was an uncomfortable silence for quite some time. There was no real reason for the silence to be uncomfortable, but they were two middle school boys with varying levels of awkwardness who both had fallen head over heels for their best friend. After a while of checking their phones and stealing small glances at each other, Henry finally decided to say something.
"I don't think your laugh is horrid," he said, but he wasn't very sure if he was helping.
After another short period of silence Victor asked, "Would you like to spend the night?"
"I'd love to," Henry replied. Victor smiled, and started texting his dad, telling him that there'd be another mouth to feed in the morning.