Prom Date by Diane Hoh Read Free Book Online Page A

"She's
    dead, Caroline-And it looks as if she fell from the deck, but Fm telling you, as a close friend of hers, that she would never have gone up there alone. So, it's time to call the police. Eddie says if you ever find a body and you don't know exactly what happened, don't touch it."
    Caroline turned her back to the water and began crying quietly. "We shouldn't leave her there, it's not right,"
    Mitch nodded grimly. "I don't like leaving her there any more than you do, but she's already dead, Caroline. You and Scott go and make the call. Margaret and I will stay here. Where's your friend? Lacey?"
    Caroline waved backwards. "Up there. She wouldn't come."
    When Caroline and Scott had hurried away, Margaret said quietly, "I'm sorry, Mitch, but I can't stay and watch what's happening to her out there. She keeps slamming up against those rocks. It's making me sick. It's horrible!" Margaret's voice broke. "But I don't want to leave her, either. What if we left and her foot slid loose? She'd float out to sea." She shuddered again, this time at the thought of Stephanie lost forever to a deep, dark, watery grave.
    "You go sit up at the lighthouse," Mitch
    offered. "FU stay here. Go on. When Caroline and Scott come back, they'll bring everyone from the picnic with them. Then it'll be your job to keep Michael from going off the deep end. If he hasn't already been told what's happened, break it to him gently, okay? He and Stephanie had their problems, but they've been dating since ninth grade."
    Margaret sat on the stone steps at the bottom of the lighthouse with Lacey, both of them trembling with cold and shock, trying to take in the horrible thing that had happened. Margaret was praying that Caroline and Scott would tell Michael. Please, please, she prayed, let someone else tell Michael so I don't have to. Please!
    "I couldn't tell him," Caroline whispered hastily to Margaret as she and Scott, breathless and red-faced, arrived back at the lighthouse, followed by a throng of picnickers curious about what was happening. "I don't even know Michael Danz, Margaret. Let Mitch tell him. They're friends."
    But there was no way that Margaret could lead Michael down to Mitch, at the water's edge, and let Stephanie's boyfriend see what they had seen. Instead, she pulled him over to the side, away from the others, and broke the news as gently as she could. Then, when
    the awful news finally sank in and he^^^ieo^^ break away from her, she clutched at^s^ft elbow and shouted to David, Kiki's boyfriend, and Beth's boyfriend, Lucas, to help her keep Michael away from the water.
    When they had quieted him down, Margaret said gently, "You mustn't go down there, Michael You can't help Stephanie now. Fm sorry. I am really sorry. She must have fallen from the lighthouse deck. There's a piece of the railing missing."
    Michael snapped out of his shock enough to shout, "No! She wouldn't have gone up there! She hated that lighthouse, and she would never, never have gone up there alone! Why would she?"
    Exactly what Mitch had said.
    No one had an answer to Michael's question.
    Little by little, the dreadful news made its way through the crowd. Margaret told Jeannine. She, too, was intent on joining Mitch at the water's edge. Margaret stopped her. "You don't want to see," she said.
    It seemed to her, as word circulated through the crowd, that everyone wanted to see. It took every ounce of her persuasive powers to keep all of them, especially Stephanie's closest firiends, from hunying down to the water. She and Lucas kept repeating that there was nothing they could do, but more important, they'd be in the way when the ambulance arrived. "Caroline and Scott will go down and stay with Mitch,'' she concluded. "Could the rest of you please stay here with Michael?" She was afraid that if anyone left, Michael would follow.
    'Tm not going back down there," Caroline protested. Her face was as white as Michael's, and she was trembling. "I can't. It's . . . it's too