Eastern Lights (Compass 2)

28

Aaliyah

“There is no way in hell I’m putting that on,” I said, standing in the living room with my hands on my hips. It had only been twenty-four hours since Connor had become my life coach, and he had already lost his freaking mind.

“Oh, yes the hell you are.”

There he was, standing in the middle of his home, wearing a banana outfit. He was grinning ear to ear like a dork as he held my costume in his hand—a plum.

“You’re insane.”

“Yes,” he agreed, then he held the costume out toward me. “Now get dressed.”

“No way. I refuse to become a plum.”

“If you’re interested, I have a peach costume in my bedroom,” he offered with his devilish smirk.

“Where did you even get these?”

“Amazon Prime, same day shipping.”

Thanks a lot, Jeff Bezos.

He began shaking his banana around as he came toward me. “Come on, Red. You had no problem exploring New York with me two years ago in costumes.”

“That’s because it was Halloween night! Everyone was in costumes.”

“Since when do we care what everyone’s doing?”

“Uh, since forever?”

He walked toward me, with his banana end poking me in the side. “Which is exactly why we are going to do this. We are going to step outside of the mode and do what no one else is doing. We are going to make fools of ourselves, because the more comfortable we become with being uncomfortable, the more comfortable we will end up.”

I blinked a few times. “Nothing about what you said made any sense.”

“All I’m saying is, we are going to have a fun day being weird and exploring town dressed as sexually charged fruits, because we don’t care what other people think of us. Life is too short to not have fun and dress up like fruit on random Saturday nights.”

“You’re so weird.”

“Yes.” He held the costume out toward me. “Now, go get dressed.” I parted my lips to argue some more, but he placed his finger against my lips, shushing me. “You promised you would let me coach you. Now, come on. Let’s get this going.”

Reluctantly, I put on the plum outfit, and came out feeling like a complete fool. I was round, plump, and a nice vibrant purple.

Connor’s face exploded with laughter as he stared my way. “Oh my gosh, this is so much better than I’d imagined it to be.”

“There’s no way I’m leaving the house like this,” I told him.

“You are definitely leaving the house like this. Come on, we gotta go.” He walked over to his dining room table and picked up a huge boom box. Why in the world did he have a boombox? This guy was so weird in the best of ways.

“Where exactly are we going?” I asked. “And why do we need a boombox?”

“We’re going to Times Square, to put on a show,” he told me, grabbing his keys off the coffee table. “So, let’s go.”

A show? What? No. Nope. I didn’t sign up for any public actions of humiliation.

“I’m sorry, Connor. I’m already drawing the line at any kind of show performances. I don’t have that level of confidence.”

“I know. Which is exactly why we’re doing it.”

“We’re not doing it.”

“Oh yes, Red.” He nodded with the biggest smile in the world. “We are.”

“No.” I stomped my feet. “We aren’t.”

Next thing you knew, I was standing in the middle of Times Square, dressed as a plum next to a male banana, as he put a cassette tape into the boom box. Where did he get a cassette tape?!

People were staring at us, but most of the people who looked on were tourists, which made me pleased to know that I’d probably never see them again. What made me less than excited? The cell phones in their hands as they began recording Connor and me.

“Connor, this is too much for me,” I said, feeling silly.

“No, not yet. This is going make it too much for you,” he explained, hitting play on his boom box. Within seconds, “What a Feeling,” by Irene Cara came blasting through the speakers. Was he truly playing the song from Flashdance?

Then, he began dancing around like a madman. He was humping his hips around with his banana, thrusting the air and spinning around and around. “Dance, Red,” he said, waving my way.

I felt so extremely embarrassed as people laughed at him leaping around like wild.

“I can’t dance like people aren’t watching, Connor,” I warned.

“Good. Dance as if they are. And then don’t care what they think.” He came over to me and took my hands into his. He squeezed them. “Aaliyah.”

“Yes?”

“Do you trust me?”

His eyes were so sincere as he asked me. He was filled with hope and excitement, and trust…

Crap.

I trusted him.

So, I allowed him to pull me into his arms, and the plum danced with the banana. We spun around faster and faster, taking the world on, and the more I danced with him, the more I laughed. The more I laughed, the more I forgot about the bystanders. The more he twirled me, the more freedom I found.