Bad dolls, p.4
Bad Dolls, page 4
“Yeah, amazing.” I hadn’t looked.
“Then drinks and music, and I got this bachelorette party game. It’s like Cards Against Humanity, kind of, but for bachelorette parties. And yeah! I’ve got some really, really special plans for tomorrow night. All fun stuff Hailey will love.”
“Cool. So tonight, dinner and a movie. Tomorrow night, general shenanigans.”
“Yes. Sunday morning bagels. Then I’ll take you back to the station. How’s that sound?”
“It sounds super fun,” I said, trying out some zest. “Thank you for organizing all of this. I appreciate it.”
“Anything for my Hailey.”
My Hailey. I wondered if she thought I was dumb. I wondered if she thought it bothered me.
It didn’t. Because I knew that Hailey and I were more than friends. We were an amalgam of pinkie promises and inside jokes and hundreds of phone calls and shared lip balms and deep confessions. We had survived puberty together. I could list every crush she’d ever had, every person she’d ever kissed. I was there when her parents split up and I held her as she cried. I knew the taste of her tears. I knew the pitch of her laugh; it lived in me.
We were sisters.
So Bri could get fucked.
* * *
• • •
The house was fine. Old, made of stone, with a wraparound porch that looked like a recent addition. It was set back in the woods. I worried about ticks.
“Isn’t it so cute?” Brianna asked me as we pulled up, and again as I got my suitcase out of the trunk.
I pointed to the wooden box, which I saw had some engraving on it. “Do you need this?”
She slammed the trunk shut, ignoring my question. “What do you think of the house, Nat?”
“Cute,” I said. “So cute.”
“Like out of a fairy tale or something,” she said, leading me up the porch steps. “So perfect for the theme.”
Ah, yes, I thought. The theme.
Brianna opened the front door, and I experienced the resurgence of the squirmy ickiness I had felt when I was packing. It was like there was a creature thrashing around in my chest. A shark. Something wild and hungry and totally alone. Something dangerous.
“Hello, hello!” Brianna sang.
Inside, the house looked as I had expected it to. Low ceilings, hardwood, a stone fireplace, a remodeled kitchen with all-new appliances and a big marble island. It was very catalog. Very Instagram-able.
Hailey was sitting on the living room floor, her hands splayed on the coffee table, Chiara painting her nails. Shelby was perched behind Chiara, watching from the couch. Chiara and Shelby were never far from each other. They were best friends and former dorm mates, while Hailey and Brianna had shared a room across the hall. Junior year, the four of them had gotten a suite.
“Look at you in that leather jacket,” Hailey said, swiveling her head toward me but keeping her body perfectly still as to not disturb the manicure.
“It’s too warm out but I had to wear it. How else would people know I’m cool?”
“Oh, they’d know,” she said.
“Hi, Natalie,” Shelby chirped from the couch. She was five foot nothing, a former ballerina who now taught dance to children and had a lifestyle blog. She was incredibly blond and had thick, straight bangs. She looked so good with bangs, I wanted to sue.
Chiara did not look up from her careful work. She was an aesthetician employed at a high-end spa in Mendham, where all the rich housewives went to maintain their youth. She was always in designer clothes. Today she wore a Fendi print top paired with deliberately ripped jeans.
“Hey, Nat,” she said.
“Hey, hey,” I said, waving.
“I’ll show you your room and then we can start the festivities,” Brianna said, taking my suitcase and ushering me down the hall.
Jacqueline was already in the room, lying on one of the beds and FaceTiming with her kids. I heard their sweet little voices saying, “Mommy! Mommy, look!”
“That’s great,” Jacqueline said, giving me a nod. She mouthed, Sorry.
I gave her a “don’t worry about it” shake of the head.
“Champagne in five?” Brianna asked Jacqueline.
“Sure,” Jacqueline said. “Be right there.”
“Where’s the bathroom?” I asked Bri.
She pointed to the door across the hall.
“Thanks,” I said. “I’m just going to wash up. I’ll be out in a few.”
