The Night Is Alive [one shot].

One moment, I'm standing at the punch table at my junior prom, watching the people dance around me and the next, I'm on the floor with punch spilled all over me. I really don't know how this happened. All I remember is being hit with something kind of black and fluffy and then I'm on the floor, with the red, sticky and spiked beverage all over me. Then I feel my hand being grabbed and I'm being jerked up, up until I'm on my feet and out of the prom and outside. It's May, in Maine, which is warm, but I'm wearing a dress and heels, and I'm still soaked and disoriented. The hand that is holding onto my wrist belong's to a male, it's big and bony, like a male's. The rest of the body is male, but I can't see much of him besides the back of his tall body as he's running with me through the parking lot. He stops at a beat up red car and goes to the driver's side, only to pause once, for a milisecond to turn to me and shout, "Are you getting in, or what?!"

And so for no reason, I get in. The second I'm in the car, the guy, whoever he is, speeds like a maniac out of the parking lot and down the long road that is parallel to the beach that the hotel that our prom is in is next to. I'm sticky and still wet and I smell like a combination of fruit punch and alcohol, probably cheap whiskey. I look at the guy sitting next to me, driving and I wait for him to say something, a reason that he just pulled me out of my junior prom, moments after I got...'punched'. He says nothing, so I, feeling like an asshole, ask, "Um, what just happened?"

The guy turns to me and smiles. "Sorry about that, seriously. I'm not from your school, you probably can see that, I came with Tony Lewiston and I got sort of into a fight with this guy he hates, I forget why and it was about to get physical and his girlfriend like threw her purse at me, only it didn't hit me, it hit you and then you fell and spilled the punch all over yourself and then you-" he says but I cut him off.

"Yeah, I think I know what happened to me. Why did you take me with you?" I ask and the guy sighs, annoyed, and squeezes his steering wheel.

"Well if you would have let me talk, I would have told you that I was afraid that you'd somehow get involved in the fight and so I decided to take you with me. I really just didn't want to get in a fight. At least not tonight." he tells me and I decide to finally take a good look at him. His black dress pants are tight on him and his white button down shirt is fitted and his brown hair is sweepy and I finally realize that he is one of those guys and I frown.

"You do know you just like, ruined my junior prom." I tell him and the guy grimaces.

"Yeah, sorry. Are you are hungry? I'll get you IHOP or something, to make up for it." he replies and I sigh and lean back into the seat and finally realize that I still have my small purse/bag/thing around my shoulder and I'm really glad. Because it has my wallet, cell phone and ipod in it, the three things I never go anywhere without. I'm glad I decided to keep it with me tonight, not taking any chances by leaving it in my friend Krista's car.

"Sure." I answer and the guy smiles. "I'm Billie, by the way." I tell him and the guy nods.

"Graham." he says to me and I smile. "Billie." he murmurs, trying out my name. "Biiiiiiillieeeeee." he dictates, elongating the 'i''s and the 'e''s. I watch him, in equal parts amusement and absurdity. "Kinda weird name for a girl." he says and I nod.

"Named after Billie Holiday." I reply and the boy, now known as Graham, nods with appreciation or understanding or something like that. I sigh and look out the window as he drives to IHOP. There isn't any music playing, which is difficult for me, because I pretty much live my life in music. "This is really weird." I finally say and Graham doesn't reply.

"I'm so fucking starving." he says instead and I look at him, thinking that this must be the weirdest guy I've ever met, in my life. But then again, he is one of those guys. "I go to private catholic school, which is why you've never heard of me before now. Let me tell you, private school sucks. But like, private catholic school just like, blows. Okay so one day. I'm in confession, I'm so bored, seriously, I'm going to die because I really have nothing to confess besides the fact that I accidentally broke a string on my brother's bass, so what I decide to do is I decide to tell the preist that I'm in love with my older male neighbor. And I tell him all about our non-existant sexual excursions. And I can just hear him in there, squirming, pretty much. And he says to me, 'Mr. Scram, you're going to need to pray a lot tonight. My child, just hope that one day that Jesus can forgive you for the sins you have committed.' It was the funniest fucking thing, ever." Graham says to me and I burst out laughing. "Funny story, right?" he says and I continue to laugh.

