"Ouch! Is putting on makeup supposed to physically hurt?" Francie's voice was plaintive.

"Only if you're a pussy," Clio answered with a laugh, leaning back with a laugh to check her work.

Francie narrowed her eyes and pushed her sister.

"Francie, stop, you're going to make her mess it up!" Finn's voice was anxious as he hovered.

"Sorry, Finn," Francie said, her voice contrite.

Francie was sitting in a folding director's chair in the girls' bathroom as Clio worked on her face for Prom, while Finn supervised and tried not to get in the way.

"Finny, move, we can't see!" Brina and Lottie complained from where they sat on the bathroom counter.

"Sorry, guys, but I want to see, too," he said, ducking down to make sure Clio did both cheeks evenly. "Clio, what about right there? I think you missed a spot--"

"You guys! Stop, or making all of you leave!" Clio ordered, laughing again. "Francie is not an animal at the zoo, and neither am I!"

"But you guys never do this, and it's so fun to watch!" Lottie declared, eyes alight. "She looks like a princess!" Her eye moved over to the dress, which hung on the back of the door. "She's going to look like Cinderella when she gets the dress on, isn't she?"

"Yeah," Brina agreed with a nod. "You're so lucky you're beautiful, Francie."

"What are you talking about?" Finn asked, confused. "All four of you are beautiful."

Clio stopped what she was doing, and the sisters looked at their little brother.

"Oh my god, Brina, Lottie, go kiss him, please, twice each, since Clio and I can't right now," Francie requested from where she sat.

Lottie and Brina obediently hopped down from where they sat and kissed their brother, once on each cheek, and hugged him.

He returned the affectionate gestures with enthusiasm, smiling.

"I'm such a lucky brother," he declared.

"Okay, enough with the mushy gush, I'm starting on your eyes now," Clio said sternly. "They'll be ruined if you cry before it's dry."

The atmosphere in the bathroom got very quiet and tense as Clio drew with the eyeliner brush.

"Wow, that looks fun," Finn whispered, his hand resting on Clio's bottom as he watched.

"Francie, don't open your eyes all the way for about five minutes, okay?"

Francie nodded, eyes closed, and leaned back in the chair.

"Weo, can you draw those on my eyes?" Finn asked hopefully.

"Oh and us too, us too!" begged the twins.

So Clio patiently did their eyes as well, and took a picture of the four of them as they sat and waited for the eyeliner to dry, eyes closed, looking like they were sleeping while sitting up.

She showed them the picture when their eyes dried, making them laugh at themselves, and then of course they had to look in the mirror as well.

"Wow, we look kinda pretty, too, don't we?" Brina asked her sister. "I like how my eyes look like this."

"Yeah, but you know who looks really good?" Lottie noted. "Finn. Look how gorgeous his eyes look."

Finn was blinking at himself. "Wow, my eyes look great with liner- eye on them, don't they?" he asked his sisters, blinking at them as well. "I gotta go show mommy and daddy," he announced, dashing out of the bathroom.

"He's going to grow up to be a drag queen," Francie murmured from her place in the makeup chair.

"Nah, it's normal for a boy with sisters to have makeup put on him at least once," Clio said complacently. "He's just lucky we haven't done the full works before. Now stop talking, mascara's hard, I could poke your eye out."

"Okay, I'm back, I'm back," he announced unnecessarily, running back into the bathroom. "What did I miss?"

"Nothing, young man, I'm just doing her mascara, and before you ask, no I'm not putting this on you," Clio told him. "It would be a crime to put this stuff on eyelashes as beautiful as yours."

Ten minutes later it was time to pull the beautiful dress carefully over her face and hair, with Lottie, Finn and Brina helping, of course.

"Francie, look in the mirror, look in the mirror," they chorused. "Look how beautiful you look!"

Just then there was a knock on the bedroom door, and Daisy poked her head in. "Is she ready? Chester's and the others are on their way up, love." She caught sight of her daughter, and she smiled, her expression softening. "Oh, Francie, you're a vision." She stepped over to give her a kiss.

Francie reached to tug at the bodice of the dress, which felt a little low.

"None of that," Clio admonished, pushing her hand down. "No, the dress isn't going to fall down, and no, your boobs don't look too big, I promise. You only draw attention to them when you pull at the dress like that, so no doing that, okay?"

"Okay, okay, I'll try," Francie promised.

"Can I use some of your perfume like last time?" she asked her mother.

"Of course."

She slipped on the beautiful new shoes she'd been wearing around the apartment to break in so she wouldn't get blisters, then hurried to her parents' room to walk under the spray of the Lily of the Valley perfume that she loved so much. "Okay, I'm ready, I think," she said to her mother.

"You are," Daisy agreed softly, nodding.

Francie walked carefully down the hallway, her mother, brother and sisters following in her wake.

The living room was a hive of people, because everyone was there, per Pete's request: Maeve and her boyfriend, Hollister, Allegra and her date, Ross, Veronica and Tyler, and Chester, of course, holding a gorgeous corsage and boutonnière.

"Oh, mimma, look at you," Pete said, turning to look at his daughter.

"Wow," Chester breathed, turning on his crutches.

And Francie did feel like a princess, for the first time in her life, in her blue sparkly dress, with the brilliants in her hair and her lovely shoes peeking out from the hem.

She reached for the bodice of the dress and Clio, who was next to her, swatted her hand down, hissing, "No! You promised!"

"I said I'd try!" Francie hissed back, as the room erupted in laughter, and her princess-like feelings were pretty much gone.

