Babe in Boyland

by Jody Gehrman

  That brings us up to now: Halloween. I’ve served my sentence at home, caught up at school, and I’m ready to paaar-tay. I survey my freshly applied pale pink false eyelashes in the mirror. Not bad. I watch as Darcy and Chloe put the final touches on their own makeup. God, I love being a girl, I think. I love dressing up. I love debating the pros and cons of kitten heels. I love scarves and potpourri and ordering drinks at Starbucks that are so complicated they require the baristas to use crib notes. Being a girl, I decide, is the bomb ticking.

  “Oh, no,” Chloe says, looking at me in alarm. “Are you getting all teary again?”

  “I’m fine,” I sniff.

  She studies me, her flatiron suspended near her face. “What’s up with you? Ever since Underwood, you’ve been such a sappy freak! Every time we get dressed up you get all weepy.”

  I fan my face, trying to hold back the tears. “It’s just so beautiful.”

  “What is, exactly?” Darcy removes a strand of wig hair that’s sticking to my glossed lips.

  “Being girls! Don’t you think? Isn’t it the best?”

  They exchange a private look.

  “Whatever,” I say impatiently. “You don’t get it. I realize that. Believe me, though, if you spent a week with your boobs smashed flat waking up every morning to ten guys peeing at urinals, you would appreciate this moment.”

  “Uh-huh.” Chloe looks doubtful.

  “I’m serious!” I wail. “You would!”

  Suddenly the doorbell rings. Chloe’s eyes go wide and she slams the flatiron down. “First guests. I wonder who it is?”

  Darcy stands up. “You ready, Freaks of Oz?”

  I grin. “Let’s do this!”

  This year our annual Halloween bash is bigger and better than ever. By eleven, the place is packed with creatures of every ilk: werewolves and fairies, zombies and movie stars. As usual, a fair number of the guys have opted for minimal (think football jersey and blackened eyes), while lots of girls have gone with your usual “just add hoochie” philosophy (oh, look, it’s the slutty nurse! And there’s her friend, the slutty cowgirl). I look around the living room as Darcy leads a disorderly mob in a nutty dance routine she’s worked out to her theme song, “Super Freak.” Nobody’s really keeping up, but they all seem to be having fun. When the song ends, I see a triumphant Darcy, glazed with sweat and laughing, fall into the arms of Tyler, who’s dressed as Sonic the Hedgehog. Somehow, in the last few weeks, they’ve started seeing each other. He looks super-cute and deliriously happy. I watch with satisfaction as Darcy kisses him. She isn’t quite ready to admit they’re an actual couple (he is, after all, still a POKSI) but it’s pretty obvious they’re headed in that direction.

  I wander into the kitchen, feeling a little forlorn. I sent Emilio a letter a week ago, but he hasn’t responded. I almost e-mailed several times before that, but always ended up deleting my efforts. The screen seemed too cold, too clinical to convey everything I needed to tell him. Of course, paper didn’t make it much easier. I went through ten drafts before I finally settled on one I could send. The final version ended up being one sentence: I miss you, followed by the necessary information about Chloe’s party. Considering it’s almost midnight and there’s still no sign of him, I’m beginning to give up hope.

  “Hello, Natalie.” My heart skips a beat at the sound of a deep baritone voice saying my name. When I turn, though, it’s just Chas Marshal standing there, eyeing me appreciatively. “You look great.”

  “Oh, hi Chas. Where’s your costume?”

  He purses his lips. “I don’t really get into Halloween. You know me.”

  Yeah, I do know you: boring!

  “By the way, I’ve been meaning to tell you, your column is better than ever these days,” he says. “Your little stint at Underwood added some real depth to your writing.”

  “Thanks.” I’m so floored by this uncharacteristic praise, it’s all I can think of to say.

  “Of course, you still need to work on your semicolons. They’re superfluous eighty percent of the time.”

  There we go. That’s more like the Chas I know and despise.

  Rachel Webb appears at his side in a cream twinset, a tweed skirt, and pearls. She dabs at her nose with a Kleenex, ignoring me. “Chas, honey, I need to go. I don’t feel well.”

  “Okay, sweetums. I’ll get your coat.”

  Sweetums? Ick! Yes, my editors from Planet Suck have decided to combine their suckyness for an unholy union.

