Knockout Nina’s

It’s hell on Earth, and I want out

It was at Knockout Nina’s that I decided to make my move.

That’s where Kelly is most comfortable, in that hell on earth. Hell isn’t full of fire and brimstone, ladies and gentlemen; it’s full of blouses and skirts and suits and accessories. It has neon piping around the already bright walls and coffin-sized changing rooms in the back, hidden from the innocent and unwary in the mall corridor outside. The Devil doesn’t have cloven feet and a pitchfork. No, it’s a she, and she wears a name tag, the store’s clothes, a permanent cheerful smile, and she carries an incessant supply of annoying questions and interruptions — “Doesn’t she look great?” “How’s she doing?” “This is cute, and it’s on sale!”

Her voice may sound innocent and hopelessly ditzy to me, but it always manages to please and encourage the twelve-year-old girls coming in to try in clothes that will make them look years older, and the forty-year-old women wanting to wear the same clothes and look years younger.

But that’s what the Devil does, isn’t it? Lures you in, tempts you, and traps you in those changing rooms. (Just like girls too, all that luring. You know it was Eve who messed up and then dragged Adam down with her). You can rarely leave without buying something. The Devil makes that blouse so irresistible, that dress so cute, those jeans so perfect for you.

That’s my humble opinion, anyway. Kelly absolutely loves that place. It’s in the Dogwood Mall, a good half an hour drive from the town where we live. I always do the driving. Kelly failed her beginners three times. Those road signs can be tricky to learn, especially the ones with words, not pictures. Most of that drive is spent listening to Kelly tell me why she is running out of closet space and could Lisa be so mean, and how could Doug do that to Wendy? I always block her out and concentrate on the road ahead. I wouldn’t want to accidentally ram into a tree and kill her, would I?

She drags me there every Saturday afternoon, and there she stays for at least three hours. I started timing our visits there after a while. Her current record in one hour, fifty-seven minutes, and this was because she’d already put the truckload of stuff she wanted to buy on layaway. She takes time to look at everything on the racks, whether it will fit her or not. After a long trek through the maze of feminine apparel, the Devil, Kelly, and I each haul a load of clothes over to the changing rooms. I always dump my load of skirts on one of the chairs outside the changing rooms, and take my usual seat across from Kelly’s.

That was how it went that last time I was in the Abyss. It was last August, and of course, Kelly had to add to her already massive wardrobe.

“School’s starting, John, and I have nothing to wear!” she said on the drive over when I asked why we had to spend the day shopping when it was so nice outside. It had rained most of that summer on Victoria Island, and that was one of the few sunny and warm days. I wanted to take her to the beach. Maybe Kelly would wear one of her bikinis. She’s one of those girls that goes to the beach and does nothing but sit there and look sexy. Not much fun, but a great person to sit next to when the buff, popular guys walk by with their girlfriends. It earns you a little respect, having a babe in a bikini sitting next to you, especially if you’re not much to look at. But no, we had to go to a place that was even hotter than the sun outside.

“What about the clothes you bought a couple of months ago? You said they’d be great for school.”

She looked at me like I had three heads. She could certainly use three heads. Then maybe she’d have a whole brain.

“That was last season’s style. I have to be ready for this season.”

I kept my mouth shut. I didn’t give a hoot about the fall’s fashion season.

We walked under the big neon sign (Knockout Nina’s — Fashionably stylish clothes, for fashionable, stylish women — the stupidest slogan I ever heard). The store is all in bright colors with huge signs with women with Jennifer Aniston garden shears haircuts wearing the clothes hanging on the racks. It looked innocent enough, with its mirrors, changing rooms, counter and cash register, with the socks and scrunchies strategically placed behind them. The only thing was, the woman manning the cash register was the Devil’s Imp. She was at least forty, and the little jumper she was wearing did not make her look any younger. It made her look even older. And it was an ugly jumper, too. I looked around for the Devil herself, and thankfully she was tormenting some other customers in the back of the store.

We did the usual tour: suits, blouses, sweaters, pants, skirts, then accessories. It took us a record-breaking thirty-six minutes to cover the entire store. Kelly didn’t seem to be in to it, but I didn’t worry about it too much. I wanted to make my move and get out. I took my seat across from Kelly’s changing room and prepared my response for when she would emerge with her usual questioning look. I’ve thought about carving the words HELP ME! I’M A TRAPPED BOYFRIEND! On the wall behind me, but I figured other unfortunate souls might follow suit. The wall would be mangled with such insights as I’M A SUCKER or THE DEVIL IS HERE AND SHE’S A FIEND FROM CLUELESS!

The first thing she modeled was a pink cashmere sweater, only one button buttoned at her chest. I broke off my contemplation of how to exorcise the Devil from the store to look up at her.

“That’s nice,” I said. “Why don’t you do up the rest of the buttons?”

“Oh John, you’re silly,” she answered, looking at me funny again and giggling. You know that giggle that Hillary did on the Fresh Prince? That’s what Kelly sounds like. Only Hillary Banks is Einstein when put next to Kelly. “It’s the style. It’s the way it’s done. It’s in.”

I nodded quickly so she wouldn’t explain why. Like I said, I didn’t give a hoot. She went back into the changing room while I waited, the usual routine. After a minute, she came out wearing a green pleated skirt. I confess it was her legs that I was examining. I couldn’t help it. Kelly’s legs are long and shapely, and they actually have some flesh on them. Why girls are always complaining about the size of their thighs is beyond me. Sure, the cottage cheese thing is nasty, but bony legs are even worse. If you can put two hands around a teenage girl’s thigh, then she’s a bone rack and short skirts won’t do a thing for her. With Kelly, though, skirts like the one she was wearing make her legs look even better.