"Your name is...your name is...Graham Scram?" I ask, totally getting a kick out of this. Graham's eyes roll.

"Come on. Seriously. In that entire story, the only thing you could find to comment on was about the fact that my name rhymes?" he asks me and I shrug, calming down a little bit.

"Sorry. Really. Sorry. But come on. You can't include your last name and expect me to not say something. But for the record, that was a good story. The only thing I'm wondering is why you're going to catholic school if you hate it?" I ask and Graham shrugs.

"It's a guaranteed spot in heaven." he says and I laugh a little.

"With a mouth like yours, if you get into heaven, it'll be luck." I reply and Graham shakes his head.

"No way, jose, I'm one-hundred percent sure I have a spot in the angels' choir. They're waiting for me. I just know it." he jokes, and I can tell he's joking by the smirk that is bending his mouth to the side, and giving his cheek a tiny little dimple. "What about you. I'm guessing you actually go to the highschool." he tells me and I nod.

"Yep." I say blankly, unsure of what else to tell him.

"So...here's something I was kind of wondering when I dragged you away. I noticed that you were all by yourself at the punch table. I'm kind of wondering why. I mean, you don't look like a freaky loner type, and most of the freaky loners don't go to prom anyway, so I'm guessing you're not a freaky loner." he asks and I consider this question, with sort of a heavy heart. I don't know if I should tell him why I was standing alone, I'm not sure if I want to delve into that. I sigh a little bit. "Seriously, you can tell me, it's cool." he says and I swing my head from side to side, considering my options and open the window of his car as he drives down the already pretty empty road. Maine, as a rule, goes to sleep early. It's only 12:07am and there's hardly anyone on the road. The outside is clean and fresh and I take a sniff of the air before turning to Graham.

"My boyfriend of six months and I broke up a week ago. I wasn't too worried about him going to prom, because he's a sophomore. Anyway, I saw him dancing with this girl and I sort of got bummed out. So I was standing there, just trying to decide if I wanted to leave or not." I admit and Graham laughs.

"So, I didn't exactly ruin your junior prom. So I don't really have much of a reason to take you to IHOP anymore, do I?" he asks and I grin deliberatley.

"Because of you, I now smell like punch and whiskey and my friends probably have no idea what just happened to me. So no, you still owe me IHOP." I reply and Graham grins back at me, only he's looking at the road. We come again parallel to the beach and the strong smell of seaweed and salt comes into my nose and I open the window more and put my head out, with a complacent smile on my face.

"You're funny." Graham tells me and I turn back to him.

"Do you mind if I put on some music?" I ask, pulling out my iPod from my purse. Graham shakes his head no and picks up the small wire that runs from a tape in his tape player. I plug it into my ipod, where the headphones go and turn up his volume a little bit before picking a song. I decide on Diamonds On The Soles Of Her Shoes by Paul Simon. Graham laughs and sings along. "You like this song?" I asked and Graham nods.

"I like everything." he says and I smile. People say she's crazy she got diamonds on the soles of her shoes...well that's one way to lose these walking blues, diamonds on the soles of her shoes..., sings Paul Simon, Graham Scram and Billie Winters. For an instant I'm glad I left the prom for this, and then I realize how weird I am all of a sudden. This really isn't me at all. "Great. We're almost there. I'm starving. Seriously. Oh god, I'm so pumped for stuffed french toast." he says and I laugh.

"That's gross." I say and he shrugs and pulls into the empty parking lot for IHOP. He parks haphazardly, and sort of at an angle. "Wow, good parking job." I say sarcastically and Graham scrunches up his nose, obviously annoyed by my sarcasm.

"There's no one else here. Like it seriously matters." he tells me and gets out of the car. I get out as well, my legs sticking together from the punch. I look down at my arms in the parking lot lights and realize that they're stained with the red liquid and so is my light hair. I pick up a piece of hair and put it to my nose. It's smells like rancid apple juice. Yuck. Graham looks at my disgusting figure in the parking lot light and chuckles. "Oh my god, I'm seriously so sorry for that. You look awful." he tells me and purse my lips and look at him.

