“Teddy Roosevelt?" I suggested. Sadie and I had been trying to figure out the second mathlete's costume for a few minutes. He was wearing a 1930's-style suit,had his hair slicked down carefully, and was sporting a fake mustache."No glasses. And I can't even begin to imagine the connection between Davy Jone's Locker and Teddy Roosevelt." Sadie pulled a long gold hair from her pumpkin-orange punch and sighed.Maybe her mother hadn't topped her Sleepy Hollow triumph, but it wasn't from lack of determination. What Mrs. Winslow hadn't achieved in creativity (she'd gone the mermaid route), she'd made up in the details. The tailed skirt was intricately beaded and embroidered in a dozen shades of blue and green. It was pretty amazing.The problem was the bodice: not a bikini, but not much better as far as Sadie was concerned. It was green, plunging, and edged with itchy-looking scallops. She was managing to stay covered by the wig, but that was an issue in itself. It was massive,made up of hundreds of trailing corkscrew curls in a metallic blonde. To top it all off, the costume included a glittering, three point crown, and a six-foot trident, complete with jewels and trailing silk seaweed."Sadie," I'd asked quietly when she'd appeared at my house, shivering and tangled in her wig, "why don't you..." Just tell her where she can shove her trident? But that would just have been mean. Sadie gives in and wears the costumes because it's infinitely easier than fighting. "...come next door and we'll see if Sienna has a shawl you can borrow?”

“Daniel stood up and loomed over Sadie. "Sing?""Sorry?""Do.You.Want.To.Sing.With.Me?"For a count of five, nothing happened. Then,a thousand sad wallflowers at a thousand loud dances were redeemed in that moment. Sadie positively lit up. "Yes," she said, sitting up straight. "I do.""Okay." He started for the stage. "Lose the jacket."She paused halfway out of her seat. "What?""The jacket," he said over his shoudler. "It's freaking ugly."I watched as Sadie froze."C'mon, Sadie. I'm aging here."Sadie slid the jacket off her shoulders. It caught at her elbows for a second, then she let it drop to the chair. Underneath, she was wearing jeans and a red cashmere sweater. She looked terrified, mortified, and really good. "Excellent," Daniel said. "Let's go.”

“This would be the third year that she would try halfheartedly to keep her mother unaware that there even was a Fall Ball,let alone the theme. But there was no question that Mrs. Winslow would get the info somehow, probably within six hours of the announcement. It didn't matter that she was presently in the Caribbean. She was connected. By morning,she would be on the phone to someone in New York or Paris or Milan, finding the perfect costume for her daughter.The last one was a historically accurate replica of an eighteenth-century dress, appropraite to rural New York State gentility, no less. It had possessed a wig, corset, and padded butt. Sadie,itchy and unable to breathe, let alone eat or drink or shake her extended booty, had spent the four hours of the dance sitting in a dark corner.I,dressed in a high-necked, tattered, and "blood"-spattered white dress and veil (Bride of the Headless Horseman),sat with her.”

“Sadie looked like she'd just discovered the gym showers didn't have curtains.”

“Maybe a young Jacques Cousteau...?" Sadie was still working on the boy in the suit. "But that would just be silly. I mean, a suit...? On.No."Apparently our scrutiny hadn't gone unnoticed. Teddy-Jacques-Whoever was bearing down on us,smiling broadly under the mustache that,I noticed, was coming loose at one corner."Good evening,ladies!"He was a senior, I thought. We didn't have any classes together; he was AP everything,but I thought I remembered seeing him during Performance Night in the spring, part of a co-ed a capella group. They'd done a Black Eyed Peas song-pretty well,too. He was cute, too, in a pale,lanky way."Walter Elias Disney," he said with a bow. "At your disposal.""Walt Disney?" Sadie was obviously too intrigued to be shy. "Um...?"He grinned and waved his arm at the spectacle behind him with a flourish. "The myriad talents of Johnny Depp aside,it is debatable whether any of this would have come about without me. It seemed only appropriate that I should make an appearance."I nodded. "I'll buy that."He bowed again,but his eyes stayed on Sadie. "Would you care to dance?""Oh.I....Oh." Several emotions flooded her face in an instant: terror, pleasure, uncertainty, and why-the-hell-not. She darted a glance at me. I gave a quick, emphatic nod. I would be fine. She absolutely should dance. "Sure," she said.And off they went.”

“I Can't Make You Love Me.' Bonnie Raitt.""Oh,Fiorella."I glared at him a little as I climbed down. "Was that delightful list for your benefit or mine?"Frankie grabbed my hand and, when I didn't pull away fast enough, tugged me onto his lap,where he wrapped his arms so tightly around me that I couldn't escape. Sometimes his strength still surprises me.He tickled my cheek with his nose. "Don't hate me just because I'm hateful.""I never do."Here's the thing. Frankie's taken a lot of hits in his life. He never stays down for long."Excuse me!" The mannequin's evil twin was glaring down at us fro her sky-high bootie-heeled heights. Her NM badge told us her name was Victoria. "You cannot do that here!" she snapped."Do what?" Frankie returned, matching lockjaw snooty for lockjaw snooty.She opened and closed her mouth, then hissed, "Canoodle!"I felt Frankie's hiccup of amusement. "Were we canoodling, snookums?" he asked me. "I rather thought we were about to copulate like bunnies."I couldn't help it; I laughed out loud. Victoria's mouth thinned into a pale line. The whole thing might have ended with our being escorted out the store's hallowed doors by security. Sadie, as she so often did, momentarily saved us from ourselves.She stomped out of the dressing room and planted herself in front of us. Ignoring the angry salesgirl completely, she muttered, "I look like a carved pumpkin!"Frankie took in the skirt, layered shirts, and jacket. "You do not, but I might have been having an overly Michael Kors moment. This will not do for a date.Take it off." He nudged me, then added, "Right here.Every last stitch of it."As soon as Sadie was back in her own clothing and coat-which got an unwilling frown of respect from Victoria; apparently even Neiman Maruc doesn't carry that line-we moved on. Sadie did better in Frankie's second choice-a lip-printed sweater dress from Betsey Johnson,but wouldn't buy it."We're just going to a movie!" she protested. "Besides,Jared's not...not..." She gestured down at her lippy hips. "He's practical and sensible and quiet.""Oh,my God!" Frankie slapped both palms to the side of his face,and turned to me. "Sadie has a date with a Prius!"He had to invoke the sanctity of Truth or Dare before he could even get her into Urban Outfitters. "Sometimes I love you less than other times," she grumbled as he filled her arms with his last choices."No,you don't," he said cheerfully, and sent her off to change.”

“It is time,my darling.""Oh,Frankie,no-""You chose dare," he reminded her."I did," she agreed sadly, stepping up. "You're right."It hadn't been entirely fair of him, starting the game in the middle of Neiman Marcus. The King of Prussia Mall, a zillion acres of retail-and-food-in-a-box, is many people's idea of perfect therapy. Me? If given the choice, I might opt for swimming with sharks instead. But today was about Frankie."So," he told her, "I pick out three outfits,head to toe. You put them on.""Fine." Sadie pulled her jacket closer around her.This one was a muddy pruple, and had a third sleeve stitched tot he back. "But if you pick anything like that"- she pointed to a tiny tartan dress that seemed to be missing its entire back- "I will cry.""Have faith," he replied with a slightly twisted smile, and dragged her toward women's sportswear. "What our sport is," he said apropos of very little save the sign on the wall, "I have no idea."Ten minutes later, Sadie was heading into the dressing room with an armful of autumn color and a look like she was on her way off a cliff.”