Author's Note: I hope you all are enjoying the story. I wanted to jump in first and clarify that I'll be making certain changes, let's call them improvements, to what happened in the show. I hope you enjoy them! Special thanks to QuinnAbrams for all the support and input! I would greatly appreciate reviews and feedback from anyone else reading out there.
Kitty didn't have the means to get a prom dress. Contrary to what she tried to let people think, they weren't rich. They'd always had four kids in a one-income family. Even before her mother had passed away, they'd lived on one income, with her mother staying home. And even now that Hunter was mostly supporting himself and Collin and Logan were independent, there still wasn't much left to throw around for a prom dress.
Enter Raven Wilde. Kitty's first cousin lived on the nice side of town and drove a cute little new car. She was a junior at all-girls private school called Lima Classics Academy. Kitty's family had moved to Lima from Dublin to be closer to the extended family, but Kitty still didn't get to see Raven as much as she liked. Raven said she had a couple of formal dresses from past banquets at LCA, and that she'd be happy to loan Kitty something. In exchange, Kitty promised her that Artie would find her a date and she could go, too. After she asked him if he had any single friends, she then had to talk him out of a scheme to sell them all raffle tickets for two dollars each.
"Just find someone normal," she'd told him. "Is that possible, given the pool you're pulling from?"
Artie had then promised to find her a guy that was "just as normal as I am," and Kitty snarked back that, if he was going to be the standard for normal, then she had her concerns.
Raven not only brought over a couple of her old dresses to choose from, she also offered to do hair and makeup for Kitty. Kitty ended up having the options of pink and silver, and since she'd already heard all about Tina's silver "designer" dress from listening to a conversation between Tina, Unique, and Marley (that she'd be carefully excluded from during glee), Kitty decided pink was her best bet.
"Curly and down for your hair," Raven decided. An only child, she was accustomed to making decisions and having nobody disagree with her. Luckily, Kitty was without an opinion and was perfectly content with Raven's. Raven always did a nice job with her own makeup, so Kitty also trusted her completely in that department.
"Hey, Raven," she said, suddenly remembering her past conversation with Artie. "Uh, before our dates get here, I should tell you that mine's in a wheelchair. Artie doesn't much like it if I forget to mention it ahead of time, before people meet him."
"Oh, okay," Raven said, shrugging and continuing to do Kitty's eye makeup. "Do you know anything about the guy he's bringing for me?"
"Uh, he's... nominated for Prom King," Kitty offered up the most positive part first, for Artie had recently informed her that he'd chosen Mohamed Omar for Raven's date, since he figured a nominee for King needed a date. "And he's like, president of one of the school clubs."
"Which club?" Raven wanted to know.
"The AV club?" Kitty phrased it like she wasn't sure, even though she one-hundred percent knew which club. "His name's Mohamed."
"Well, he sounds awesome," Raven said, with a laugh, Kitty joining in. "Seriously, though, if he's not white, then he's kind of my type already."
"But you're white," Kitty pointed out.
"No," said Raven, tossing her long dark hair over her shoulder, which was the same color as her dark brown eyes. "Remember? I'm of Colombian decent."
"Well, that explains why I'm so jealous of you, bitch," Kitty replied, blotting her lipstick, as Raven put the finishing touches on her look. Raven had already finished making herself look gorgeous, as well, with smoky eye makeup that perfect complimented the black and silver dress she wore, the one Kitty had turned down.
"I'm the one who should be jealous," she said, as Kitty stood up and walked over to look in her full-length mirror. "Because that dress looks way better on you than it did on me last year."
"Thanks," said Kitty, and looking out her bedroom window, she noticed Artie had arrived, with Raven's date already getting out and handing Artie pieces of his chair from the backseat. "Our dates are here."
"Oh, nice," Raven said, coming up beside Kitty and checking out her date. "He's kind of cute. Should we go ahead and go out there? Save your guy the trouble of getting out?"
"Oh, no," Kitty said, quickly. "No, Artie's old school. It's kind of sweet, huh? I know he wants to come to the door and get me himself."
