If Louise were a dog at the pound, she’d have nothing to worry about. She’d find a home, no problem.
“Can you believe it’s already November?” she says, propping her feet up onto the dashboard, which is annoying, but I don’t say anything. “How is that even possible?”
“It’s crazy,” I say. “And that proposal for Whitbey’s project is due next week.” I find myself loosening up, relaxing, and I wonder what I was so uptight about.
???
The anti-mall is crowded, but kind of festive. Even though it’s not even Thanksgiving, the stores are decorating for Christmas already. Santa’s workshop is being constructed right where it goes up every year, in front of Urban Outfitters, and there’s a little wooden sign that reads Ho Ho Ho! Santa’s coming to town on Black Friday!, which Louise moans and groans over, saying, “Don’t they even see the irony?”
I don’t think she’s using the word “irony” exactly right, but I don’t give her a hard time about it. We wander into Lavish, this slutty little dress shop where half the girls in our class go to buy dresses for the semiformal dances, and Louise raises her eyebrow and says, “Want to?”
I laugh and say, “Why not?” and then it’s on. We both still remember the rules—the left half of the store, from the entrance all the way to the dressing rooms in the back, is mine, and the right half is hers. We go our separate ways just inside the door, and the hunt begins.
Simple rules. Three dresses for each of us. Ten minutes to find them. Then, to the dressing rooms. Sluttiest dress wins.
My first choice is a short red sequined tank dress. It’s probably not short enough for a win. I could tuck up the hem a few inches, but technically that’s cheating. Still, there’s a deep V in the front, and the back dips down pretty low, too, so that’s good.
Other than us and the sales girl, the shop is empty. Homecoming happened a month ago and winter formal is still two months away, so demand is low right now for sequins and lace.
Next I find an LBD, classic and sexy. I grab one that’s a size too small because it’s made of a stretchy material that should earn me bonus points. The third is a no-brainer, a hot pink slip dress, ankle length but slit all the way up to the thigh.
Boom. Eight minutes, fifty-two seconds.
Louise barely makes it to the dressing rooms in time.
I pull out to an early lead with the sequined dress; the V-neck, when I yank down on the neckline, descends halfway to my belly button, an easy victory over Louise’s cream-colored satin choice.
“I thought it would be more see-through,” she groans before retreating back into her dressing room for Round Two.
But my early lead collapses under the divine weight of Louise’s boobs. They’re an unfair advantage, and I think they’ve gotten even bigger since last time we played this game over the summer. I don’t ask, though, because I don’t want to remind her how long it’s been since we’ve hung out.
“Are you girls planning to buy any of those dresses?” asks the sales girl as we’re heading back into our dressing rooms after Round Three. She calls us “girls” even though she’s probably five years older than us. Louise blushes, heat spreading from her miraculous boobs up to her face.
I say, “We were thinking about it, but I don’t think they’d pass dress code.” I stick my leg out through the dress’s high slit. The silky material parts around my thigh like water. The sales girl rolls her eyes all emo and huffs away.
“To the victor goes the spoils!” cheers Louise, fist-pumping wildly, her right boob just barely encapsulated by the silvery rhinestone-laden bodice of her dress. So after we ditch the dresses, avoiding the salesgirl’s glare as we pass the cash register without making a purchase, it’s off to the Gypsy Den Café where I buy Louise whatever complicatedly named beverage her heart desires, per tradition.
We wander, Louise sucking back her drink, which is practically a milkshake, me taking little sips of my peppermint tea, mostly just peering through windows. It actually feels kind of nice to hang out with Louise again. I try to remember why, exactly, I stopped calling her.
“So,” Louise asks as we peer through the window of the haberdashery—this overpriced men’s boutique full of hats and cuff links and pocket squares—“How are things with Seth?”
Aaaaand, there it is. That’s why. I can hear it in the casual-cool tone, see it in the side glance.
“Great.” I take the last sip of my tea and toss the cup into a trash can.
“You guys have been together for a while,” she says. “Like three months?”
Is it creepy that she knows how long Seth and I have been together? “Today’s our anniversary, actually,” I say, remembering Seth’s gift and pressing hard on the nail I peeled back, pushing until it hurts again.
Louise laughs. “And you’re here with me?”
There’s this test a feminist made up—the Bechdel test—to determine if a movie is worth seeing. To pass, the movie has to have at least two women in it, and the women have to talk to each other, and they have to talk about something other than a guy.
My entire friendship with Louise would fail the Bechdel test.
???
“You sure you don’t want to come in?” Louise asks as we pull up in front of her house.
“I’d better get home,” I say. “That Whitbey proposal.”
“Yeah,” she says. “Okay.” But she doesn’t get out of the car. She just sits there in the passenger seat, not even unfastening her seat belt.
“Well, thanks for hanging out,” I say after a while.
“Yeah,” Louise says. “Thanks for driving.” She presses the button to release her seat belt and unlatches the door. “Well,” she says. “See you.”
I watch her walk up the path to her door. Part of me wants to roll down the window and call to her to wait. She looks lonely. Her back looks lonely, if that’s possible. Just the way it curls forward at the shoulders. The tilt of her head.
But I don’t roll down the window, or call to her, or go inside. Instead I check my rearview mirror the way they taught us in Driver’s Ed, and I pull away from the curb, and I drive away.
Condition 2: I don’t call Seth. But this time, I do. I put him on speakerphone, so I can drive and talk at the same time, and I push aside the clammy sensation of sickness I feel about breaking this unspoken rule. When he answers, I make my voice playful. “So I didn’t get a chance to give you your anniversary present.”
“Oh, yeah?” He’s distracted. I hear a video game in the background, explosions and shouts. I picture him, game controller in his hands, his phone wedged between his shoulder and his cheek.
Right now, I have less than half of him. I want more. So I say, “It’s been a week since I started the Pill.” Actually it’s been six days. Close enough.
The background noise cuts off, and the scratchy connection is suddenly clear. He’s holding his phone now. His attention is all on me. “Are your parents home?”