"You owe me like, 180 dollars worth of food." I tell him and he flashes me a confused look as we go inside the brightly lit building. It's clean and hygenic in here and I wouldn't be surprised if they threw me out. But there's no one in here, so they're probably just excited to get any business at all.

"Why 180?" he asks and I pick up the hem of my black dress. It's flowy and falls right above my knees.

"Because this dress was 180 dollars." I reply and Graham rolls his eyes.

"No way. I owe you like, 10 dollars worth of food. For the dry-cleaning bill." he tells me and I roll my eyes.

"You can repay me the 170 dollars in any other service you'd like to give me." I say and he's about to reply, when the hostess comes up with a perky smile.

"Two of you?" she asks and I nod and smile and she picks up two plastic, greasy menus from the counter and we follow her to a booth in the restaraunt.

"Where to sit." jokes Graham and I laugh, but the hostess only gives us a dirty look. As if she expected people wanting IHOP at this hour. As if she's offended that nobody is here and Graham is making it a kind of light situation. We say nothing to her after that and she puts our menus on the equally greasy table and we sit down in the just-as-greasy booths and I can feel myself stick to the plastic seats. I know I'm making a face because Graham is smiling at me and I'm rolling my eyes and picking up the menu. "I was going to ask you what kind of service you'd like. You know, the other 170 dollars worth." he says with a smile and I know he's thinking something dirty so I just roll my eyes and open my menu.

"I'm going to make it exactly 10 dollars. Get ready to spend that on me. Because I'm getting my ten bucks worth here. Don't you dare think any differently." I say.

"I wouldn't have it any other way." Graham says and I peek over the menu and his eyes are twinkling and merry and I feel my mouth turn into a smile because Graham is really cute. For one of those guys, anyway. "So what was your ex-boyfriend like?" he asks and I put down my menu, considering this question.

"A stoner, first of all." I say and Graham nods. "I mean, it's not like that makes him a bad person, but I always felt uncomfortable when he was doing it..." I add, trying not to alienate Graham, if he is, in fact, also a stoner. Graham just nods again. "I don't know, really. We were together for a long time, but I'm not really sure why because we never really liked each other all that much. Or at least, I mean, he didn't like me all that much." I tell him and Graham laughs.

"He had to like you at least a little bit if you dated for six months. Trust me, a guy is not going to waste six months of his life on a girl he doesn't like." he informs me and I watch him carefully as his eyes travel down the menu. "What was his name?" he asks suddenly, looking up to me. Our eyes me and I look down at the menu, instantly feeling awkwardly embarrassed.

"Zack Tyler." I tell him and Graham laughs.

"That's really funny because that's the guy I was getting into a fight with." he tells me and I stare at Graham for a few moments. So. Zack's new girl, Veronica Smith, I know her, she's in my grade, threw her purse at me. Well, apparently at Graham, but still, it hit me. I got hit with Zack's new girl's purse. I start to laugh and lean down on the dirty table and close my eyes, thinking about how unfair life really is. Not only did Zack dump me, unceremoniously, at that, but he got with Veronica Smith, they danced dirty at the prom, and she hit me with her purse and I fell and got punch spilled over me and now I'm at IHOP with the guy who was about to get into a fight with Zack and he's buying me a dry-cleaning's bill worth of food, even though I'm sure this will probably cost more than 10 dollars to clean.

"It sure is a small world." I say sarcastically, with my cheek on the table.

"Do you have any idea where that table's been?" asks Graham and I lean up.

"Of course I do. It's been here." I answer and Graham shrugs.

"Hey, it's not all that bad." he says and I feel my stomach clenching.

"Not all that bad?I was in love with Zack Tyler and then he dumps me and then I got hit with his new girlfriend's purse and now I have punch all over me and I'm red, sticky and I smell like an alcoholic. Please inform me how it is not all that bad." I say, annoyed. I wish I could just be home right now, in my bed.

"You're with me?" Graham says and I sigh and lean back into the booth.

"Yep. I'm eating breakfast at midnight with Paul Simon himself." I say ironically and our waitress comes over. Graham orders raspberry stuffed french toast and, because I never even really looked at the menu, I order that too.

"It's only like seven dollars." Graham tells me and I shrug.