And the other part of this was taking pictures in front of the mantle. Her dad was just as good as a mother when it came to this stuff, maybe better, because he had his professional camera out and ready to go as the girls headed downstairs to answer the door for Artie and Mohamed. Hunter beat them to it, however, and answered for them.
"What do you want?" he pretended to look menacing, cracking his knuckles and scowling, mostly to scare the guy who hadn't met him. Artie, however, hid a smile. "Are you the two losers who think you're taking out my little sister and my little cousin?"
"Uh, yes?" said Mohamed, his Adam's apple visibly going up and down in his throat as he gave a hard swallow.
"I'm just messing with you, dude," Hunter said, unable to keep it up for long. He stepped back to allow the guys entry.
"Raven, this is Artie," she said, and judging by Artie's reaction to Raven's non-reaction, Kitty had gotten it right this time. "And this is your date, Mohamed. Mohamed, this is my cousin, Raven."
"Do you really go to school with three-hundred chicks?" Mohamed asked, to which Artie promptly reached up and slugged his shoulder. "N-nice to meet you."
After the introductions were made, the guys presented corsages to the girls and the girls had their boutonnières ready. Artie had gone to great lengths to ensure he found something that matched Kitty's borrowed dress. After she'd been on the phone with him, trying to exactly describe the color, she'd finally had an a-ha moment and snapped a picture of the fabric. She'd gotten plain white for him.
Artie, being who he was, couldn't stick with the standard bowtie and shirt that came with the tuxedo rental. Oh, no, he'd gone and found something that looked a bit vintage, a floppy black bowtie with a touch of yellow on it, and he'd paired that with a ruffled shirt. And yet, for all its quirkiness, it worked, especially with the funky black shoes with thick white soles, which Kitty had talked him into, due to the fact that he'd always be able to keep them clean.
After they posed for a few pictures, they headed out to the car. Artie transferred and dismantled his chair once more, with Kitty waiting around to stick the pieces in the trunk, before taking her seat in the passenger seat while Mohamed and Raven climbed into the back.
"Those look like ski poles," Raven commented, leaning forward to satisfy her own curiousity about how Artie would be driving them there.
Artie grinned down at his hand controls. "This does the brake, and if I push on this, it controls the ignition," he said. "I promise, I've had a few years of practice and I'm a pretty good driver."
As promised, Artie got them all to the prom safely. And secured the best parking, of course.
Raven was excited to be attending something with an actual band and dancing, as opposed to her stuffy private school banquets. And much to Kitty's surprise, she seemed to hit it off pretty well with her date. Mohamed was unexpectedly cute and charming. Maybe he'd actually been nominated, too and Kitty really was unaware of the entire makeup of their student body.
"You did a good job finding Raven a date," Kitty said, leaning down to plant a kiss on his cheek as they trailed behind the other two. "Thanks for taking care of that."
"Nerds make the best dates," Artie said. "We all know it's true."
They walked in to the unexpected treat of the continuation of Beatles week, prom-style. Unique, Ryder, Jake, and Marley commanded the stage with their take on Sergeant Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band, complete with bright, flamboyant costumes. And everyone in that room was totally fine with this, it seemed. The world was changing, that was for sure. Even if people like Bree Westbrook tried to keep that from happening.
Speaking of Bree, she was there, with her posse, in what Kitty considered a rather tacky, low-cut dress. Kitty had avoided being alone with the girl, ever since the ambush in the parking lot. And she was certain Bree had been responsible for those horrible posters, though she still couldn't figure out how she'd managed to manipulate photoshop. But when she spotted Bree talking to Dottie, the childlike friend of Tina who looked extremely young in her 80's style velvet green dress, suddenly the pieces were coming together.
"Artie," she said, stooping over in the middle of the fast song they were dancing to, so that he could hear her. He paused the funny dance moves he was doing, straining to hear her over the noise. "I think Bree is up to no good and I think I know who's helping her. It's that Tina worshipper, Dottie."
"We'll keep an eye on her," he said, frowning and following Kitty's gaze, just as Bree and Dottie were going separate ways again.