Brianna gave me a look that I couldn’t decode.
“What?” I asked after a few seconds of her ambiguous stare.
“Just remember not to mention Dana. We’re all really disappointed she couldn’t come.”
Dana was Hailey’s sixth bridesmaid, another college friend. Brianna had called me earlier that week to inform me that Dana could no longer make the bachelorette, her tone so somber I initially thought someone had died.
“She can’t make it,” Brianna had repeated. “Hailey’s devastated.”
“Is Dana okay?” I asked.
There was a long pause. Finally, Bri had huffed and said, “Her mother fell and broke her jaw.”
“Jesus,” I said. “Is her mom all right?”
“She’ll be fine. I’m just trying to figure out how to salvage the weekend the best I can.”
“I’m sure Hailey understands. We’ll still have a good time.”
“Hopefully,” Brianna had said. “I just wanted to let you know because I don’t want it to come up this weekend. No mention of Dana.”
It seemed extreme, but I’d agreed because it was easier that way.
I gave Brianna a thumbs-up and circled her to get to the bathroom. I locked the door behind me and savored my two minutes of seclusion. When I opened the door, there was Jacqueline. She smiled at me and gave me a hug.
“Good to see you, comrade,” she said.
“You, too.”
“Shall we go anesthetize ourselves?”
“Please.”
Brianna had created an elaborate, adorable setup in mere minutes. The kitchen island was decorated with succulents in small metal pails. There were polka-dot bowls filled with pretzels and cocktail nuts. There were many, many bottles of champagne. There were plastic champagne flutes, a variety of liquors and juices and syrups, laminated cards with types of cocktails on the front and recipes on the back. There was a wooden sign that read Bachelorette Weekend in loopy script.
“Let’s make some cocktails and have a toast!” Brianna shouted over the music, a playlist I’m sure she had carefully curated. It kicked off with “Lady Marmalade.”
Brianna popped the first bottle and everyone whooped and giggled. I went ahead and started mixing myself a drink without referencing any of the recipe cards, something that Brianna noted and clearly did not appreciate.
“The cocktails on the cards are tried-and-true,” she said.
“Going off book?” Hailey asked.
“Yep,” I said, pouring a splash of Cointreau in my flute. “What are you gonna go for?”
“Hmm,” she said. She picked up a bottle of Chambord. “Remember when we used to sneak this from the liquor cabinet when my mom was out?”
“We’d mix it with orange juice.”
“Was it good? I forget.”
“No idea,” I said. “What did we know then?”
“What do we know now?” she asked, pouring some into a flute and then reaching for the OJ.
“You’re doing it?” I asked her.
“I’m doing it,” she said. “Throwback.”
“Then I’ll have one, too.”
I looked up just in time to catch Brianna’s eye. She was wrathful.
She pulled it together to give a toast. “Let’s raise our glasses to our bride, Hailey, my best friend in the whole world. I love you, Hailey! And I’m so excited for this weekend, for the surprises to come, and to celebrate you. And I’m just so happy you all are here. Now let’s show our girl a good time! Cheers, bitches!”
“Cheers!” everyone said, tapping our plastic flutes together.
“Not bad,” Hailey said, sipping the drink from our reckless teen past.
“Nahh, dude, too sweet,” I said, spitting it back into my flute.
“That’s why we use the cards,” Brianna said.
“You’re right, you’re right,” Hailey said, beginning to browse through them.
Brianna gave me a smug look. I waited for her to turn away and then covertly poured the rest of my drink into a conveniently located houseplant.
After we all finished our drinks, we were instructed to go back to our rooms to get changed for dinner.
“I’m just wearing this,” Jacqueline said through a yawn. “Can’t be bothered.”
“No judgment from me,” I said. “I’m not changing because I’m a conformist. I’m changing because I was on public transportation.”
“Mm,” she said. “Fair enough.”
