Wannabe More

by Billie Dale

  In the circle drive as I climb into her worn out Toyota Camry, I respond, “Okay. I promise.” I agree knowing no amount of sleep or thought will change my mind.

  SHE THROWS UP A CLOUD of dust in my driveway, kicking gravel everywhere. Preslee knows only one speed, balls to the wall. I spend the entire drive gripping the holy shit bar and tightening my seat belt.

  I jump from the car, hoping Dad didn’t try to lower the engine himself, cursing myself for being late. She races away yelling she’ll call me later out the window. The big garage door sits closed so I jog around to the side door, rushing to put on my coveralls. “Daddy, I’ll be there in a minute,” I call, clicking the snaps up the suit.

  “Hey, Pops, sorry I’m late.” My hands refasten my ponytail because getting grease in my hair sucks. I come around the front of Mrs. Rayburn’s Oldsmobile, expecting to see Dad bent under the hood. The engine sits on the crank, ready, all the tools we’ll need spread out on the workbench but he’s not here. I call out again but meet silence. Thinking he must have needed a part from town, I begin the checklist.

  In the middle of oiling the valves I hear a bell. Not the booming church bell type but a tiny tinkle like a jingle from a cat’s collar. We have plenty of barn felines but I’ll be damned if I can get close enough to any to put a pretty collar on. It’s not a cell phone because we can’t afford one, but I check my pockets anyway to make sure I didn’t bring Preslee’s home with me.

  The ringing gets louder until it’s jing-a-linging right outside the bay door. March in Kentucky isn’t frigid, but it’s cold enough to demand we keep the doors closed. Curious, I tug on the pulley string. Standing on her four pink-painted hooves is Princess Glitter Piggle II. But today she’s a legit princess. A purple cone hat sits on her head with flowing pink ribbons dangling down by her ears. She’s dressed in a lavender satin dress with tulle and lace wrapped around her portly body. A big red bow sticks up behind her ears and jingle bells hang under her chin. A cream envelope pokes out from under the ribbon.

  “Awe PGP, look at you. At last you’re a real princess. What is this?” I coo, pulling the paper as she roots against my shin. Unfolding the note, my eyes scan near the house but see no one.

  Specks of glitter dot the heavy paper. The script swoops and swirls,

  Here ye, Here ye,

  I, Princess Glitter Piggle II, am the courier of the quest.

  My princess status ordained upon acceptance of a date.

  Sir Mazric Jason Vortex requests the attendance of Lady Samantha Lee Gentry

  On Saturday the tenth day of May 2008 for Senior Prom.

  The dress is formal. Slip on heels with your overalls and accept his invitation, so I may long live in the kingdom of Piggles as royalty.

  I laugh but butterflies swirl in my stomach and my heart drums behind my breastbone. A shuffle in the next bay shifts my attention. Mazric leans on the shiny driver side door of my Mustang.

  The setting sun shines in the windows haloing him in gold. Caramel-tinted strands of his hair glimmer, sticking up around his head from repeated passes with his hand. Light hits his eyes turning them to warm bourbon. A blue short-sleeved polo stretches against his biceps, slimming down into a dark pair of dress pants. He holds a lone long-stem white rose. Dust motes dance in the air casting him in a cloud of dreamy this can’t be real.

  “So what’cha say, Sammy Lee?” His lips pull up on one side, diving that dimple deep in his cheek. “Be my best friend prom date?”

  And there goes my giddy balloon, puffing out in farting air all over my heart. Stupid, stupid, of course he only wants to go as friends. I mean who doesn’t create the fairy-tale perfect invitation for a person they view as a friend?

  “Don’t leave me hanging.” His smile drops. “Has someone else already asked?”

  I swallow the lump of disenchantment clogging my throat, screw my most believable smile in place, and inch toward him. “PGP the first never got the chance to live out her namesake, and it would be a true tragedy if Princess Glitter Piggle the Second were to miss out on this golden opportunity because of a decision I make.” My words are sure but shaky.

  He chuckles but his forehead pinches. “Do I hear a but in there?”

  “No, not a but per se, more an alternative. Unless you’re serious about me wearing this,” I wave a hand toward my torso. “You should ask someone else. Dress stores aren’t too accepting of Monopoly money or the bartering system.”