"Whatever. No big." I tell him and Graham sighs.

"Listen, if it's any consolation, Zack Tyler is an asshole. I know I'm saying that maybe because I've got nothing else to say and because I tried to beat him up at your junior prom, but this is coming from a catholic school boy. All my life I've been taught what Jesus thinks is right and what Jesus thinks is wrong and being an asshole is definitely wrong on Jesus's list. Maybe that's vague, but still. He was crazy for dumping you. Just look at you. Who could deny that with all that punch on you, you're beautiful." Graham tells me and I laugh, because I know the last part he is joking, but he still makes me feel better about the situation. "And while everyone else at your prom is out, maybe even at their after parties, getting drunk and fucked up and everything else, we're here, at IHOP, all by our twosies and it's really amazing because I just wouldn't have it any other way." he explains and I smile.

"Thanks." is all I say and Graham smiles back at me a little faintly and our food comes out. I would be surprised that it came so fast if I didn't know that most everything here is like, CYSCO food that was pre-frozen and all they did was throw it in the microwave and out here it comes and we've got our little toasted hashbrowns with it and everything. We eat in relative silence and I have to admit, right now I am glad that Graham Scram ruined my junior prom.

My phone rings just as I'm about to throw the towel in on my seven-dollar-fucking-crap-raspberry-stuffed french toast. My ring tone is Willie Nelson's Songbird and I know it's Krista calling me, because she put that ring tone as hers. I answer the phone with a sigh-filled, "Hey."

"Where are you?!" she shouts over the music.

"At IHOP." I reply.

"What?" she shouts again.

"IHOP." I say a little bit louder.

"WHAT?!" she screams and I sigh. "I'M GOING OUTSIDE. GIVE ME A SECOND." she says and I can hear her breathing and imagine her weaving around people as she gets outside. "Sorry about that. Where are you?" she asks in a normal voice as soon as she's outside.

"I'm at IHOP." I repeat.

"Why? Who are you with?" she questions.

"It's a long story. I'm with Graham Scram." I tell her and I hear her gasp on the other side of the phone.

"The friend of Tony's who almost got into a fight with Zack Tyler?" she asks and I sigh.

"The one and only." I reply and she laughs.

"You are we-ird." she tells me and I physically shrug, even though I know she can't see me.

"Tell me about it." I say. "Well, I'm going to get back to him now, okay? So don't worry about me. I didn't even leave my stuff in your car, so don't worry about that, either." I explain to her and I hear her 'mmhmm'. "All right so, seeya." I say.

"Use protection." she says.

"Ew." I reply and hear her laugh and click off. I hang up too and put the phone back into my purse and look back at Graham, who is smirking. "You totally heard that entire conversation." I say and he shrugs.

"Would you like me to pretend I didn't?" he asks and I nod.

"Please." I say and he laughs and gets out his wallet from his tight black pants. He flips his head back, flicking his hair out of his face and I'm once again reminded of how he is one of those guys. He is one of those Zack Tyler guys. With all their skateboarding, mosh-pitting, screamo glory, and I'm sure he's got the bruises to prove...whatever it is he wants to prove. His toughness, his manliness? Whatever. It's not like I'm about to marry the guy. He just bought me shitty french toast at IHOP and now, who knows. The waitress has already brought out the check, even though it's not like we have to hurry out, there's no one else here.

Graham also pulls out his cell phone from his pocket, after he's done paying the bill. He opens it and holds it up, as if he's trying to get a connection. He presses a button and I hear a fake shutter sound, like the sound a real camera would make if it were taking a picture. "There. Now I have a picture of you for my phone." he says and I balk.

"Wait a minute. So when I thought you were getting a signal, you were actually taking a picture of me? Oh jesus, what does that look like?" I ask and Graham shows me the picture but doesn't let me take the phone, he probably knows I'll delete the picture if he lets me take the phone. The picture of me is awful, my hair is pink and wet and my eyes are heavily with eyeliner that Krista did before we went to prom and I realize I could possibly be pretty if I didn't look so gross. I almost want to laugh, and I would if this were anyone but me, but it's not. It is me. So I just frown and let Graham giggle and put the phone back in his pocket. He slides out of the booth easily and I attempt, but I'm stuck to the seat. "Oh god." I say quietly and Graham's giggle trails off into a laugh as I unstick myself from the booth.

