At 6, I Promised My Best Friend with Down Syndrome We’d Go to Prom Together – 12 Years Later, Mom Said I Could Go with Him Only on One Condition

“Prom.”

Then his entire face lit up.

“I already bought the bow tie.”

I blinked. “When?”

“November.”

“Noah, it was November.”

“Exactly.”

“What does that mean?”

“Stores run out of things,” he said.

“I already bought the bow tie.”

“They were not going to run out of bow ties.”

“You don’t know that.”

That was how Noah officially asked me to prom.

***

On prom night, I was upstairs fighting with an earring when the doorbell rang.

My aunt called up.

“Chrissy! He’s here!”

“Tell him two minutes!”

“Chrissy! He’s here!”

From just beyond the front door, Noah’s voice filtered in.

“She said that 15 minutes ago!”

Traitor.

I finished the earring and checked myself in the mirror.

Pretty dress.

Hair curled.

Makeup that had taken my aunt almost an hour.

I was nervous.

Not about Noah.

About everything else.

I was nervous.

Prom had always seemed like one of those things that happened to older people.