Search Results: getting a date for prom

As a teenager, I have a pretty good handle on teen mentality (in my opinion). However, there's this one young man that I know that I simply cannot comprehend, for the life of me.

He practically flirts with anything that moves, short of those within a four year range above and below himself (for reference, we're both seventeen). I don't particularly have a problem with this, it's just a bit distasteful to always have to witness it in public. So he's popular. Whatever. Let's move on.

We're both in the same boat. We don't have dates to Winter Ball and Senior Prom. Now, I was planning on going stag and saving money and going stag, but I've been getting that "parental push" to take a date. Frankly, it's this guy or one of the awkward kids I partially grew up with, the remaining of which would rather not be my date. It's a bit of a combination between the fact that they're apathetic towards me and they're just aloof boys in general. Second push: I'm in student council and am strongly encouraged to bring a date.

PROBLEMS:

1) Winter Ball Ticket is cheap compared to the heartbreaking price of $90/person for senior prom.

2) We're acquaintance-teammates. If you go by Facebook, he also liked one of my teammates (year younger), making some pretty visible advances a couple months ago. Both involved teammates are still single.

3) I mentioned he's pretty popular. This is another problem. He's got a loud mouth, with the potential to be vulgar. I would probably be harassed about this for the rest of my natural life in high school, but I don't really care, nor do I like or care about my classmates who would bring up something like that. High school drama's not my thing, so my first two problems are probably more important.

This all essentially boils down to, should I ask this guy to Winter Ball/Senior Prom? We're not on negative terms, but we're not really friends. This is because being "friends" (with me as a female) means falling prey to his masculine charms, in addition to his stupidity. I have a brain and I won't swoon over this guy. I think that he's a nice guy for the most part, as I've witnessed in his better moments, and I'd like to be his friend eventually (when he matures). He's a superficial guy, but it doesn't mean he's rotten.

Also, when should I ask? I heard that he was still available for both Winter Ball and Senior Prom for the first time, yesterday. He was talking about his own high school, though.