"First of all, we need to settle on a theme." Kate said as the five of us sat in a circle on the floor of our dorm and I was poised and at the ready with my notebook.
"Nothing tacky." I said. "Something clever and cool."
"What about…" Josie said looking down at her computer screen. "Underwater themed, hippies versus hipsters, Gatsby, classy versus trashy, round the world, come dressed as your Mum..." she read out.
"They're all good ideas, but nothing really stands out." Kiki said.
"Okay, um…what about time travelers." Josie said. "You can come dressed from any era."
"That would be easy to do the music for too." I said. "Just get the ten top hits from the past five decades."
"I like that theme. It's fun, and the charity shop would get cleaned out in an instant," Drippy said.
"Fun and functional." I said.
"So it's settled then? Time travellers." Kate said.
"I'll make some flyers and stick them around the school." I said, pulling out my computer to design a flyer.
I then spent the next hour printing off and sticking the flyers all around the school. I realized that this social had been distracting me from what had happened with Freddy. We hadn't spoken since his cricket final, and I'd reaslied what'd upset me the most wasn't so much that he and Harriet had kissed, I mean of course I was down about that, but it was more so the fact that he hadn't tried to reconcile anything and that wasn't like him. Mind you, I've only known him for six weeks, and I've never had any experience with boys before but he seemed like such a compassionate and loyal guy.
But, as Kate had said, "don't give up on him just yet" so I wouldn't. Not yet anyway.
Along with our social planning, we still had lacrosse practice that afternoon.
"Freddy and I are going to the school social together. He asked me you know." Harriet said loudly as she walked past me, across the field with Charlotte and Jane. I wasn't going to give her the satisfaction of seeing me annoyed. So, instead I swung the lacrosse stick and launched the ball into the goals, only barely missing Harriet's head.
"What did you have for breakfast this morning?" Kate asked. "You're training like a beast."
"I just pretended the ball was Harriet." I replied.
"All right, girls." Miss Rees-Withers said, gathering us together. "We're playing Lady Sarah's College this weekend. I know most of you will be tired from the school social the night before, but you really need to have your game faces on. Lady Sarah's have always been the ones to knock us out of the competition, so I really need you to give it your all."
By Thursday the school was beginning to get excited about our social, and so were we.
"But is it fluro enough?" Drippy asked holding up a bright green, mesh t-shirt.
"If it were any more fluro, you'd need sunglasses." I said. The five of us were dressing in the fluro, eighties work out era, which meant, crimped hair, tights and legwarmers.
Kiki and Josie had raided their mum's old wardrobe and found matching outfits in greens, yellows and purples. Drippy had a bright orange tutu, a light blue vest that said 'Chocoholic' on it and a mesh shirt over the top. We didn't need to crimp her hair but when she put on a pink sweatband; it made her look like a mushroom.
Kate had this strange psycadelic tennis dress, which she pared with pink tights, white sneakers and green legwarmers.
I had a sloppy white vest with the word 'Gnarley' on it, written in rainbow text and underneath it, a yellow camisole. I had a pair of bright pink shorts that went over the top of black tights. And on my feet I had a pair of white sneakers and orange legwarmers. I had blue sweatbands for my head and wrists and a rainbow scrunchiefor my hair.
"Guys, we are going to look awesome." I said. "But there's just one more thing we need. Back home in Australia, at almost every dance, there's a dance-off. Everyone makes a circle and people show off their moves."
"The St Paul's boys always do that, but no one from Abbey Mount ever does." Drippy shrugged."Well, maybe it's time they got their asses kicked." Kiki said.
"What do you suggest?" Josie asked me.
"Let's make up a hip hop routine. Only thirty seconds long or something, that will go with any song." I suggested.
"The St Paul's boys aren't going to know what hit them." Drippy said. And so for the rest of the afternoon we came up with a hip hop routine that not even Flo Rida could beat.
