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‘Your dad wants you to drive All you have to do is learn how to drive a stick’

‘I already kno to drive a stick’

‘Then what’s the proble irritated

‘Hey, we’re out of the neighborhood, can you sit up now?’

‘I’ll sit up e get to Twenty-fourth Street’

She sat up at 24th Street, but they didn’t talk again until 42nd

‘Where are we going?’ she asked

‘I don’t know,’ he said He really didn’t He kne to get to school and how to get don, and that was it ‘Where do you want to go?’

‘I don’t know,’ she said

Eleanor

She wanted to go to Inspiration Point Which, as far as she knew, only existed on Happy Days

And she didn’t want to say to Park, ‘Hey, where do you kids go when you want to fog up the s?’ Because, ould he think of her? And what if he had an answer?

Eleanor was trying really hard not be over-awed by Park’s driving skills, but every tiht herself swooning Hea Scotch on the rocks, it made him seem so much older …

Eleanor didn’t have her learner’s per Eleanor’s license wasn’t a priority

‘Do we have to go soo so?’

‘What do you ether? Where do people go to be together? I don’t even care if we get out of the car …’

He looked over at her, then looked back, nervously, at the road ‘Okay,’ he said ‘Yeah

Yeah, just letlot and turned around

‘We’ll go don’

Park

They did get out of the car Once they were don, Park wanted to show Eleanor Drastic Plastic and the Antiquarium and all the other record stores She’d never even been to the Old Market, which was practically the only place to go in O out don, a lot of the much weirder than Eleanor Park took her to his favorite pizza place And then his favorite ice cream place And his third favorite co that they were on a real date, and then he’d remember that they were

Eleanor

Park held her hand the whole night, like he was her boyfriend Because he is your boyfriend, duirl working at the record store She had eight holes in each ear, and she clearly thought Park was a whole closet full of cat’s paja ht?

They walked down every street of the Market area, and then across the street, into a park

Eleanor didn’t even know all this existed She hadn’t realized Omaha could be such a nice place to live (In her head, this was Park’s doing, too

The world rebuilt itself into a better place around him)

Park

They ended up at Central Park Omaha’s version

Eleanor had never been here before either, and even though it et andhow nice it was

‘Oh, look,’ she said ‘Swans’

‘I think those are geese,’ he said

‘Well, they’re the best-looking geese I’ve ever seen’

They sat on one of the park benches and watched the geese settle in on the bank of the manmade lake Park put his arainst hi out’

‘Okay,’ she said She didn’t say anything about hi how to drive a o to prom,’ he said

‘What?’ She lifted up her head

‘Proo there?’

Because he wanted to see Eleanor in a pretty dress Because he wanted to help his mom do her hair

‘Because it’s prom,’ he said

‘And it’s lame,’ she said

‘How do you know?’

‘Because the theme is "I Want to Know What Love Is"

‘That’s not such a bad song,’ he said

‘Are you drunk, it’s Foreigner’

Park shrugged and pulled one of her curls straight ‘I know that proo back and do You only get one chance’

‘Actually, you get three chances …’

‘Okay, will you go to pro ‘Yeah,’ she said, ‘sure

We can go next year That will give my mouse and bird friends plenty of tio to pro to happen,’ he said ‘You’ll see I’ anywhere’

‘Not until you learn how to drive a stick’

She was relentless

Eleanor

Pro to happen

The amount of chicanery it would take to slip proh now that Park had suggested it, Eleanor could al to proet ready at Park’s house, his ure out was the dress …

Did they even make prom dresses in her size?

She’d have to shop in the mother-of-the-bride section And she’d have to rob a bank Seriously

Even if a hundred-dollar bill fell right out of the sky, Eleanor could never spend it on so as stupid as a prom dress

She’d spend it on new Vans Or a decent bra

Or a booive it to her o to next year’s proreed to accompany Park to his first cotillion, the Academy Awards after-party, and any and all ‘balls’ to which he received invitations

She giggled so eese complained

‘Go on and honk,’ Eleanor said ‘You think you can intiood looks, but I’irl’