"Okay, come and have a seat, please, everyone, I want to talk to you before you go," Pete said.

The octet of teenagers came and arranged themselves on the large sofa and gave Pete their attention.

"So I've known most of you since you were very little, you and your parents. I like you and trust you, or I'd never let my daughter go off with you into the city for the night," Pete said. "You know what the laws are regarding drinking alcohol and doing illegal drugs and so forth." He looked at them seriously. "However, I know that those things are to be had very easily in New York City, and I"m not going to ask you for anything silly like a promise not to do those things. Francie has consumed alcohol right here in our home all her life, with us, she knows what's safe and what's not. I'm just asking you to use your common sense, please, and don't put yourselves or our daughter in any danger. If anything happens and you need us, for heavens' sake, please call us, no matter what the hour, do you understand?"

He looked at the kids, who were all nodding.

"Anything can be worked out, as long as you're alive to work it out. If you're dead, nothing can be fixed, nothing can be saved. Your parents and I can't kill you for doing something terrible if you're already dead, capite?"

The kids continued to nod, though most were smiling now as well.

"Va bene, good, now let's have Chester and Francie pin each other, then get some photographs of you beautiful ragazzini so you can start your evening!"

So Chester pinned Francie's beautiful corsage to her wrist, and she pinned his boutonniere to his lapel. He kissed her after, and whispered, "You look amazing, and you smell so, so good," in her ear.

Then they got photographs of the whole group in front of the mantel and on the circular stairs that led up to the little reading loft.And it was easy for everyone in the whole group to smile very hugely and enthusiastically, because Lottie, Brina and Finn were next to Pete for every picture, grinning at everyone.

Then it was down to the stretch SUV for everyone to pile in and head to the Plaza for dinner. While they were driving, Hollister, Maeve's boyfriend, said, "I've never met your dad before, Francie. Is he always like that?"

"Like what?" Francie turned around to look at Hollister.

"Just, I don't know, funny and cool and down to earth? I thought he'd bee sort of slick and rock star-ish or something."

"Francie's mom and dad are the coolest parents I know," Maeve answered. "They've always been that way. I remember way back in kindergarten, Francie's mom let me eat the extra frosting right from the container when we were decorating cupcakes because I was crying about something, and when I told her that it wasn't allowed, she just said, 'Well, then we won't tell anyone, okay?' like it was no big deal and it would just be our little secret."

"I mean, the way he talked to us?" Hollister continued. "I feel like if I did anything, like scored some weed or whatever, and anything went wrong, I'd be letting him down or something. I never feel that way with my own parents. My dad's like, 'Hollister, you know the difference between right and wrong, don't let your mother and me down, son.'" For his father's voice, Hollister changed his voice to a very funny, deep voice that sounded a lot like the cartoon character Foghorn Leghorn, which made everyone in the car laugh. "I just feel like whatever I can get away with is fine where my parents are concerned, but your dad made me feel guilty."

"Well, just don't do anything, and we'll be fine," Chester said. "I figure we can bring some wine or whatever to the suite, and leave it at that, is that cool?"

"Sounds good," everyone agreed.

They pulled into the turnaround at the Plaza, and everyone got out into the warm dusk, the boys helping their dates up the steps to go to dinner. Francie felt like she was floating on a cloud. "Pinch me, Chester," she whispered as they stood in the lobby.

"What, like on your ass? You got it," Chester replied with a laugh.

Francie just shook her head at him. "Don't you dare," she warned.

People stopped to watch and smile at the group as they were seated for dinner, nudging each other.

Aww.

"You know what I was wondering?" Allegra asked during dinner. "I hope it's okay to bring this up?" She looked at Francie and Chester. "About the whole mess with Francie?"

Francie nodded. "It's fine, I don't mind."

"You know that horrible disease you said she had? What was it?"

"Lymphogranuloma Venereum," Chester supplied with a smile. "Yeah? What about it?"

"Is that real?"

"It's real," Chester nodded while cutting his steak. "I may have embellished some of the symptoms and treatment a little, but the disease is real, you can look it up."

"How did you hear about it?" This time it was Tyler who spoke. The entire table was silent, hanging on Chester's every word.

"Remember in ninth grade, when we had Hadley for Health Studies that one semester? I needed some extra credit, so I did a paper on STDs, and that was one of them," he explained. "And it was particularly gnarly, so I remembered it. I mean, I did make it sound extra grody when I talked to those assholes in the courtyard, but yeah, doesn't it sound terrible? It's almost enough to put you off sex, isn't it?"

Everyone at the table nodded solemnly before going back to their food.

"I'm really sorry about what happened, Francie, in case I never said before," Maeve said, putting a hand on her friends wrist.

"It's okay," Francie assured her. "I know you weren't one of the ones spreading rumors. In fact, I remember you standing up for me in physics to that horrible Karen." She looked around the table. "I'm just glad it's over, so I can enjoy Prom and the end of the year, you know?"

"Yeah, so let's stop all this icky talk and talk about something fun, like how we're going to spike the drinks at Prom," Ross said with a grin. "What do you think, how should we do it?"

"You're not serious," Veronica said. "That's so 1980s, Ross, do people even do that anymore?"

"I hope so, I spent fifty bucks on booze and hid it in the bathrooms yesterday," he responded with a wink. "All we have to do is figure out how to get in the punch, or whatever they're serving."

Everyone at the table laughed, and began strategizing on how best to get the alcohol from the boys bathroom into the beverages at the Prom.