“It’s cute and summery.”
“It’s revolting. And it’s February.”
“These will look adorable with it.” She hands me a pair of plain ivory Sketchers with matching silk laces, as if I haven’t said a word in protest. Dammit, I hate that she’s right. They would look cute. On someone else.
“Carmen, no.” I toss them to the floor. “I am perfectly capable of dressing myself.”
“Laurel…” She turns me around, so my back is to her. She starts to lift my shift up and over my head. Like a child in defiance, I shove my hands across my body and beneath each opposite armpit, a death grip now on the silky fabric.
“Oh my God, stop,” I demand.
“I refuse to let you out of this house looking like you’ve walked straight from the pages of a comic book. Dios mios.”
Not giving up, Carmen abandons my dress and moves to my leggings, and because my hands are otherwise occupied, she successfully strips them down to my ankles in one fell swoop. I screech and fight her, but they’re like soft, stretchy shackles holding me prisoner.
“I’m not even going to comment on the undies. Gross.”
“Except you just did,” I tell her.
While Carmen wrestles with my pants, mumbling something in Spanish, I catch our reflection in the mirror.
Carmen’s midnight-black hair is tousled, now wild and out of place. The ruby-red lipstick she applied with perfection is smudged on the two pristine-white front teeth she’s dug into her lower lip. Her eyes are bugged and crazy. My dress is bunched in a wad beneath my utilitarian white bra, which matches the white grannie panties settled neatly over my belly button. They are gross, but dammit, they are comfortable.
I look so ridiculous; we look so ridiculous that I start to laugh. I laugh so hard that Carmen, still fierce and determined, joins me and gives up her fight with my leggings. I laugh so hard Meringue runs from the room, hissing her displeasure. I laugh so hard, I eventually lose my balance and topple to the floor, luckily missing the corner edge of every piece of furniture in my pint-sized bedroom on the way down. I laugh so hard I pee myself a little.
“I think I dislocated my shoulder,” Carmen whines between giggles and hiccups.
“You’ll live.”
“You’re heartless.”
“I love you,” I tell her, turning my head to face her. Carmen has been my best friend since college. I am an introvert and keep my circle intensely small, but when I met Carmen in an elective drama class in a failed attempt to “open up,” she stomped her way right into my life and locked the door behind her.
She clutches my hand in hers. “Te quiero tambien, hermana.” Sister. She’s the closest thing I have left to one.
I squeeze my eyes shut, remembering the smattering of freckles dotting the bridge of Esther’s nose. She would have liked the dress. And that’s always the point, isn’t it?
“Hand it over.” I am resigned as I hold out my hand for the butt-ugly dress that’s fallen on the other side of her, just out of my reach. I turn it over in my hands, keenly aware the tag is missing. Another of my mother’s tricks, so I can’t return it. “Did you get this from the back of my closet?”
“Of course.” With ease, she pops herself to her feet, not bobbling at all on her strappy cream wedges. She extends a hand to help me up. “That’s where all the good stuff is.”
“You mean Candice’s collectibles?” That’s what I’ve named my mother’s attempts at changing my wardrobe to her liking instead of mine.
“Hey,” she says gently, placing a hand on my shoulder. “You be you.” She knows the struggles I’ve had with my mother over the years, this being one of many. “Lo siento. I’m sorry. If you want to wear that—” She pauses, visibly choking the words out. “You should.”
“Nah. You’re right. It’s…what did you say?” I toss my gaze up to the ceiling, pretending to think. “Comic-bookish?”
She winces. “That may have been rather harsh.”
“But true.”
With a few ballet-like moves, I rid myself of leggings that could be seen from the space station. In short order I don the new dress and try not to pull at the stretchy fabric that I think shows too much cleavage and clings too tightly to my full hips. I tie my shoes quickly and primp my hair, more for effect than concern. Finally, I remove the large hoop earrings and stick a classic pearl stud in each ear.
“You look great,” Carmen tells me, adding on a catcall for effect.
I stare at myself for a full ten seconds. I actually do. Sleek yet casual. Dirty mustard looks good on me. Not sure how I feel about that.
“Guess I’m ready.”
While Carmen beelines out of my bedroom, I slip my hands between my legs to check the status of my underwear. Damp. I should probably change them, but…nah, they’ll do. Not like anyone’s going to be up in them anyway.
I quickly follow her to the door and swipe my cross-body purse as I pass the island. I lock my apartment door behind me with a snick. Carmen throws an arm around my shoulder as we head to my car. I like to drive. I like being in control of my own destiny, or the illusion of it anyway. We each slip into our respective sides. Carmen immediately puts down the sun visor and opens the mirror. She smooths her hair back into place and reapplies her lipstick, removing the stain from her teeth. She then grins from ear to ear.
“You ready to meet tu amado?”
Your beloved.
“Carmen.”
“What?” She is as transparent as saran wrap.
“I thought this was a girl’s night?”
“It is.”
Carmen may be a brash, sassy, rough-around-the-edges Puerto Rican woman on the outside, but inside she’s all goo. A romantic at heart. She’s been with her boyfriend, Manny, since she was sixteen. They’ll marry, but she she’s making him earn it. “Don’t propose to me until your credit score is at least seven-hundred and fifty,” she always tells him. He thinks it’s in jest. I know otherwise.
She wants me to have what she does. I don’t know that I ever will, because the love that Carmen and Manny share is uncommonly rare. It’s both sickening and enviable. I have had one serious relationship in my twenty-eight years. Johnny “Ace” Wallace. I dated him for precisely six months and two weeks in my junior year of college. He had a big ego and even bigger gambling problem. You’d think the nickname would have been a dead giveaway. Things sort of fizzled out when I discovered he’d stolen and pawned my dead grandmother’s three-carat emerald ring, which was handed down to me. I got the ring back. He got prison time. I’ve been pretty gun-shy since then.
“I have a good feeling about tonight, Laurel.”
Carmen and her “feelings.”
“I’m glad someone does,” I drone, my skin suddenly a bit too tight for my body. Isn’t there a liquor store on the way to the restaurant?
“You’ll see.”
Carmen fiddles with the radio and starts singing along with Michael Bublé’s smooth jazzy beat on “Haven’t Met You Yet.” She croons at the top of her lungs and sways to the music.
She keeps singing, turning to me as if to say, “See? It’s serendipity. Today is the day.”