  Watching them walk away, I can feel my mood sinking a couple inches lower. Apparently, even neurotic, punctuation-obsessed tyrants have more luck finding love than I do.

  “Hey, Glinda! What you got up your wand?” Tyler punches me in the arm playfully. Beside him, Max surveys the room imperiously in a detailed Louis XIV costume.

  “Necessary Good Witch supplies. You need some fairy dust?”

  Earl comes running up to us in a furry black suit with a plastic feline mask. He makes a growling sound and flashes his claws at me.

  “Nice work,” I say. “You’re a panther, right?”

  He pushes his mask up onto his forehead. “The Black Panther, to be precise, also known as T’Challa. He made his debut in Fantastic Four issue number fifty-two, published in—”

  “Okay,” Tyler interrupts. “We get the picture. No need for the dissertation.”

  “Don’t look now.” Max adjusts his wig and purses his lips primly. “But Marilyn Monroe just walked in. Puhleaze! As if she’s got the hips to pull that off.”

  We watch Summer stride across the room wearing a white Marilyn Monroe dress, strappy sandals, and a platinum blond wig. She’s arm in arm with Robbie, her boyfriend, who’s settled for streaking his face in blood—how original. I wait for the familiar jealousy to tug at my guts, but it doesn’t happen. Somehow, playing Cecily seems to have exorcised that particular demon from my psyche. I’m just not threatened by her anymore. I feel blissfully detached as I watch her work the room.

  “How much you want to bet she pulls the old ‘whoops, there goes my dress move’ by the heater?” Tyler mutters.

  “Oh, she’s spotted it.” Max nods. “Yep, she’s moving in for the kill.”

  We all watch as Summer positions herself over the floor vent and squeals delightedly, holding her skirt down as it billows around her.

  Tyler grins, shaking his head. “So predictable.”

  I laugh. “I miss you guys!”

  “Glinda the Good Witch, huh?” says someone behind me. “Cast any spells lately?”

  I spin around and there’s Emilio, alarmingly close, his eyes the exact shade of espresso brown I remember. I open my mouth, getting ready to say something, but nothing comes out. Apparently my vocal cords have seized up.

  Emilio smiles, noting my paralysis, clearly enjoying it.

  “You made it!” Tyler slaps Emilio on the shoulder. “Good to see you, man.”

  “Hey Emilio,” Max says, “happy Halloween. What are you supposed to be?”

  Emilio looks down at himself. He has on ragged black pants shredded mid-calf, a ripped-up silk shirt, bare feet, and an eye patch. “Shipwrecked pirate,” he says. “It was the best I could do at the last minute.”

  “Interesting choice.” Earl nods in approval. “Pirates have a fascinating history. Did you know that during the golden age of piracy the colonial powers made it legal for English privateers to attack and rob Spanish ships?”

  “Come on, guys.” Tyler flashes me a knowing look, then grabs Earl with one hand and Max with the other, dragging them toward the living room. “Let them be.”

  Just like that we’re alone—well, we’re standing in a kitchen packed with creatures of every sort, most of them hunched around a rowdy game of quarters—but as far as I’m concerned, we’re the only ones in the room.

  “Don’t look so shocked,” he says after an awkward pause. “You did invite me, right?”

  I clear my throat, hoping to jump-start my speaking apparatus. No luck. Here I’ve b
een telling him things in my head for weeks, writing long, frenzied missives to him I know I’ll never send, and now that I have him less than two feet away I’m struck dumb. Fantastic.

  “Oh my God, Grant Bryers just kissed me!” It’s Chloe, out of breath and pink cheeked, moving as quickly as she can in her high-heeled ruby slippers. “Holy shit, he’s so cute!”

  I clear my throat again forcefully, as if trying to dislodge something—gross, I know, but this is apparently the only communication I’m capable of.

  She looks from me to Emilio and back to me again. “He showed up!” When my only response is a scorching blush, she says to him, “Are you here to put her out of her misery?”

  I have reason to believe Chloe’s had a few too many of her specialty cocktail, the Trick-or-tini. Apparently, they’ve loosened her tongue in unfortunate ways.

  “Well, I’m here, anyway.” He looks amused.

  Finally, out of sheer desperation, I find my voice. “You’ll have to excuse her—she gets carried away.”

