Polaroid

There's a photo of two people. He's in a tuxedo, she's in a prom dress. The photo is taken in their parents' living room. He's putting a corsage on her left arm, she's smiling and looking directly into the camera. He's looking slightly off to one side. His eyes are glazed over. He looks like he might have been drinking. I remember going to my senior prom. There was no excitement about it. I went with a knee-jеrk, nothing-to-do-that-night variety of resolved borеdom. It meant a bit more to my date. I rented the stupidest tuxedo I could find, a real old one with long tails. I looked like Groucho Marx. I forget what she wore. I picked her up at her mother's house. I felt like a stuffed animal. Every step I took felt like I was following painted footsteps on the floor. He's wearing a scarf. It is hanging on either side of his neck. Her wrap is sitting on the left arm of a rocking chair. When we got there, I saw that there weren't many people from my class who had showed up. I immediately ditched my date, jumped up on stage, and tried to sing "Soul Man" with the band. One of the horn players shoved me off the side while he was playing. I only danced to two songs - I danced with the headmaster's wife, knowing it would make him mad, and with my date. We danced to "Stairway To Heaven", the last song of the night. By that time, the only people in the place were a few bored teachers, some jocks, some geeks, and the band. It was a depressing waste of time. I got my date back to her house as quickly as I could, and jammed back to my neighbourhood to try and find my friends, and make the most of a tragic waste of a Saturday night spent with losers, teachers, and a date who worshipped Fleetwood Mac. The boy and the girl are from Michigan. On the back of the picture, there's a sentence written in black ink. "Shot himself in the head."