  He grimaces. “Sammy Lee, I don’t care what you wear.” Placing the flower in my hand he circles me. “This is your golden 80s movie moment. I mean, cut the sleeves off this baby, tie-dye it with spray bleach, rip out the crotch so it has a nice slit up the front and the back then grab your sewing machine and one of my mom’s old dresses. Add lace and fru-fru stuff, cinch it up with one of Preslee’s sparkling belts, slip on some heels, and presto you’ve got a whole Pretty In Pink moment. I knew you making me watch that movie a billion times would come in handy.”

  My jaw hits the ground, not because I’m giving merit to his ludicrous idea, but because the set of his brow and twist of his lips tells me he is. Molly Ringwald’s dress was hideous and I always complained she would have been better off just wearing Iona’s old garb than the awful creation she made.

  “Are you kids done? I need to get back to work,” Dad sticks his head in the door, saving me from having to come up with an answer to the Mazric prom dress madness.

  “Right, sure. Sorry.” I grab Mazric’s hand. “We’ll talk about this later?”

  “Jaysus can that girl ever arrive without spraying the driveway all over the place?” Dad growls as I hear a car skidding to a stop.

  Preslee bounds in the barn, smiling ear to ear. “PGP, looking good.” She scratches my pet pig on the back before turning her beaming face toward me. “Giiiirrrrrllll, we’ve got serious prom dress shopping to do,” she cheers, grabbing my hands and spinning in a circle.

  Dizzy, I pull back. “Nothing has changed from when we discussed this earlier, Pres. I still don’t have the funds to buy a dress. How did you know anyway?”

  “Carrie Lynn was busting at the seams to tell someone when Mazric was over here asking your dad’s permission. She called me, I waited for what I thought was the right amount of time, and here I am.”

  He asked my dad? Oh, swooning melty wow. I angle my head to Maz then to Daddy.

  “Boy did the right thing. Said he wanted permission since you’re so young,” Daddy chimes full of pride.

  POP! His words shoot bullets right through those hearts in my eyes. “Right, of course,” I deadpan.

  “Elvis, do you have a dress hidden in the cavernous depth of your closet for Sam?” Mazric asks.

  Carrie Lynn and Pappy round the edge of the door. “We got you covered, baby girl. We’ve been working the budget for the past hour and between all of us we’ll get it done,” Pappy says.

  “I have a better idea,” Preslee’s Aunt Vivianne adds.

  When did she get here?

  “I talked to the twins parents and since Hendrix won’t be needing anything, they volunteered to pay for the girls’ dresses. Told me to hand them the credit card and let ‘em go hog wild.”

  “Really?” Preslee squeals, jumping up and down. “Weekend shopping trip is on.”

  My inner voice screams to decline, stop the madness, and tell them it’s too much. But everyone is smiling and joyous. I don’t want to be the mood killer, but dear God in heaven; I hate shopping with Preslee. She is the most indecisive woman and prom dress buying will be excruciatingly long and tiresome.

  Daddy’s getting restless and too many people crowd his garage. “Well, Maz, looks like you got a date and PGP II becomes a real princess.” I say.

  My pet pig wiggles, snortling—my term for her giggle sounding snort—prancing in a circle almost as if she knows she excelled in status.

  “Daddy and I need to get Mrs. Rayburn’s car back on the road. Preslee, I’ll call you later to work out details. Viv, I wan
t to talk to Mr. and Mrs. Carmichael, and Carrie Lynn, well, I’ll be over soon to freak out. Mazric, you stay and help us. Everyone else, shoo.”

  “Hey, before I forget, don’t worry about transportation. I’ll let Mazric drive the Mustang,” Dad adds as if it’s nothing, making his way to the workbench.

  “Yeeeessss.” Maz fist pumps the air.

  “Great,” I say through a sigh, crestfallen because he’s more excited to drive my car than to be going with me to a dance.

  Through dented pride and battered heart, I allow in a smidge of excitement. I’m going to prom with Mazric. Wish granted. Too bad I wasn’t specific with said wish.

  Twenty

  SAMANTHA

  “PRESLEE,” I WHINE, plopping in a high-back chair of the fifth dress store we’ve visited. My stomach growls, my feet burn, and I’m over the entire experience.

  Do you know how many dress designers angle for a tomboy?

  Zero, absolutely nada.

  Frilly. Poofy. Itchy. This is the South and a dress isn’t a dress without a crinoline. I’m getting hives from the abrasive hooped petticoats.

