Prom Night: A REAL Horror Story

The year was 1987.  We danced to "Walk Like an Egyptian" and had nightmares about the rabbit scene in  "Fatal Attraction."  In May of that year girls put on their finest poofy dresses and stocked up on aerosol hair spray in preparation for the prom (side note:  why do some schools say "THE prom" while some refer to it solely as "prom", as in "What about prom, Blaine, what about prom??")

Anyway, I was one of those girls.  The dress I wore was borrowed.  It was an electric blue dress that my boyfriend's cousin wore as a bridesmaid.  I loved it, especially since it gave me the opportunity to buy electric blue eyeliner and eyeshadow to match.  Of course, my boyfriend had a matching bow tie for his tuxedo.

The night started off normally enough.  The rented limo took us to the Hilton hotel in Manhattan.  Of course, the anticipation of the after-prom activities is always high. We wondered with excitement what Manhattan hot-spots would let in underage kids in formal wear.  Unfortunately, the first place we tried was not such a spot, so the limo moved on.  There were 6 of us.  My best friend at the time was on a "blind prom date" with her co-worker's brother, Tony, a nice enough guy in a white tux.

Suddenly the limo jolted a bit, sputtered along and then stopped.  We had broken down right there in front of The Limelight, a famous nightclub that was housed in an old Episcopal church.  Broken down on prom night!!  Well, this is one of those time where youth was truly wasted on the young.  There we were in Manhattan, no chaperones, graduating high school and facing an uncertain future, and what did we do?? Did we leave the limo to hit the town?  Nope, we stayed there.  Guess in this day and age of cell phones it would have been easier to venture out but we were all a bit sheltered, and decicded the wisest thing to do was to stay put. 

Hours passed and eventually the limo company sent a car for us.  Not a limo, a car.  Six of us promsters, our original driver and the new driver piled into a Towne Car like circus clowns.

We decided to call it a night and start fresh in the morning.  The next day we headed for the beach, but as  pretty much every high school senior in Queens and Long Island had their prom the night before and had the same idea as we did, the fields were full.  OK, so much for plan B.  Plan C was a picnic in the park.  We went to the deli for sandwhiches and snacks and what happened next will forever be emblazoned in my memory.

Tony was driving.  As he was making a left from one major intersection to another, he, well, came in contact with a pedestrian.  Til the day I die I will never forget turning around from the back seat and seeing the packages she had been carrying fly into the air as Tony yelled "did she get up??"  When we told him that she had, he kept driving, much to all of our surprise. Then we heard a booming voice from the van in back of us:  "Pull over you son of a bitch!!"  Gulp.  Tony pulled over and a burly man came to the car and promptly  punched Tony right in the face through the open window as he said "you're following me to the police station."  HUH???  This is the prom, dammit!!  These things are not supposed to happen!!!  I should be on my second application of sunblock right now slightly hungover from my experimentation with Bahama Mamas!

After giving our statments to the police, none of us was really in a picnic kinda mood so that was it.  No  post-prom party the night before, no beach day, and no second date for my friend and Tony.

To this day, I get a bit envious of kids who get to experience their prom the way it was meant to be experienced.  I do feel cheated out of what was supposed to be a great night.  The plus side, I always win the "who had the worst prom" game at parties.