By the time Saturday morning had arrived, everything was organized and ready, and after lunch the five of us headed down to the hall to set up all the decorations. We covered all the walls in gold streamers and decorated the music stand like an old fashioned DJ deck. The tables were covered in brightly coloured cloths and we covered the lights in cellophane so they each glowed a different colour.
We'd only just finished setting up when people started arriving, so we hurried upstairs to get ready.
"Don't burn it!" Kate squeaked as I crimped her hair."Sorry. It's harder than I thought it'd be." I replied, untangling a bit of hair from the crimper.
"Okay. Let's do it." I said, finishing Kate's hair and tying my own up in a scrunchie.
We closed the dorm door and hurried down to the hall, where we were all hit by a proud moment; seeing our decorated hall in action and everyone was dressed up in outfits from the Gatsby era to whatever era the matching tracksuits came from. Even the teacher's had dressed up and I was surprised that most of the boys were as well. I'd have thought they'd think it was a bit uncool. When we entered the hall there was some loud seventies music being played by Mr Nellis, our very own Abbey Mount DJ who was dressed as Elvis and was chatting to Miss Rees-Withers, AKA Amy Winehouse. We made our way over to the side of the hall where Kate rushed over to her friend, or 'Boyfriend That She Keeps Telling Everyone Is Just A Friend Although No-One Believes Her.'
I looked proudly around the hall and spotted a group of boys taking the time travel theme all the way back, in their pirate costumes. I didn't notice at first because of the hat, but I eventually spotted Freddy in the pirate crowd, and before one of his friends could point me out to him, I turned back to Drippy.
"So what's the goal for tonight?" I asked her.
"Five dances and eight direct conversations, with boys that they started." She said, as the music suddenly scratched to halt and Charlotte and Jane hurried towards the entrance of the hall dressed in period tuxedos. Replacing the pop music was the type of music you'd hear in a movie to announce the arrival of a beautiful princess, and as Charlotte and Jane pulled open the doors, Harriet walked royaly into the hall in a long, light brown gown. She'd done her hair up in a braided beehive with little pearls throughout it.
She waltzed up behind Freddy and he turned around as she spoke to him.
"Mr Darcy…" she began and I rolled my eyes. "What undue pleasure it is to be afforded your company." She continued not to be deterred by Freddy's alarmed expression.
"Keira Knightley would be horrified." Drippy said to me, and I snorted loudly earning a glare from Charlotte and Jane.
"Hi." Freddy managed feebly.
"You may only call me Mrs Darcy when you are completely, perfectly, incandescently happy." She finished and Drippy and I laughed as Freddy looked around the room for help. He saw at me and waited to see what I'd do, but I just raised my eyebrows at him. Harriet saw him looking at me, so grabbed his hand and pulled him into the middle of the room where some couples were already dancing.
"Love the outfits, girls." Miss Rees-Withers said coming over to us. "You've done a brilliant job. It looks fantastic."
"Thanks Miss." Josie replied.
The rest of the night went off without a hitch, but it wasn't until towards the end of the social that my friends and I had the best time. Kiki pointed to the dance floor as a group began to form and one of the St Paul's boys started dancing in the centre as everyone cheered him on.
"Ready girls?" I asked.
"Yeah. Let's do it!" they laughed and we ran over to join the crowd. We pushed through them and joined the middle as the boy busted out his best moves before waving his arms at the crowd, challenging someone to one up him. I stepped into the circle and shooed him back before spinning around starting off our dance routine. It wasn't the best dancing ever, but it had the desired affect and soon the St Paul's boy stepped forwards again with three of his friends and they began to dance back.
As they danced, I walked in front of them with the others and we began our polished and well-rehearsed routine, slowly pushing the boys back into the crowd until the whole circle was ours and we'd won Abbey Mount's very first dance battle.
Everyone cheered and swamped the circle and together Abbey Mount and St Paul's enjoyed the last few songs of the night.