  She drops an armful of satin in my lap, pointing me to the dressing room. Despite my bellyaching, she’s relentless. I knew I was in trouble with the dress she picked in the first store.

  I walked out of the dressing room up to my eyeballs in tulle, unable to breathe from the built-in corset Preslee said would give me boobs.

  Carrie Lynn’s promise of my body developing came to pass over the past months. I swear one day I was flat as a pancake and the next my chest weight hunched my shoulders. My hips curved out, pulling in my waist, and these balloons below my neck hurt. I had to buy a whole new set of sport bras and I’ve kept the developments buried under big sweatshirts. From what I remember of my mother, she wore her curves like a favorite shirt, exposing as much skin as she could. I prefer to stay under layers but thanks to these dresses, Pres knows what she’s working with. A wicked gleaming determination lit her eyes and she made it her mission to enhance my new rad bod—her words—as much as possible.

  Strapless, plunging, flaring, ugh, I’m dying here. Someone needs to drop a house on Preslee and squish these chipper damn sales ladies too. I stomp in the tiny room with mirrors on all sides ‘cause yes, I enjoy seeing my naked body from every angle. Cursing dressing room designers, I dig through my options.

  In the middle of the pile, royal blue catches my eye. No fluff, no hassle, and no tulle. After stripping off my clothes, I slip the dress over my hips, hooking the gold sequin straps over my shoulders. The draping material feels like cool water on my overheated skin, as the floor-length hem drops to my bare feet. Scrunched blue cups my breast as a loop of more gold rings underneath, pushing them high and displaying a fair amount of cleavage. Dramatic pleats flow around my legs with a long split up the side to my thigh. The bodice form-fits my figure to perfection.

  This is the dress.

  A huge smile tilts my lips as I step out to show Pres, only to find her staring back in the same damn dress but in fuchsia. “Wow,” a low hushed appraisal comes from a man who stands next to his wife; waiting for who I guess is their daughter. He likes my dress. Judging from the slap his wife issues to his chest, she does not.

  “Yeah, what he said,” Preslee agrees. “This one is yours.” She nods rushing back into her dressing room. I breathe a sigh of relief, hoping she finds hers and we leave this hell.

  Shoes, shoes, shoes. Why? Why is she torturing me?

  Pres said ‘yes to the dress’ but before I could even let out a cheer, she ushered me off to the shoe section, which is a whole new fresh level of Hades. She’s going on and on about salon appointments and waxing with twinkling joy shining in her eyes. I’ve gripped my necklace so much today I fear the leather string will snap, though no matter how many wishes I make to just be back on the farm, the nightmare continues.

  I should’ve just worn my coveralls.

  HAS PREPARING FOR ONE night of teenagers dancing to pop music while dressed in expensive clothes always taken a week?

  Why can’t I put on my dress, brush my hair and teeth, slip on my shoes, and go?

  As I sit in a local hair parlor waiting to get waxed, I ponder these things, along with why did I have to let my leg hair grow for two weeks?

  Hearing the ouches and agonized howls of the other patrons is not helping my calm. I’m two seconds from bolting out the door when Jasmine, the owner of Dye-N-Style, calls my name.

  An hour later I understand why those sounds filled the waiting area. That woman removed hair from places I’m certain Mother Nature meant to stay furry. I dropped more curse words in the last sixty minutes than I have in my fifteen years on this planet.

  Fire burns from my vagina to my toes. A bikini skim is what Jasmine called it, but a more proper name is the Satan Ripping. She hit first on my pubes. By the time she terrorized my legs I’d given up all hope, willing to offer her my firstborn if she’d stop the suffering.

  I exit the room walking bow-legged and wondering if a snow cone from the store across the road would extinguish the blaze keeping me from closing my legs. My eyes find Preslee. Spitting nails mad, I hobble faster, fighting welling tears from the added friction. She rises from her plastic chair, gingerly stepping with feet spread wide out the door.

  We ride in silence through town. When we reach the farm, I have one pressing question. “Who in the hell do you think is gonna get a gander at my virginal hoo-ha? Did I wrong you in a previous life? Was this punishment for past sins?”