I was tempted to make a snarky comment about Bri but held back. I didn’t want to be petty. Not openly anyway. Not in front of Jacqueline, whom I genuinely liked and whom I wanted to like me. Cattiness was unbecoming and I didn’t want to alienate an ally. So I held my tongue.
I changed clothes. Then Jacqueline and I joined the rest of the group in the living room, where Chiara was fixing Shelby’s eyeliner and Hailey sat on the floor, holding her phone in one hand and a giant curling iron in the other.
I plopped down next to her. She smelled wonderfully familiar. She’d worn the same perfume since seventh grade: Curious by Britney Spears.
“Let me do your hair,” she said. “You look so pretty with curls.”
“I don’t look pretty now?”
She rolled her eyes.
“Fine, fine,” I said, turning around and removing my scrunchie.
I felt the gentle pull of her hands in my hair and closed my eyes. It was like we were back at one of our sleepovers, lounging around and getting all dolled up for no reason. Maybe later we’d make prank calls.
“Hailey, can you come here for a sec?” Bri hollered from somewhere. “I need help picking an outfit.”
“I can finish her up, Hail,” Chiara said. “You can go.”
“Really? Cool, thanks! B-R-B.”
I almost said something about her abandoning me, but I let it go.
Chiara yanked my hair back. “Nat, your ends are so dry. You need a trim.”
“Yeah, I know.” That would have been enough to annoy me, but then . . . “Ow, fuck! Did you just burn me?”
“Oh, sorry, hon! My bad.”
She didn’t sound sorry. She went on chatting with Shelby over my head, discussing the big twist in a show I’d never seen, until Brianna and Hailey came back.
“Everyone ready?” Bri asked. “Chiara, almost done?”
“Done,” she said, unplugging the curling iron. She shimmied off, carefree, like she hadn’t just maimed me.
I reached for the burn, the skin there satiny, still hot.
“Onto the front porch!” Bri said, shepherding us outside. I noticed she was holding something behind her back.
“Ladies,” she said. “I have some accessories. . . .”
In a dramatic reveal, she spun around and held up a set of silk sashes. Everyone clapped. Except for me, of course.
“Oh, God,” I whispered to Jacqueline. “Are we going to have to wear those in public?”
“For the bride,” Brianna said, presenting Hailey with a white sash that read, Future Mrs. Poulter.
“I love it!” Hailey said, pulling the sash over her head and smoothing it across her chest, beaming.
After her parents had divorced and her mom reverted to using her maiden name, Hailey told me that if she ever got married, she wouldn’t take her husband’s name. Thirteen years had passed since then and she was allowed to change her mind, but I wondered if the choice was conscious or a result of societal expectation. Maybe she worried if she kept her name, she’d have to field questions about why and then feel compelled to explain her deeply personal reasoning. She wouldn’t have had to explain it to me. I understood. I bore witness to the unraveling of her family after her father left and to her mother’s struggle to reclaim her independence, her own identity. So I couldn’t help but feel a little uneasy watching Hailey proudly declare her status as the “Future Mrs. Poulter.”
“For you,” Brianna said, handing me a pink sash.
“Thanks.”
I was about to put it on when I noticed that everyone’s sash said something different. Brianna’s read, Maid of Dishonor. Jacqueline’s read, Hot Mama. Chiara’s read, Slay Queen. Shelby’s read, Dancing Diva.
I looked down, dread putting everything in slow motion.
Naughty Girl.
Could have been worse, I thought. I swallowed my pride and slipped it on. I reluctantly posed for a group photo.
An Uber picked us up and took us to dinner. The restaurant was cool and casual, exposed brick and cozy booths under a tin ceiling. I appreciated the lack of pretense and happily ordered a cheeseburger.
Brianna insisted that we go around the table and tell our funniest Hailey story, which at first I thought was forced and corny, but it ended up being pretty entertaining. We laughed a lot. We drank pitchers of sangria.