"You're great. Seriously, you're so funny." he says and I glare at him.

"Yeah, yeah, I'd be laughing at you too if you were drenched with whiskey-spiked punch." I say and Graham's laughter dies, but he still grins.

"It was vodka. Tony put it in the punch." he informs me and I nod with a fake smile on my face.

"Glad to know." I tell him and he shrugs.

"Thought you might." he explains and we leave IHOP. We pass by the hostess and just as we're about to leave, Graham turns back to her and waves. "Hope you get more customers! You probably won't, but I hope you do!" he says and giggling, we run out of IHOP. In the bright flourescent lamp light, Graham's parking job looks even worse. On the sidewalk, our giggles evolve into shrieks as we collapse against each other.

"What a bad parking job." I laugh and Graham nods.

"I know! It's terrible." he says, putting and arm around my shoulders. He then pulls back and with another laugh, says, "Wow, you are sticky!" and I laugh too, going to his car.

"It's disgusting." I agree and he unlocks the car. He locked it, obviously, because you can't trust anyone who goes to an IHOP at midnight, even if it's just no one. We get in and sigh through our laughs and Graham, still laughing a little, presses the play button on my iPod. Elevator Love Letter by Stars starts up and we leave the parking lot of IHOP as he drives to who-knows where. "Where are we going?" I ask. I'm so hard for a rich girl, my heels are high, my eyes cast low. And I don't know how to love...I get tired after midday, lately... sings the girl from Stars and it's suddenly much calmer than it was only a few seconds ago.

"Swimming." he tells me and I, with confused eyes, study his face.

"Why?" I question.

"Cause you're disgusting. So we're going to the beach." he says.

"Um. Brr. No thank you." I answer and Graham only smiles and takes a left, turning onto one of the side roads. The road is paved, but soon is sandy. Graham stops when it gets too sandy and we can see the water, the cold, dark water in front of us. The outside is warm, like I said, May in Maine usually is, but the water is always freezing. It's still cold in August, even when the air is thirty degrees warmer. Graham stops the car and exits and takes off his shoes and socks before running down to the water's edge. I have no choice but to get out of the car and out of my black pumps and run down with him, totally unsure why I'm doing this, but for once in my life, feeling like I'm doing something unexpected and exciting. I know that I'm smiling when I see Graham with water up to his calfs. He hasn't even rolled up his pants, the water is soaking his pants. I follow him and the water is like ice against my legs. "Oh my god, it's so cold!" I say, clutching onto Graham.

"It's not that bad!" he exclaims and pulls me along, going deeper and deeper into the water. I find myself laughing as we get deeper and it's making my dress billow out around my legs. I know I'm going to be paying a lot more than just ten dollars for dry-cleaning this, but right now, I don't care. I feel totally free and I'm doing something crazy and it doesn't matter. Finally, the water is up to my chest and I'm so cold my teeth are chattering and then Graham takes me with him as he falls back into the water, and I've got my arms around his waist as I hold my breath as we go under. The ice water envelopes me like a blanket and my arms feel numb as we bob back up, buoyant in the Maine sea water. "D-d-did y-y-o-ou ev-e-ever do any-th-thing like th-th-is-s-s wu-wu-with Z-z-ack Tu-tu-uyler?" Graham asks me, his teeth chattering in the water and I feel my own teeth chatter and I laugh a little bit.

"No!" I reply with a smile. Graham swallows and smiles back at me and I suddenly become aware that my arms are still around his waist and we're mashed up in the water and close and then I feel our noses touch and then our lips touch and then we're kissing. And if my life, if this night had a soundtrack, Kissing You by Desiree would be playing in the background, like in that version of Romeo and Juliet with Claire Danes and Leonardo di Caprio, when they're kissing in the pool. And we kiss just a little bit harder and a wave rolls over us and we're kissing as fresh cold hits us and we finally pull back as the water sputters into our noses. We pull back with laughter and Graham smiles at me.

"You're not sticky anymore." he tells me and I feel kind of soft right now.