At that moment, Queen T made her entrance, in the designer prom dress that was every bit as elaborate as what she had described when she was doing her best to exclude Kitty from the conversation. She was flagged by an entourage of single girls, her dates. This brought Sam Evans, whom she'd rejected in favor of being the Wallflower Queen, to mind. Kitty located him by the punch bowl, flirting with someone that Kitty almost didn't recognize without her usual scrubs and coat.
"Isn't she the school nurse?" she exclaimed, pointing them out to Artie, who had to turn his chair to see them. When he spotted Sam, he laughed.
"I'm glad he finally got up the nerve to talk to her for real," he said. "Sam's been coming up with any and every excuse to go see the nurse ever since he met her. The other day, he tried to say he got a spider bite, except it was a human bite from an enormous mouth. That fool bit himself."
Kitty burst out laughing at Artie's retelling. "Well, I hope that works out for him," she said. "Maybe it'll make up for Queen T dumping him."
"Maybe," Artie agreed, as the music changed to a slow song, Lucy in the Sky with Diamonds. He grinned and gestured to his lap. "Only one way to do this. You ready?"
"Been waiting all night," said Kitty, as she seated herself on top of him, wrapping her arms around his neck. "You know what's great about this? We get to dance closer than every other couple here, and they can't throw us out."
"It's pretty great," Artie agreed, and his face said it all. Senior prom was one for the books.
"Congratulations, New Directions," Sue barked into the mic, barely waiting for the song to finish. "On accomplishing the impossible. You've made me hate the Beatles."
Artie looked at Kitty, joining in the collective eye roll of everyone around them. She then called the prom nominees to the stage. Naturally, there was no ramp, because of course not. This school never came through for Artie, why would tonight be any different? The rest of the guy nominees lifted his chair a few feet off the ground to get him onto the stage as, nearby, an unconcerned Sue read the names of the nominees. It appeared to use up what little energy she had left not to use any mean nicknames, as some kids' parents were present as chaperones.
"And now, here's the moment you've all been waiting for because your lives are so devoid of meaning that something like this seems important," Sue went on, opening the envelope in her hands, and frowned. "This can't be right. Oh, well, what the hell do I care? Your Prom King and Prom King are..."
Ryder played a quick drumroll.
"Brett Bukowsi and Tina Cohen-Chang!"
The crowd went wild as Tina's shocked expression turned into one of pure joy. The rest of them moved off to the sides of the stage, Artie catching Kitty's eye briefly and mouthing thank god, both of them relieved that they weren't declared the winners. A cry of "Stoner Brett!" came from the crowd below. Kitty realized she'd seriously underestimated the number of stoners in the crowd.
As Kitty watched Tina accept a huge bouquet of white roses, she did a quick crowd check for Bree. Sure enough, there she was, in the middle of the crowd, looking oddly smug for someone who'd just watched the Asian girl from glee club win prom queen. She couldn't find Dottie, though, which was strange. Shouldn't Tina's biggest fan be front and center for her big win?
Kitty turned her attention back on Tina and somehow noticed when something red dripped from above, landing on the white roses. Kitty followed the drips upward, to the source, an enormous bucket. Attached to the bucket was a rope. Kitty followed the rope to a person in the wings, wearing a tacky green velvet prom dress, as she gave the other end of the rope a hard tug.
"Noooo!" Kitty didn't even have time to think. She did, however, have time to run across the stage and push Tina out of the way, sending her and her bouquet of roses flying back.
Kitty took the full brunt of it, as shards of ice and red slush covered her from head to toe, with the stunned crowd looking on, a scene reminiscent of the movie, Carrie.
It was Artie who approached her first, jaw slack as he took in the sight of his drenched girlfriend, who was trying very hard not to cry. Behind him, the fact that Tina hadn't also been hit with red slush didn't stop her from emitting huge, loud sobs. Kitty held his stare for just a moment, before jumping off stage and taking off in full sprint. She knew he'd be jumping off and sprinting after her, if he could.