When it came my turn to share a story, something surprising and unfortunate happened. I drew a blank. When everyone else was telling theirs, I sort of assumed that by the time it got to me, I would know what to say. I had so many stories to choose from. That time we went trick-or-treating a week before Halloween, stone-faced with confused neighbors. The time we commandeered my little cousin’s Barbie Jeep and rode it through the Dunkin’ Donuts drive-through. The time we faked breaking up in an Olive Garden. Somehow, on the spot, nothing seemed funny enough. It seemed impossible to convey how it had been in the moment. How hard we had laughed. So hard we couldn’t breathe, we couldn’t see. We laughed beyond sight, beyond sound. We were openmouthed and silent. We transcended.
“Come on, you know you have one,” Chiara said.
Brianna added, “Don’t be shy.”
“I’m not shy. I’m thinking,” I said, hooking my hand on the back of my neck, my fingers finding the burn. I wanted to tell them to come back to me, but I realized I was the last one to go. I looked over at Hailey, hoping for some assistance or an out. But she looked back at me expectantly. “This is too much pressure.”
“It’s no pressure,” Brianna said. “Never mind. Don’t worry.”
“I’m not worried.” As soon as I said it, as I heard myself say it, I knew I’d spoken too harshly. I followed up with a much softer “There’s just so much history. We were kids together. We went to the same orthodontist.”
“We did,” Hailey said, picking an orange slice out of her sangria. “Tough times.”
Jacqueline graciously changed the subject to Mike. “Let’s roast the groom now, yeah?”
The rest of dinner went okay. I tried not to let the story thing bother me, but my efforts were futile because I was very bothered. Why award memories superlatives? Wasn’t it enough to have them, to have lived them? Why play favorites? It was stupid.
Despite being steadfast in that belief, I felt guilty for not being able to harvest one to share. A shiny gem of a memory that beautifully reflected my friendship with Hailey and all the time we had spent together, all the fun we’d had. I felt not being able to do so invalidated that time somehow.
It also reminded me that those times were so far behind us, getting smaller and smaller in the rearview. What if they got so small that they disappeared altogether?
* * *
• • •
When we got back from the restaurant, I was too drunk and too tired to watch Bridesmaids. I knew if I verbalized my intention to go pass out in my clothes, I’d be met with peer pressure and/or disappointment. I could hear Hailey’s voice in my head. You’re not going to watch the movie?
So I slipped away without saying anything. I left them in the living room, Brianna taking a poll of who wanted popcorn. I went to the bathroom.
I balked at my reflection. My hair looked absurd. Big spiral curls, like I was a toddler pageant queen. I was mortified that I had spent the whole night like this, thinking I looked fine. How had I not noticed? Why had no one said anything? I wondered if it had been done to me maliciously. I wondered, Are these fucking girls all out to get me? Is Hailey?
I sighed, slipping the scrunchie from my wrist and pulling back my hair, accidentally tying it up too tightly and straining the skin on my neck. My burn screamed. I loosened the scrunchie, but the pain lingered.
Curious to see the extent of my injury, I rooted through the makeup bag on the vanity. I found a compact and held it up, turning my back to the mirror over the sink and angling the compact to properly examine the back of my neck.
The burn was gnarlier than expected. A vicious smudge about the size, color, and texture of a peach pit. It was bad enough that I considered I might require burn gel. Aloe. Something. But I dreaded asking the group for help, knowing my need for medical attention would likely be viewed as a downer. I was already the “naughty girl,” the bad seed, the odd one out.
I snapped the compact shut and returned it to the bag, then walked across the hall to my room, kicking off my shoes, rendering a single drunken hiccup before passing out facedown on my bed.
* * *
• • •
I woke up nine hours later to Brianna knocking on my door.
“Morning,” she said. “We’ve got yoga in twenty!”
“All right,” I grumbled. “I’ll be there.”
I put on leggings and a sports bra and went to the kitchen for water, drinking several glasses while watching birds flitter past the window.
The yoga instructor arrived a few minutes late. She was vivacious, tall, and muscular, and I think YouTube famous, but I didn’t dare ask. I admired her septum piercing.
