Co-lacks

Fiction

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“Alright, remember when I made you a scarf for Christmas?”

I run my fingers along the scarf, which I am wearing, “Ummm . . . maybe.”

She sips her coffee, “Remember the awkwardness?”

My fingers clutch at the softness of the wool, and I protest, “I didn’t know we were going to exchange gifts! You didn’t say!”

“Hmmm. Well, let me ask you this . . . did we exchange gifts last year?”

I tighten the scarf defensively, “Maybe.”

“And the year before that?”

“Yes. Damn it. I forgot, alright?”

“Mmm hmmm . . . so amidst the awkwardness, remember what you promised? You promised . . .”

I wave my hands to silence her, “It’s the thought that counts! My gift was the thought! My gift was not the following through on the thought! You misunderstood!”

“. . . to go to the mall and get a makeover with me,” she finishes.

“Aughghghghghghgh! I was under duress! I would have said anything! I didn’t mean it! I was drunk!”

“You were not drunk. You were just in a panic.”

“Pretty sure I was drunk.”

She shakes her head, “Nope.”

I sink into a chair and plead, “Oh please don’t make me do this. You know I have issues. Personal space issues and just . . .,” I flap my hands in frustration, “. . . issues. I have issues. There’s no way I can do this.”

She looks at me pityingly, “If only you had thought to get me a gift . . . all of this angst could have been avoided.”

“I don’t even wear makeup! Please don’t make me ask a woman in a pretend lab-coat to paint me like a whore. Please?”

“It will be fun!”

“It will not be fun! Forty-something-year-old women do not go to the mall and get makeovers. This is a teenager thing. WE ARE NOT TEENAGERS! It will not be fun! It will be a public humiliation of massive epic proportions! Oh please don’t make me do this.”

She ignores my protests, “So I thought we would go this morning.”

“No! I won’t do it.”

“Yes. Yes, you will.”

I stand and pace and wring my hands, “I’m sorry, but I won’t. They’ll shame me and they’ll mock me and they’ll make me stare in one of those magnifying mirrors and I will be able to see all of my pores and all of my wrinkles and all of my gray hairs and all of the evidence of the passage of all of the seconds that have gone into making me the 46-year-old un-beauty I am and they will tsk tsk about how I don’t pluck my eyebrows and they will cluck at me about how my lips are chapped and they will ask me about my beauty regimen and I won’t have an answer because I do not have a beauty regimen because I do not have beauty that needs to be regimented and they will feel sorry for me and they will make me feel insecure and worthless and they will shame me into purchasing about $4000.00 worth of products I will never ever use and then as the lab-coated woman rings up my credit card she will tell me I have pretty eyes and I will burst into tears and then I will be filled with rage at having been revealed in all of my fragility and vulnerability and raging insecurity and then my mascara will smear and the lab-coated woman will hand me a tissue and pat me awkwardly on the shoulder as I blubber about my co-lacks of self-esteem and confidence and how I have never felt good enough and how all the popular girls used to make fun of me and . . . and . . . and . . . I will be completely undone. Don’t you see?”

She stares at me, “I do see. Yes, that’s exactly how I imagine it will go.” She grabs her keys and jingles them cheerfully, “Ready?”

I reach to loosen my scarf a bit, succeeding only in tightening its loops around my neck, and my voice rises in frustration, “Seriously, this will undo me. A makeover will undo me. I do not want to be completely undone and WHY IS THIS SCARF CHOKING ME?” I rip it from my neck and hurl it to the ground between us, “I will not be choked out by a guilt-scarf.” I kick it toward her, “Here. Take back your demon anaconda scarf of culpability.”

She leans to pick up the scarf, “So you really won’t do this with me?”

I glare back at her, “Nope.”

She considers for a moment and then shrugs her shoulders, rests the keys on the counter, “I figured you wouldn’t. Fun to watch you panic at the thought, though.”

I take a deep breath and work to regain my composure, “So what . . . you just wanted to torture me?”

She folds the scarf and extends her hand to offer it to me, “How long have we been friends? It’s like you don’t even know me at all. Alright, so what have you learned this morning?”

I cautiously re-wrap the scarf around my neck, “That you take gift-exchange obligations way fucking seriously?”

“And?”

“That I should not have forgotten to get you a gift?”

“And?”

“That I am insecure and vulnerable and just one small insincere compliment away from weeping hysterically and spilling my emotional guts in the middle of the mall?”

“And?”

“That I should not make promises I am unwilling to honor?”

“And?”

“Ummm . . . that I still owe you a gift?”

“Yes!” She smiles, “And that is why I stopped by the drugstore on the way over to buy all the supplies we need.”

“What are you talking about?”

She waves a tube of mascara she has pulled out of a bag I did not notice until now, “It will be fun!  I’m going to give you a makeover, which I know you will hate, and that is why it is a gift to me.”

“No. No, you are not. Since when are you a makeup expert anyway? Wait, is that glitter? GLITTER?”

“I’m not an expert, but it’s me or the condescending judgmental lab-coat woman . . . which would you rather?” She reaches to take my chin in her hand, turns my face this way and that, “A little bit of glitter will do you good.”

I groan, “Why are you doing this?”

“Because I think giving you a makeover will be fun, and because . . .,” she holds up one end of the scarf and shakes it in my face, “I don’t have a scarf.”

I spin away from her as she holds so that the scarf unwinds from my neck, “You can have this one, if you like.”

She stares at me, dangling scarf in hand, “Shut up.  You love this scarf.”

I do like the scarf.  I sigh.  I surrender, “OK, a little bit of makeup.  Subtle.  And if you make me cry, I will kill you.”

She giggles, “You do have pretty eyes. Just think how the glitter will make them pop!”

Damn it.