  Chloe reaches out and pumps his hand energetically. “Congratulations, Emilio. You’re the only guy who’s ever turned our Natalie into a basket case for more than a week. She won’t shut up about you, I mean—”

  “Catch up with you in a minute,” I tell her, stepping between them slightly and bugging my eyes at her. “Okay?”

  She just smirks and saunters off, shrieking something at Grant Bryers as she goes. I turn back to Emilio. “Sorry, it’s—you know, Halloween. Everyone’s all excited.”

  “Yeah.” He glances at Zoë Showalter, who’s tearing open her Velcro-fastened evening gown to reveal a pink sequined bikini beneath. “I can see that. Wow. You don’t see that every day at Underwood.”

  I laugh. “I can imagine!”

  “You’re one of the few girls who really can imagine.”

  We look at each other for a long moment and the drunken shrieks, the pounding bass, and the sequined bikinis fade into something soft and remote, like the hum of a distant airplane. His eyes seem to be asking me something, but I don’t know what, exactly, and before I’ve decided what to say in answer to the question I can’t decipher, I open my mouth.

  “Listen, Emilio, I know you were probably mad—maybe you still are—but I never meant to hurt anyone, it was just an idea for a story, and then I met you and it became . . .” I trail off.

  He tilts his head quizzically. “Became what?”

  “It became so much more. I mean, I became . . .” His mouth! I’ve forgotten just how full and perfect it is. “. . . emotionally invested.” I blush again, look down at my shoes. “Bad idea, I guess.”

  “I read your article.”

  “You did?” I can’t breathe as I try to decipher his expression. “And . . . ?”

  “It was enlightening. Dr. Aphrodite? How many aliases do you have, anyway?”

  Relief makes me laugh out loud. “Two, I guess, and counting . . .”

  He runs one finger lightly down my arm, and I close my eyes, savoring the warmth of his touch. When I open them again I see he’s taking me in, letting his gaze wander slowly down every inch of my body. For a second I’m embarrassed, but then suddenly I’m glad—so glad—he can see me in all my girly glory at last.

  “Are you mad?” I ask.

  “I was.” He glances at the ceiling, then back at me. “Or confused, anyway. The whole thing threw me for a loop. I thought I’d finally met a guy at Underwood I could relate to, and it turns he wasn’t a guy at all.”

  I swallow. “I can see how that would be weird.”

  “In a way, though, I was relieved.”

  “Relieved?” I echo. “Why?”

  He looks around, embarrassed. “Let’s just say you had me questioning my sexual orientation.”

  I laugh, then slap my hand over my mouth, trying not to be insensitive. It’s just such a relief to know he felt the electricity that was driving me insane! “I’m sorry—how rude of me to make fun.”

  “No”—he grins a little sheepishly—“go on, have a good laugh. I’m sure it’s hilarious.”

  “Emilio, really! I didn’t mean to—”

  But I don’t get to finish my sentence. Suddenly he bends his head and kisses me, his full, perfect lips finding mine without hesitation.

  I have to say it’s the most sizzling, delicious, sublime kiss ever. In the history of human beings. Possibly back to and including dinosaurs.

  “Huh,” I mutter, when at last we pull away, both of us reluctantly. “And to think we wasted all that time as roommates just talking.”

  “Don’t worry.” He touches my cheek gently. “I’ll make it up to you.”

  I hear shrieks of delight coming from the living room. “Spooky Little Girl Like You,” the Zombies song Chloe, Darcy, and I traditionally blast at midnight on Halloween, starts playing super-loud on the stereo. I can make out their voices calling my name at top volume—chanting it with the crazed enthusiasm only best friends can muster.

  He smiles broadly. “Apparently you’re being paged.”

  I giggle. It feels so good to be a girl around him—absolutely divine. At the same time, I know it was the five days I spent with him as Nat Rodgers that allows me to really understand him.

  “You feel like dancing?” I ask.

  “Uh . . . sure.”

  “Don’t worry.” I gesture at my petal pink stilettos. “I promise not to step on your toes.”

  “I’m not worried.”

  “Emilio?”

  “Yes, Nat—alie?” He ads the last two syllables after the tiniest hesitation, which makes me smile.

  “I’m really glad you showed up.”

  He throws back his head and laughs, then slips his hand across the small of my back and guides me out of the kitchen. “Believe me, spooky girl, there’s no place I’d rather be.”