“Welcome to our event.I’m Marion, your host for this evening.May I have your names?”
When we provide them, she refers to the list on her clipboard and nods like we’ve given the appropriate secret password.She flips the list over the top of the clipboard and turns it toward me, revealing a sheet of blank Hello, My Name Is stickers.Most of them are missing, and when I glance over at the other women, I spy the red-and-white tags marring their carefully coordinated outfits.
“If you could just write your names on a sticker and place it somewhere visible, we can get your night started!”Marion says in an upbeat tone, and I take the clipboard and the pen she seems to pull from thin air.Once Laurie and I both have our name tags stuck to our chests, Marion jumps right into a practiced monologue.
“Please get yourselves adrink.” She says the word like they’re going on her tab and the cost of the ticket wasn’t ramped up to ensure that even with the most dedicated of drinkers the event organizers are not going to be anywhere near out of pocket.Her shoulders shimmy back and forth when she says, “Mingle.Our cocktail hour gives you a chance to settle in andrelaxand meet some new friends among the women before you find somethingmorewith one of the men.”
She winks at us, shoulders rising in a “what a time to be alive” movement that draws an assuaging smile from me and a look of distaste from Laurie.
“I’ll let you know when we’re ready for your dates to come and join you.We have someveryhandsome men lined up for you tonight and they areeagerto meet you,” she says before turning to the entryway where another woman has appeared.
“Why are the hostsalwaysweird and overly happy?”Laurie mutters as we restart our path to the bar.“It’s psychotic.”
I can’t help but laugh.“Maybe her positivity is the price you have to pay so you can do what you love: grill a man for ten minutes without him being able to leave.”
“It is one of my favorite pastimes,” she says with a shrug, her glossed lips pursing in amusement as she asks lightly, “Should I open with politics or religion?”
I snort just as we hit the edge of the bar, and the woman who’s been there since we walked in turns at the sound of our arrival, her eyes shifting warily between me and Laurie before they settle on me.I wait for a shy smile or some sustained eye contact that usually kick-starts the social niceties that become commonplace in environments such as this, but I don’t get it.What I get is her dark brown eyes flicking to the top of my head and then performing a quick once-over that ends in her plump cupid’s bow lip curling up just slightly.I catch a glimpse of her name tag—Billie—in clear, though somewhat scratchy, writing before she pushes off from the bar and stalks away.
The interaction—if we can call it that—is brief, but that doesn’t stop the self-conscious thoughts from arising, popping up stronger than Michael Myers after being shot six times in the chest.I glance down at my dress.
“Do I look okay?”
“What?”Laurie asks, and when the bartender turns back from cleaning up the last drink he made, I see why her attention has been drawn elsewhere.He’s got a cute pair of glasses, some seriously well-styled dark waves, and black suspenders over a starched white button-up shirt.When he grins at her and she instinctively leans into the bar, I know there’s no way she saw the look I think I got from Billie.
Laurie has two distinct types when it comes to men.Hot, clean-cut nerds or lumberjacks.There’s no in-between.I’m just lucky thebartender falls into the former category, and she’s merely distracted.She gets major tunnel vision when a man gives off wood-chopping vibes.It’s been that way since college, when she was involved in a “will they/won’t they” situation with a guy in her Media Ethics class (whom she maintains to this day she always despised).
And that’s why, after Laurie asks for an espresso martini and I hold up two fingers to double the order, I have to repeat, “Do I look okay?”
I hold my arms out from my side, drawing Laurie’s attention away from the hot-nerd bartender as he free-pours vodka into a shaker.
“That’s a stupid question, baby girl.”
“Not if I was just on the receiving end of some pretty severe stink eye.”
Laurie allows herself one glance toward where I subtly direct my head in Billie’s direction.My friend considers the odds and then shrugs in that unaffected way only someone who represses a lot of emotions can do.
“She probably just has resting bitch face.”
Maybe.
I turn my gaze over to where Billie has situated herself in relation to the other women.She isn’t looking back at me.She’s standing on the fringes, not quite next to a redhead with a Julia Roberts smile and a brunette with an enviable blowout who are engaged in a gestural conversation.
“Thatdidn’t feel like resting bitch face, that felt like—”
I mimic the look, and Laurie nods, picking up the espresso martini slid in front of her and saying sagely, “A stink eye.”
I frown down at my dress again as the bartender places my own martini in front of me.“Maybe I should’ve—”
“No.”Laurie cuts me off in a tone that leaves no room for argument.She isn’t being complimentary when she says, “You look amazing.”Then she turns with her drink and surveys the room, the bartenderforgotten now that my self-esteem is on the line.Six other women stand in the space.“Honestly, everyone looks amazing.”
She’s not wrong.All the women in the room have interpreted the cocktail attire dress code in their own way, but they all look fantastic.Laurie herself looks like she’d grind a guy’s testicles to dust in the palm of her hand and he’d thank her for the privilege of it.Next to my flirty, floaty dress, we live up to the stereotype of odd-couple female friends.Her dark features, the long, lithe, ballerina lines of her body, her interest in the secret lives of sea moss farmers—it’s all a foil to my melanin-deficient characteristics, my curves that multiple online tests have told me are considered “theatrical romantic,” a term that Laurie said could double as a definition for my general demeanor, and my preference for any media that isn’t boring as shit.
“If you want me to smack a bitch, I’ll need at least two more of these.”
Laurie’s offer draws my attention away from the other women in the room.Her glass is poised at her lips, her gaze locked on mine, and the speed at which she drinks her cocktail is entirely dependent on my answer.I raise my glass to my lips and take a tentative sip.It isstrong.Like “Jason Voorhees knocking a person’s head off with a single punch” strong, and that’s why I say, “Yes to the espresso martinis—”
I glance back at Billie.She still has that unimpressed expression on her face, her lip is still curled up, but maybe she does just have one of those faces.
