PERFECT MEMORY
Summary: For some strange, inexplicable reason, Chloe has kept the dress.
Rating: K
Disclaimer: I don't own. Okay?
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For some strange, inexplicable reason, Chloe has kept the dress.
In the back of her closet is where it lives, covered by in protective plastic. It's pink and floats to the floor. It's strapless. It has gold embellishments. It's not your traditional gown but it's beautiful and unique.
The dance she bought the dress for was ten years ago. Her freshman Spring Formal. She was fifteen and in love, going to the dance with the boy she loved. She had the perfect dress, the perfect date, the perfect life. Only, it wasn't really her life. Nothing in her life is ever perfect.
The dance ended horribly. Clark deserted her, just like he promised not to, off to rescue Lana. He left her standing in the middle of the dance floor, a fool in a pink gown. He left and ruined her perfect night, ending her dreams of the perfect life. Everything had crashed down around her, reminding her of just who she was—a foolish, naïve girl in a ridiculous pink dress.
After the dance, she zipped the dress back up in the plastic bag it came with. To protect the dress, of course, since she never had any intention to look at the beautiful dress ever again. Tucked the dress away in the far reaches of the closet, tucked her heartbreak away and convinced herself that it was better to have Clark's friendship than to have no Clark at all. Afterall, the perfect life wasn't never really hers and so the perfect guy wasn't hers either.
The next day she told Clark she just wanted to be friends, hiding behind the best friend shield. A defense mechanism, one that she always fell back on when she was scared. Clark smiled, clearly thankful that she had said the words that he clearly couldn't, or was it wouldn't, say. It doesn't matter. It doesn't change anything. It doesn't change the fact that Clark smiled at her when she told him that she just wanted to be friends, looking relieved that he didn't have to break her heart.
Chloe did it for him.
Later she went to The Torch office, got the downloaded pictures from the Spring Formal, found all the images of her and Clark. The photos were lovely, capturing the perfect moment, a lie really for nothing about the Spring Formal was perfect, not anymore. It was a tarnished memory, no longer pure and perfect. It was soiled and painful.
One by one she deleted the photos that displayed a world that simply did not exist. Then the message popped up, the one that asked for confirmation that she wanted to delete the images permanently. She hesitated, knowing she should delete the images of the not-perfect night but she couldn't. She clicked saved, keeping the Spring Formal pictures that she should have deleted but couldn't because she so desperately wanted to believe that the night had been perfect.
The night had been anything but perfect but the pictures didn't reveal that. They showed a boy and girl dancing, entranced by one another. The perfect night, the one that should have ended perfectly but didn't. But the pictures didn't tell you how the story ended. She couldn't delete them, couldn't truly accept the reality of the situation.
She should have gotten rid of all the remnants of that night but she hasn't, even ten years later. She still has the dress. The corsage flowers, the ones she pressed, are in a box beneath her bed. In that box are the tickets from the dance, as well as a photo album. The album contains the photos she couldn't delete. She got them printed after Lana found them on her school computer, because having a hard copy was so much safer.
The album is white, lovely but simple. Each page features a different photograph. The album was expensive, much more than she could afford at sixteen but she had bought the thing regardless. It just fit with the whole occasion she wanted to commemorate. Everyone thinks white means purity but white is deceptive, just like those photos are. The color white is anything but pure.
Still, she loves the album, loves the photos it contains. She takes the album out occasionally, thumbs through the thick pages, wishes that the night had really been as perfect as the pictures pretend it was. The pictures just didn't capture reality but she's kept them regardless.
She definitely shouldn't have so many mementos from that night but she does and she doesn't care if that makes her pathetic. She wants to remember that night, even though it wasn't perfect. The reasons why she wants to remember are two-fold.
On one hand, the night reminds her of what could have been. There was so much potential between her and Clark. So much potential but circumstances had conspired against her. Tornados and dark-haired girls Clark couldn't resist. What chance had she stood against those odd coincidences?
On the other hand, the night forces her to remind herself that things can be deceptive. One look at the pictures and what you see is the perfect night. But it wasn't the perfect night and remembering it helps make her stronger, makes her less of that naïve freshman left on the dance floor by her date.
In many ways she still is that naïve freshman girl. It's been ten years but she still remembers the night with crystal clarity. It's a horrible thing to remember so clearly because of all the imperfections, both of the night itself and what followed in the days and months afterwards. Yet she can't forget that night, can't make herself throw away the dress and her box of mementos, can't do away with the memories and the feelings that night still invokes.
Maybe she's a glutton for punishment. Maybe she's more naïve than she ever thought, still waiting for the fairy tale ending with Clark. Not that she expects this ending because this isn't a perfect world. Nothing's ever been perfect, not in her life, and there's something entirely bittersweet about the fact that she has all these mementos that speak of a perfect night that wasn't, a night she's never actually had. Bittersweet, tinged with something even more bitter and sour, with the over-flavor of something incredibly unfair.
She should have had the perfect night, not just the physical traces of a perfect night. She should have the perfect memory to accompany her mementos but she doesn't. All she has are the remnants, the pieces of a non-perfect night, and that's all she'll ever have.
There's no such thing as perfect. Chloe Sullivan, age twenty-five, jaded journalist, knows this intimately.
-M.