“I can, though.”
She gets out of the van. “Have a good day, love you!” she shouts. I touch my nose with my index finger and point at her, our little hello and goodbye gesture, and she repeats it with a smile. I wait until she gets in and immediately text the girls before driving home.
Me:
SOS
Cara:
What?
Allie:
Nat
Roe:
What?
I should’ve known texting them something like that would have them spiraling, and I should’ve considered that now that I’m driving and can’t reply. I should’ve also considered they have zero chill, and now they’re group chat calling.
I answer, Allie’s voice filling the space now that she’s on speakerphone. “Are you okay?”
“I am. I’m sorry. I shouldn’t have said that.”
“You scared the sparkles out of me, Natalie Rose,” Cara adds. She’s been saying that since we were kids, and I love that she hasn’t dropped it.
“I wasn’t even awake, but your spiral woke me up.”
“I amnotspiraling,” I quickly mention.
“Then why the SOS?”
“Well, I think I’m going on a date.”
Their screeches are hard to bear. What in the world?
“With the bookstore hottie?”
I sigh. “Yes.”
“Okay, details. We need details,” Allie says.
“I’m almost home, can I videochat from there? Because I don’t even know what to wear. I don’t own dating clothes. Hell, I haven’t been on a date for years, and the one and only person I’ve ever dated, I married, and then he died and I?—”
“Breathe, Nat,” someone says, but I don’t know who. Spiral and all. “Get home and call us back. We’re here.”
I hang up and continue my drive home, trying to get out of my head, but it’s impossible. The never-ending questions, the possibilities, the fears—all of it is too much. I’m close to messaging Holden and telling him not to come.
But it’s not a date, right?
“Okay, shoot!” Cara shouts from the other end of the line while I stand in front of my mirror.
“I don’t know. I hate it.” I turn to show them the high-waisted jeans with the spaghetti strap top, which somehow is too short and too big for me to feel confident.
“Change. You look hot, but we don’t need hot. We need confident. You’re hot all the time, but I need you to feel like it too,” Cara adds.
I get out of my clothes while I try to tune in to what they’re saying, but it’s too hard. Between struggling to slide the jeans off my thighs and grabbing a denim skirt that I love but that I have to ride the struggle bus to get it over my ass and then to button it, I’m overstimulated.
