When I started my freshman year of high school, I met a girl named Charlotte, and we quickly became best friends. We had a lot of things in common, like singing, acting, doing ballet, playing the violin, and talking about the latest boys we had crushes on. However, it turns out that we both liked the same guy at once his name was Joey. Joey was kind, intelligent, funny, and had the most beautiful dark brown hair and deep blue eyes we had ever seen. Charlotte and I both knew that junior prom would be coming up, and there was a chance that Joey would ask either of us to be his date at the prom.

Charlotte and I were juniors, so we weren’t sure if we were his type. Joey was into pretty girls who played soccer and were more athletic. At least, that’s what Charlotte’s brother Liam always told us. Liam always gave Charlotte and me the inside scoop about what Joey liked because he and Liam were best friends, so he knew a thing or two about how Charlotte and I could try to impress the guy.

I’ve never been the type of girl who has been into wearing makeup, dressing up, or doing my hair every day. The last thing I would want is to end up in fights with my older brother for taking too long in the bathroom, which many girls my age seem to have a problem with. Charlotte has blonde hair and blue eyes, she’s skinny, she’s also a cheerleader and most guys would love to be with a girl like her. She wears a lot of pink and dresses like she could be the next Elle Woods from Legally Blonde. She even said she plans to attend law school after high school. I don’t know that she’s necessarily cut out for being a student at Harvard Law School, but she’ll probably make it into Columbia or something because her grades aren’t that great.

Even though I’m her best friend, I am constantly jealous of her because she’s way prettier than I am. I have dark brown hair and brown eyes, I wear giant framed glasses, I don’t wear makeup, and I don’t dress like any girls my age. Although I’m not athletic, I prefer dressing more casually and spend most of my free time playing my violin and acting in local theater productions. I usually wear t-shirts, cardigans, dark jeans, and Ugg boots, and that’s my outfit of choice during this time of year since it’s still early spring.

Charlotte and I see Joey standing next to his locker, and he glances in our direction. I blush and tell Charlotte that the sight of Joey makes me so nervous that I feel like I have butterflies in my stomach. Joey then slowly walks over to us and says hi to both of us, although he’s smiling and looking directly at me. I reply to him by saying, “Hi Joey, I’m Olivia and this is my best friend, Charlotte. You may have seen us around school sometimes.” Joey replies by saying, “I know who Charlotte is because I’m the quarterback on the football team, so I always see her cheering for us since she’s on the cheerleading squad, but you’re both beautiful. Nice to meet you, Olivia.”

I’m so utterly confused right now because I didn’t think there would ever come a time when Joey would notice me, but of course, the only reason he ever sees me is when I’m beside Charlotte. Charlotte is more his type than I am, so if he asks me to prom this year, I’m going to be shockingly surprised. Joey then turns to Charlotte and says, “Charlotte, I would be the luckiest guy in the world if I could count on you to go to prom with me. So, would you like to be my prom date?” Charlotte replies, “I’d love to, but what about Olivia? We’ve both had a crush on you forever, so it wouldn’t be right for me to go to prom with you without her permission.” Joey looks a little stunned, “I guess I could go to prom with both of you if you’d like me to, or we could set Olivia up with my best friend, Eli. He doesn’t have a prom date yet and would love it if Olivia went with him.”

I’m not sure how I feel about being set up with a stranger to go to prom with. So I reply by saying, “Sure, that sounds like a great idea. Who’s Eli?” Joey replies, “Eli has been my best friend ever since I was in kindergarten, he plays on the football team, and he has a huge crush on you Olivia.” I never thought any boy would ever have a crush on me, let alone some guy who played on the football team. Most guys on the football team are all dating cheerleaders, but I’m not that pretty, so why would a guy ever like me? I reply to Joey, “I never thought anyone would ever have a crush on me, but I would love to meet Eli. Wait a minute, I think I might already know Eli he’s a guy in my theater class, but he never says much to me because he’s always too busy drawing in his notebook.”

Joey replies, “So it’s settled then we’re all going as a group to prom together.” Charlotte and I both reply simultaneously by saying, “Okay, sounds great.” I don’t even know the first thing about going to prom, so Charlotte told me that we are going to go prom dress shopping this weekend, so we will see what ends up happening. It’s a Friday so that means Charlotte and I are going to have another one of our famous sleepovers. We order pizza, make some popcorn, browse some teen magazines, and talk about our latest boy drama but tonight I guess plans have changed a little since before all of the fun festivities tonight we’re going prom dress shopping.

Charlotte and I get into her light blue convertible, and she drives us to the Springdale Mall. While we’re in the mall we notice not only the department stores but also the cute little boutiques they have they even have one called the Pretty In Pink Boutique and they just so happen to sell prom dresses in so many different colors not just pink. Charlotte and I go in and try on dresses in shades of light pink, blue, and purple. I end up choosing a dress in the color lavender that Charlotte says brings out my brown eyes and she ends up choosing a sky-blue dress that brings out her deep blue eyes.

After we finish shopping for both shoes and dresses we then decide to head back to Charlotte’s house. When we get back to her house, we put on our pajamas, make some popcorn, order a pizza, and watch a few of our favorite romantic comedies, such as Legally Blonde, 27 Dresses, and The Princess Diaries. We both love watching romantic comedies because we both hope that someday we will have our own boyfriends who will make us the happiest girls in the world.

My biggest fear about prom is that Eli won’t act like the perfect gentleman and that if it rains, he’ll forget to bring an umbrella, so then my prom dress will get ruined. Eli seems too quiet what if he barely even talks to me all night? But the music will be too loud to even hear him speaking to me, so what am I so worried about? This is my first prom, and I’m looking forward to it and I have a date for it, which is something I thought I would never have. I have a beautiful dress, a pair of shoes to wear, and light makeup to put on my face, and my mom is planning on doing my hair in some type of updo but she will probably need a lot of hairspray for it considering my hair is very wavy and also thick.

Charlotte and I are going to be the most beautiful girls at prom because we found dresses that will make us look perfect, and we are both going with two wonderful guys to it, too. I’m just hopeful that the entire day will go perfectly without anything bad happening, like it raining or our car breaking down on the way there.

This was written by our co-founder and editor, Hanna Perry.