STARGAZER wants me to be his date for the Senior Prom. In this case, “senior” refers to a spunky set of revelers who wrote their last term papers in 1961. “I know this is a lot to ask,” he says in an email. “Other people’s high school reunions are pretty deadly, but it would mean a lot to me if you’d come.” I choose a prim black dress with a jacket that hides my “bingo arm” flab. I go with simple gold earrings and conformist sandals, assuming wrongly that a room full of Minnesotans is a room full of L.L. Bean. As it turns out, most of the women are wearing diamond jewelry, and quite a few appear proudly in sleeveless dresses with no trace of upper arm jiggle.

Stargazer looks terrific in a tux, despite being 50 pounds overweight. He’s got sparkle and style, and he steers me through the crowd, introducing me with an air of casual nonchalance. I wonder why even those he refers to as close friends seem surprised, even shocked, to see me on his arm. The band is a good one, and the musicians play a mixture of contemporary tunes and oldies from the 50’s. STARGAZER is an awful dancer, but because he’s a musician he has a good sense of rhythm; his heart is in it, and his happiness is contagious. “What the heck,” I think, swaying with the band’s rendition of Love Me Tender. “Nobody knows me here. I can dance any way I want to.”

When it’s time to powder my nose I make my way through the crowd, smiling at people to whom I’d been introduced and receiving strangely unresponsive glances in return. The door to the ladies’ room opens to a vestibule seating area, where two women are bending anxiously over a huddled figure. They raise their eyes as I enter and look at me with what seems like contempt. As soon as I lock the door to my stall, the two women begin to talk about a party crasher, a brazen foreigner who has insinuated her way into an otherwise jolly group of friends. When I emerge to wash my hands, one of the pair, a short blonde wearing a green sequinned sweater, fixes me with an icy stare and mouths, “how can you do this?”

It comes to me that the seated figure is a woman scorned, evidently by STARGAZER. I breathe in sharply, incline my head toward her, and look inquiringly at the blonde, who nods haughtily. I want to say something, but I can’t think of anything that won’t make matters worse. To say, “I’m sorry” seems both empty and condescending. Anyway, for what am I sorry? — for being used unknowingly by STARGAZER to hurt someone who cares this deeply for him? I exit the ladies’ room quickly, and without saying a word. As the door closes I hear the blonde say scornfully to her tearful companion, “Ooooh, honey, you are SO much NICER than SHE is.”