Weinberg freshman Justin Cruz got asked to prom.
Contrary to popular reports, those mysterious pink posters that plastered campus paths Sunday weren't a misguided attempt by Joseph Kony to distract Northwestern students from the plentiful (well, multiple) Kony 2012 posters pinned during the campaign's Cover the Night event Friday. They really were just asking a single question, one person to another.
In a genuine gesture of cutesy girlfriendiness, Cruz's long-term girlfriend Alyssa Carillo, a Resurrection High School senior, taped bright pink flyers around the library and sorority quads Sunday while Cruz was away at a volleyball tournament.
"The past two years, I asked her in sort of fun ways like this, and she wanted to mess with me and embarrass me this year," Cruz said.
Upon returning home, Cruz saw neon flyers peppered along the sidewalk, displaying his name, face and a single, vital question: "Justin Cruz will you go to prom with me?"
'"I called her, and I was like, 'You got me. That was good,'" Cruz said. "And she was like, 'Are you embarrassed?' and I was like, 'Not yet, but maybe later.' I'm not embarrassed, but every time I walk around campus right now, I'm, like, looking at people, and I feel like they're always looking at me back, thinking, 'Hey, that's the kid.'"
Carillo's grand gesture followed two years of Cruz's elaborate methods to ask her to dances. Cruz led her on an elaborate scavenger hunt throughout Chicago, and the next year spelled the word “Prom” on a hillside in tea light candles. Carillo said flyering would be "easy," and it was something she knew Northwestern students did.
Cruz maintained that he wasn’t embarrassed by his girlfriend's delivery method, but Carrillo's explanation offered a different spin.
"It turned out to be a big ordeal, like everyone freaked out about it for some reason," Carillo said. "He said he wasn't embarrassed, but I think he was, a little bit."
The good news? Cruz said yes.