“He’s why you’re going to go with me.”
I laugh, and this time it’s real. “No, I am not.”
“Oh come on,” she begs, “It’ll be fun. Don’t you want to see Adam again?”
I do. Oh, I do. I’d love the chance to see him in person. But now, just as every time I’ve have that thought in the last ten years, bright red embarrassment creeps in and I know that I can’t ever face him again. “You know I can’t.”
“Ollie, all that was ten years ago. People probably don’t remember, and if they do…it was high school, so who cares?”
“I care.”
“Listen, I think you deserve another chance at your high school crush. Especially when your crush is this hot!” She shoves the phone in front of my face for emphasis.
“He wasn’t my crush!” I say, probably too quickly. “I just…liked him a little.”
Lorraine rolls her eyes. “Girl, you were crushing so hard I thought my ovaries were going to explode just by being in your proximity. Yours were already toast.”
I shake my head. “That doesn’t make it better. The last time I saw him is when…everything happened. How do you move past that?”
“Sasha is a bitch. She’s always been a bitch. That’s what I’d tell everyone.”
“All that’s going to do is make me look bad.” I shove the blanket off my lap and gather the trash from my food. “I’m not going to go anyway, so it doesn’t matter.”
Lorraine follows me. “Olllllllieeeeee,” she whines, dragging my name out, pleading. “Don’t make me go alone. Please? I’ll make sure you look so fucking fabulous that no one is going to remember prom night.”
“Lor...”
“Please? Please? I swear it will be okay. If anyone says anything to you, I’ll punch them in the face, and then no one’s going to bother you because they’ll all be talking about me. Please?”
She’s trying to make me laugh and it works. “You promise?”
“I do. You’re going to be so hot, Adam is going to fall over when he sees you.” I know that won’t happen, but my breath catches and I find myself blushing. Lorraine squeals. “See? I knew you wanted to see him.”
“Shut up,” I mumble under my breath.
She pulls me back into the living room. “Come on, we’ll look at dresses through my portal on the site and tomorrow you can come try them on.”
Lorraine is a personal shopper at Bergdorf Goodman, and is undisputedly the best person in her department. Her supervisors know it too. She can’t legally tell me, but I know that she dresses her fair share of celebrities that live in New York. So borrowing a couple of dresses for a class reunion? No sweat given the amount of money that she makes for the store.
My job is…far less glamorous. I’m an accountant. Don’t get me wrong, I like my job. I like the comfort of numbers and the way I can make them fall in line. And in a city with a whole lot of numbers to make fall in line, I can’t complain—I know that I’m a lot better off than many people in this city.
My best friend has already kicked off her shoes and commandeered my laptop, logging into her shopping portal. Part of the time she works from home, prepping what she’s going to show her clients with a portal that has live listings of the store’s stock.
By the time I sit down with my glass of water, she’s already entered in my sizes and is scrolling through pages of dresses. “Aren’t reunions usually less formal?” The dresses she’s looking at belong on the runway and not in our old high school gym.
“Do you remember high school at all?” Lorraine says, playful sarcasm filling her voice. “Think about who went there. You think there’s any chance that that group of people is going to plan an event where you can show up in a t-shirt and jeans?”
“I’d be the luckiest person on earth if they did.”
She laughs. “No. It’s at the Plaza.”
“Are you serious?” I shake my head. “Well, at least that’s convenient.”
“Right?”
I lean back on the couch and let her go to work. She knows what looks good on me better than I do anyway. It’s amazing, I didn’t want to see anybody, and even though I’m still upset, she’s made me feel better. “Thanks, Lor.”
“Anytime.”
2
Ollie
The lights in this mirror are so bright that they’re blinding me, but the cheerful blonde girl applying make-up to my face assures me that they’re necessary for her to work. Her name is Maren and she works with Lor, who seems to have disappeared for the moment.
I’m sitting in one of the make-up chairs at Bergdorf Goodman, and letting all the stuff that Lorraine has planned unfold. She made me try on about a million dresses and wouldn’t let me see how I looked in any of them, and wouldn’t tell me which one she picked. If I didn’t absolutely trust that she’s going to make me look fabulous, I’d be freaking out right now.
Okay, I am freaking out right now, but not because of the dress. In an hour I’m going to walk across the street to the Plaza and into a ballroom of former classmates. I’ll probably throw up all over the dress Lor’s picked. I hope that’s within her discretionary budget.
I’m trying to breathe. It must not be working because Maren asks, “Are you all right?”
“Fine.” The high pitch of my voice makes it clear that I’m not. “Just nervous.”
“Honey, after I’m done with you, you’ll have nothing to be nervous about.”
“Oh, it’s not that,” I say. “It’s just that the last time I saw all of these people something really… I’m not looking forward to it.”
I open my eyes for a second and she nods, understanding. “Well, we’ll make sure you look great. You give them hell.”
I laugh. “I’ll try.”
My hair is already done, and the stylist managed to style my hair in a way I always wished it could look but never accomplished myself. It’s a simple style, falling in waves down my back with the sides twisted away from my face. I only get a glimpse of myself before she waves my eyes closed again, but Maren knows what she’s doing.
She’s brushing my face and lining my lips and I go into a zen-like zone while I let her work. I nearly jump out of my skin when I hear Lorraine’s voice. “How are we doing in here?”
“Geeze, Lorraine.”
“Sorry,” she grins. “Business voice. You look great!”
I glance toward the mirror, and she’s right. My eyes look bigger and more green than they usually are. She picked a deep berry color for my lips that I never would have chosen for myself. The effect is amazing. “Thank you,” I say to Maren.
“No problem.”
Lorraine guides me to dressing rooms. These aren’t your typical dressing rooms; they’re extra luxurious and usually reserved for the store’s A-list clients. “You’re going to look so badass,” she says, pointing to a room.
Behind the curtain I find an icy blue silk dress, and freeze. “Lor?”