  She shifts, cringing from her butt rubbing the seat, “I heard Asia and them talking about having it done. If they can handle it, we can too. It’ll get better. Do what Jasmine said and sit with a bag of frozen veggies on for a few hours. Mazric might think he wants to go as friends, but when he sees your dress it will open his eyes. I’ve told you for years he’s like an onion, you just need to peel back the layers. It never hurts to be fully prepared.”

  “Whatever. See ya later this week,” I huff easing out, mumbling about her losing her damn mind if she thinks Mazric will want any part of my terrorized vagina before squat hobbling to the house. “Thank goodness Daddy is in the barn,” I whisper, fishing in the freezer for a bag of peas. The stairs almost kill me but I make it to my room, which is where I remain for the rest of the night except for trading out the melted bag for a fresh one.

  I STARE AT THE PRODUCTS spread out over the bathroom counter. After the waxing nightmare, I argued with Preslee for days over my ability to get myself ready. She provided me with hair products and makeup, giving me a quick tutorial on how to use it all. Yet as I stare at the carnage covering my vanity, I’m thinking I should’ve asked for a diagram. My hair is piled on my head and a straightening iron set to eleventy billion degrees smolders to my right.

  The one item I recognize is a bottle of lotion. “Guess I’ll start with this.” I shrug squirting a dab on my fingertips before spreading it all over my face. Next, I pick up one of the three bottles labeled primer. I dispense a small amount rubbing the paste-like glob between my fingers.

  “This feels like tar. Why? Why do women wear this heavy crap on their face and should I be using a putty knife to spackle it on?” A snorting snicker comes from the open door. Startled, I turn, swinging a hand sending the products lined up like soldiers tumbling to the floor. “Shit,” I shout, watching two splash in the toilet. Fishing them out, I cock a brow at Carrie Lynn now cracking up in the hallway.

  “Sorry.” She sucks in a hiccupping breath. “Preslee called and said you were over here getting ready, so I thought I’d come see if you needed help.”

  “Do you know how to use all of this?” I flip my hands at the counter.

  “Yes. But you don’t need most of it. Take a seat on the toilet.”

  I do as I’m told. She begins with dabs of a light clear primer. Holding up a flesh-toned bottle. “I will use a small amount of this on your forehead and chin, I don’t want to hide your freckles.” She moves t
o my eyebrows, lids, and lashes explaining each step. Within fifteen minutes she’s completed what I’m certain would’ve taken me until tomorrow morning.

  “Now let’s work on your hair.” She pulls me up, placing me in front of the mirror. I gasp at the reflection. Mascara stretches my lashes, curling them high toward my sculpted brows. Subtle sweeping bronze dusts my lids, darkening in the corners and crease turning my eyes into vibrant shamrocks. My cheeks shimmer warm pink, matching the rosewood shade of my lips. Years ago, when Preslee dolled me up for Asia’s party the makeup felt thick and clumpy. Carrie said she only applied foundation on sections she thought needed smoothed. Her light hand allowed the spray of dots along my nose and cheeks to shine through.

  Her fingers pull through my curls from my scalp to my ends. “I’ve been wanting to get my hands in your hair since your first day of fifth grade. Do you remember?”

  My nose scrunches as my eyes meet hers in the mirror. “You said something about Dutch braids?”

  “Yeah,” she hums nodding her head.

  Confusion crinkles my forehead, digging deep grooved lines into the smooth makeup. “You never asked again though.”

  “No, I ‘spose I didn’t,” she responds. “Mazric’s dad and I were trying to have another baby before we lost him,” she offers in a question but expects no answer before she continues. “When I saw how little help he was with Maz, I decided raising another child with an absent father would be wrong, but over the years my mind changed. I tired of dealing with the shallow military wives and pasting on a plastic smile. A part of me hoped another child would open Kyle’s eyes and heart. Our marriage wasn’t great yet not terrible. I wanted a little girl. Mazric is a wonderful boy but he was all about dirt and trucks.”

  A wave of sadness tightens my chest watching her eyes haze, drifting into the past while her fingers work my hair. “Wasn’t too hard to convince Kyle. He got more loving when he was on leave and I got a baby. For two years we gave it our best shot, then one day he was gone. About a month after his funeral I thought I was pregnant for a hot minute but it turned out to be stress.” She swipes a tear from her cheek, offering me a sad smile. “The military didn’t want us anymore, the wives never wanted me, and dealing with the fallout became too painful for his unit. Then Joe came up with a cockamamie story about needing us on the farm.”