The Convenient Wife

Emily screeches like an excited child, shaking her fists up by her face. “Let me work my magic. Come on.” With a skip in her step, she sets her mug down on the counter as she walks through her kitchen and into her bedroom.

Her apartment is small, a first floor, one bedroom, last renovated circa nineteen ninety-one. There’s blue wallpaper with small white flowers covering her kitchen walls, and tan laminate sheet countertops.

Burn marks pepper the surface from hot pans, and the edges are chipped and worn down from years of use. All the ceilings have those three ring light fixtures that buzz when she turns them on, the ones that sound like a hive of bees.

Emily’s passion is not interior design, it’s fashion design, which is why she’s so excited for me to raid her closet. Any chance for someone outside our circle to see her style tips makes her happy.

“Star!” she calls out to me.

“I’m coming, I’m coming.”

“Hey, it’s not me who needs this internship, it’s you. If you want to go looking like you just got done doing leg presses at the gym, be my guest. But if you want to nail this meet and greet, then let’s dress you for the part.”

“Fine, but nothing frilly, lacy, or anything that will make me itch in weird places. I don’t want to be scratching like I have body lice or something.”

“Got it. No rashes or doilies.” Giving me a thumbs up, she throws open her closet door like a bevy of white doves will spring free and fly around the room.

I half expected the interior to glow like heaven and music to play from above. None of that happens, but damn if that girl doesn’t treat her closet like a treasure chest filled with jewels.

“Alright, with your skin tone, you’d look gorgeous in green, maybe even a nice blue.” Pulling out several dresses, she lays them on her bed. “But you can tell me what you like better.”

There are three dresses in front of me and all of them make me want to throw up. A deep, emerald green tea-cup dress with sequins that trace a small flower pattern across a sheer layer on top. The second is more of a pastel blue, and all I can think of is an Easter egg, one that’s been dipped repeatedly in dye but won’t hold the color.

None of these dresses match who I am.

“Hate it.” Touching the first dress, I lift it up and hand it back to her. “Hate it.” Taking the second one, I hold it out for her take. The last dress is the worst, and I can’t even look at it without scrunching my face up tight. “Yuck, burn it.”

The dress is olive green, with white frills on the sleeves, and large out of place buttons down the center.

“What? That’s my favorite one. I wore it to my sister’s graduation.” Her voice sounds slightly sad and insulted, and I don’t mean to be rude about her clothes.

I just need her to understand I’m not a dress kind of girl.

“Em, it’s just not me, you know this. I want to look nice, but I also still want to be comfortable. How am I going to make a good impression if I don’t feel like I’m in my own skin?”

“Star—you can’t go like that. I know you’d rather be wearing basketball shorts or yoga pants, but this is important. You want to work with fancy alcohol that requires people to know the layers of taste, and what type of hops—”

“Grains.”

“What?” Em looks at me confused, so I explain.

“You don’t use hops in whiskey, you use grains. Beer uses hops. Whiskey and beer start off the same, but whiskey uses grains and pitching the yeast in—”

Opening her lids wide, she lets out a groan as she cut me off. “Okay, whatever. The point is, you want to make a good first impression, and you won’t dressed like that.”

“I just hate dresses.”

Inside I know she’s right, I just don’t want to change. There are certain things I love about myself, and it’s hard for me step out of that box I’ve come to love.

Dresses are a no.

Push-up bras are a no.

Fake eyelashes—nope.

Thongs. . . I should instead ask you thong-wearers—why? Why slip a string purposely up your ass crack? Please, tell me why, so I can understand the meaning of a self-induced wedgie.

We all avoided them like the plague as kids, but the second girls hit sixteen, some even younger, they start wearing a wedgie like it’s some sort of fashion statement.

Newsflash: it’s not.

“I know, but trust me on this, Star. You want to shine don’t you?” Nodding, I can’t argue her point. “Then let me make you the star you are.”

“Can you do that with a pair of dress pants and flats?” Tilting my head, I arch my brows. “Because that would be great.”