“Coming in second at two minutes and forty-five seconds, Eugene Wolf,” the announcer says. Gene jogs back toward the starting line, then faces the bleachers, looking directly at me with the tiniest smile playing on his lips.

“Is he confused?” Abigail asks, and there are murmurs of the same question around us too. Suddenly he pulls his pinny over his head, exposing the sparse but determined happy trail beneath his belly button.

“Ow owww!” someone on the bleachers calls.

“Oh my god,” Hilary squeals. There’s a black question mark painted between the indents of his stomach, the shiny paint starting on his chest and ending by the waistband of his shorts. He tucks his wet hair behind his ear and my stomach drops. Sweat has smudged the paint a little, but it’s unmistakable. This boy is asking a question.

“I’m gonna cry,” Abigail whispers. “Are you?”

“I’m a little frozen,” I say with a grin. “And also like really overheating.” Gene hasn’t taken his eyes off mine, and my face is burning up in an exquisite fire.

Doug jogs over and stands to Gene’s right. He takes his shirt off, revealing a painted M.

“Is this what I think it is?” Abigail says. I’m grinning stupidly, and there’s a tingling in my body that goes all the way from my butt on these hard bleachers to my toes nestled in their knee-high combat boots.

“This is the cutest thing ever,” Hilary says as Smith takes his shirt off, then Dan, and JJ, so that they’re standing there shirtless and smiling before the bleachers, spelling out PROM?

A loud “Awwwwww” sounds from the bleachers all around us.

“Um, wow, there’s a lot of you here,” Gene calls into the crowd, looking around, then laughs. “Will you go with me, Cham?” he asks, a pearl of sweat running down his stomach.

“Yes,” I say, a frog in my throat as I’m smiling like a goof. The bleachers are all croons. Even the metal stairs are wetting their pants over how adorable this is.

“Okay, cool!” He comes running up the bleachers toward me, the muscles in his stomach flexing as he breathes.

“Stand up,” Hilary hisses, pushing me from behind. With Abigail’s help I stand on my legs, now 98 percent water, thanks for asking.

I walk down the stairs right into his eyes.

“That was the sweetest thing I’ve ever seen in real life,” I say. His body pressing against mine smells like the armpit of an onion, but I like how raw he is. I even like the damp question mark he leaves on my coat when he pulls away.

“Good thing you said yes,” he says, giving me a rather sweaty kiss on my lips. “That would’ve been awkward.”

I laugh and catch Hilary and Abigail staring at us. Hilary’s phone is pointed at us, which I pretend to roll my eyes at, but really, thank god for iPhones and friends willing to capture moments like this. “I have something for you,” I say. I grab the cupcake off the bench and hold it out to him.