"True." I answer and then he's swimming back to shore and taking me along with him because I'm still attatched to his waist and then he's walking in the water and I let go and just walk beside him. We finally get to the beach and the warm air hits me with warmth and then I'm freezing all over again. We run back up to Graham's car and he goes to his trunk and pulls out two blankets. "How come you have these?" I ask as he pulls a blue one around my shoulders.

"Emergencies." he tells me, looking so serious, I can't help but giggle. Graham smiles at me and we get into his car and rolls up his window and I roll up mine. He turns on his car and blasts up the heat and Elevator Love Letter by Stars ends and Welcome Home by Radical Face comes on and I smile. "This is a good song." Graham informs me. "I've never heard it before. But I like it." he adds and I smile.

"I have a friend who knows someone who knows someone in the band. So." I explain and Graham silently 'Ahh''s.

"Groupie, huh?" he asks and I laugh.

"No way." I reply. "Just a fan." I tell him. "You know, I'm sort of surprised that you like all this. Cause you're totally one of those guys." I explain and Graham laughs, and I know he has no clue what I mean when I say those guys. "I mean like Zack. Zack Tyler. You're like one of him. At least you look that way." I say and Graham stops laughing.

"You know that's funny because a lot of people think I am. Because I hang with Tony Lewiston and Kevin Fletcher and Richard Elliot and all of them. They think I'm like one of those hardcore scream-y, metal-y stoner guys. The thing is though, I'm really not. But people just see me and they sort of assume who I am, and they don't take the time out to you know...get to know me before they make their judgments about me." he tells me and I feel guilty.

"Sorry." I mumble and I watch Graham as he smiles.

"It's okay." he responds and I shrug.

"No, it's really not. What are you like?" I ask and Graham is silent for a second.

"I had this girlfriend. And I was so in love with her, what I did was I took a spray can of that graffiti paint, you know the type, and I graffitied our names together on that train that never moves. It was really cool, and someone I knew saw it and took a picture of it. He put it up on his blog, and not only did she dump me for it, I got arrested for defacing public property, because I stupidly put my full name on the train. So then not only did I not have a girlfriend afterwards, I had to repaint the part of the train I fucked up. That's the kind of guy I am. I do stupid things for stupid causes. It's like that story I told you about, the one where I lied to the priest. I told him I was gay with an older guy because I was pissed off that everyday I'm forced to sit in that stupid church and make believe that I actually think Jesus died for my sins." he says to me and I'm silent, not sure of what to say. "You want to know who my girlfriend was?" he asks, and somehow I already know.

"Veronica Smith." I reply. Graham laughs ironically.

"See, another stupid thing. I didn't get into a fight with Zack Tyler for the reason I initially told you. I got into a fight with him because I was pissed off that he was with Veronica. Because I know Zack Tyler and I know he's a little punkass, who thinks he's cooler than me because I go to catholic school. Well, fuck him." Graham says to me.

"Yeah. Fuck him." I say and Asleep by The Smiths starts playing on my iPod.

"This is a damn good playlist." Graham comments. I smile.

"It's called The Night Is Alive." I reply. Sing me to sleep, sing me to sleep...I'm tired and I want to go to bed... sings Morrissey and we sing along with him. "Where are we going?" I ask, for the second time tonight.

"I'm going to go deface some more public property." Graham says and I look at him.

"Why?" I ask and Graham smiles a little.

"Because I've got something to ask." he explains and I keep quiet, with not a clue on what he means. I'm starting to get a little sleepy, and this song is not helping at all. The clock on the dash says that it's almost 2am. I never told my parents what time I was going to be home, and honestly, this is the first time I've ever been out so late. I don't mind though, really I don't. I'm starting to like Graham, a lot. Maybe it's a little quick, or something. But I don't mind. The music-box version of Auld Lang Syne plays at the end of Asleep, and the music fades out. From A Balance Beam by Bright Eyes starts and Graham laughs a little. "I used to listen to this song on repeat, for hours and hours on end. I used to think that the lyric, 'In a foreign hotel's bathroom I baptized myself in change and one by one I drowned all the people I had been and I emerged to find the parallel's were fewer I was cleansed, I looked in the mirror and someone new was there' like, explained my life." he confesses and I laugh.

"Me too!" I say and I can't believe my luck. So far Graham has liked every song I've played. I remember listening to this playlist with Zack and how stupid he used to think all my music was. It was like, if it didn't have a heavy guitar riff, he just wasn't interested. And if more than like, five thousand people had heard of them, it was like they sucked. Now that's a bit of an exaggeration, but still. He thought he was so 'deep' and so 'underground'. Graham couldn't had said it better when he said 'Fuck him'. Graham slows down on the road we're on and I notice that we're at the train by the side of the road that never moves, and I know this is the place where Graham drew that one graffiti and where he's going to deface public property again. He stops the car and gets out of it, and when he turns off the car, the whole world is totally silent because it's like, 2 am and we're the only ones awake in this whole damn state.

Graham opens the trunk again and picks up a bottle of spray paint and goes over to the train. He looks back at me and smiles. "Just stay there. It'll only take a minute." he tells me and I lean against the hood of his car, still damp, but not as soaking and not half as cold as I was when I got out of the water. That was only like a half an hour ago but it feels like almost a lifetime. I smile as I watch him write on the train in white paint. Suddenly, I hear the generic beeping ring tone from my phone, and I know I have a call. I get up from the hood and lean into Graham's car, because I didn't bother to close the door and pull out my phone from my purse. I don't recognize the number and answer.

"Hello?" I ask.

"Oh Billie, Billie, Billie." slurs out Zack's voice, obviously drunk. I sigh.

"Hey Zack." I say and he sighs with relief that I answered.

"Oh Billie I miss you. I'm sorry I dumped you, I'm sorry." he tells me and I lean out of the car and look down at the side of the road and I can hear Graham still spraying in the background. "Billie I was so stupid. Please forgive me. I should have never said what I said. I didn't mean any of it." he tells me and I scrunch up my mouth, not sure what to say back. I hear that Graham's done spraying and I look up because he's standing next to the train and in white, the train says: "BILLIE, WILL YOU KISS ME AGAIN?" and I smile and hang up the phone and clutch onto it as I run up to Graham and he grabs onto me around the waist as I collide my lips with his own, smiling through it.

And I know I've finally made the right choice. And I'm finally 100% glad Veronica Smith, Graham Scram's ex-girlfriend and new girlfriend to my ex-boyfriend Zack Tyler, threw her purse at me. Because Graham was right when he told me that the good thing about tonight was the fact that we got to meet each other. I'm glad that I got vodka-spiked punched all over me. I'm glad that Graham ruined my junior prom. Because I've had more fun tonight than I can ever remember having.
rest in results.

Graham drives me home and on my playlist, Billie Holiday's I'll Be Seeing You starts playing and with a smile, I take Graham's hand and intertwine his fingers with mine. It's like this song describes everything around us perfectly. Her soulful voice fills up his old car. He's driving down my road and it's quiet and the houses all look alike here and I feel like I'm in one of those 1940's romance movies. And I could be wearing one of those hats and one of those pencil skirts and my skin could be perfect and diamond ear bobs could be hanging from my ears and my lips could be deep red. Graham could be wearing a tuxedo and he could have one of those hats on too and a khaki trenchcoat on and everything is so pretty and quiet right now.

"It's this one." I say quietly to Graham and he pulls into my driveway. We sit in his car for a few moments. I'll find you in the morning sun, and when the night is new. I'll be looking at the moon, but I'll be seeing you, Billie Holiday tells Graham for me. We smile at each other.

"Well. I'll be seeing you." he tells me softly, leaning in just a little bit closer to me.

"I'll be seeing you too." I say. I'll be seeing you... sings Billie once more and the song ends with her voice in Graham's car and we kiss one last time for tonight. I smile because I know that Graham doesn't have my number, but I also know that this isn't the last time we'll see each other. I pull back and get out of his car, with my purse.

"Wait! Don't you want your iPod?" he asks and I smile.

"You can give it to me the next time we see each other." I reply and Graham nods with a smile.

"Okay." he says and I smile once more before closing the door to his car and running up the path to my front door and I go in, silently, and out the kitchen window, I see the full moon. Billie Holiday is right. I'm looking at the moon, but all I see is Graham.