“John? John, what do you think? Is it too short?” I tore my eyes away from her thighs to look up at her.

“No, no, it’s great. You should get that.” I wasn’t thinking that I may not see her in it if I went through what I planned to do.

“I’ll think about it,” she said distantly, as she turned and disappeared behind the changing room door. I didn’t give the distance in her voice much thought then, but I’ve realized since what it meant.

She was gone longer this time, giving me time to think. I hadn’t minded coming to the store that day, despite my protests, which were automatic (ring a bell, and the dogs salivate; tell me I’m going to Hades, I protest). Because, like I said, it’s where Kelly was most comfortable. You see, the move I wanted to make was to tell her I thought we should break up. I just couldn’t do it anymore. Kelly is a hopeless ditz. When we weren’t at Knockout Nina’s, I’m helping her with her homework, which, most of the time, is simple. She wears all these sexy clothes and walks down the halls in school and flirts mindlessly with anything in jeans, never noticing my anxiety. And she has that stupid giggle that says, uhuh, I’m easy and stupid, uhuh.”

Why did I start going out with her? Well, I’d always liked looking at her and when we both signed up for the debate team (don’t ask me why she thought she could discuss anything but Calvin Klein and Levi’s), we spent a lot more time together. I finally got enough guts to ask her out and without a giggle she said yes. We’d been going out for three months that Saturday at Nina’s. Why? Because it would take more guts to dump her than it did to ask her out. Even if I didn’t really respect her, I didn’t want to hurt her feelings, and I was sort of used to the idea of having a girlfriend, ditzy or not. Even away from the beach, Kelly made me look handsome and cool when she was with me, and I liked that. Besides, her lack of brains didn’t come into effect when we kissed. And, could she kiss! If tonsil hockey were an Olympic event, Kelly would win all three medals — one each for endurance, intensity, and tongue speed. Kissing is obviously studied in a book, because she could do it without any trouble.

“John?” This time it was a pair of jeans. “What do you think?”

“They look nice. Aren’t they a little loose?” They looked if they were painted on. Again, I couldn’t help myself. Kelly looks great in anything skintight. I wondered if she was damaging her internal organs by wearing them. I wondered if I cared.

“I don’t think so, but I can get another size,” she said immediately, surprising me. Instantly, the annoying saleswoman came up. Speak of the Devil, I thought.

“Do you need a smaller size?” she said in her best helpful voice, which to me sounded like a demented canary, high-pitched and stupid.

“Yeah, I need an eight,” Kelly replied Kelly in the same voice, but with less brains.

While the Devil was getting the jeans, I looked up at Kelly. She smiled at me. Yeah, she was pretty. She had big brown eyes, a cute little nose, and a very cool mouth. She had big lips, not so big as to be freakish, but a nice size for kissing. She had brown hair down to her shoulders, in that Jennifer Aniston thing I mentioned. I couldn’t believe it that May when she came to school with that new hairdo. She’d joined the majority of girls in our school who had copied the style. When I asked her if she felt like a clone, she shrugged and said, “I guess we all have the same good taste.” Or the same brain-eating disease, otherwise known as femininity, I thought, but did not say. Despite all her sex appeal, though, I just couldn’t respect her. She thought a quarterback was a refund.

I decided to go for it.

“Kelly, there’s something I have-”

But the Devil was back. She was like a bad penny, always turning up. She handed Kelly the jeans. She had been looking at me funny again, but this time it wasn’t because I’d asked a stupid question. It was as if she was considering something. She turned into the changing room.

“Does she need anything else?” the Devil/saleswoman asked, turning to me. It amazes me she never stopped to consider the gaps at the top and bottom of the changing room door, not to mention the lack of a ceiling on it. The thing wasn’t soundproof. Why did she always ask me? I don’t wear the silly clothes! That’s another thing — if I was a girl, I would be strictly jeans and T-shirts, and none of these satin and shiny clothes either. If someone was wearing on Electric Circus, then it’s not for me. But I’m not a girl, and that’s something I’m thankful for every time I see Kelly taking min steps in her tight miniskirt.

“No thanks,” I said, managing a pathetic smile. I hated her, but I was gracious. What can I say? I had put up with Kelly for three months, hadn’t I? And I was going to let her down easy, in her favorite place in the world. She probably wouldn’t appreciate it though.

“Okay,” came the cheerful reply. I watched her walk away to meet a customer coming toward her. It was a girl my age carrying a skirt twin to the one Kelly had tried on. She was with a guy, probably her boyfriend. Whatever he was, he was another sucker, lured in here by the girl and trapped by the Devil. Was it a conspiracy? Could be. Girls do that. They get together and plot and plan. That is, they plot and plan when they’re not giggling or gushing over Brad Pitt.

The Devil guided the girl to the booth adjacent to Kelly’s. The boyfriend sat down next to me. He was pretty big, in a jock sort of way. He didn’t look too happy to be there. His rough-looking face was crunched in a frown. I didn’t think e really had a reason to frown. After all, he only had to sit for one skirt. I was pretty jealous of him.

“Here you go,” said the Devil, opening the door for the girl.

“Will she be needing anything else today?” she piped. The boyfriend had considerably less grace than I did, which is normal for a jock, the male equivalent to girls like Kelly.

“No,” he growled, looking up at her. Way to go, I silently cheered. The Devil was taken aback.

“Like, sorry,” she muttered and walked off. I looked over at the boyfriend with new respect. His frown had deepened. The girl came out with the skirt on. Her legs were almost as nice as Kelly’s. She asked the guy what he thought. His eyes were crawling over her legs, which I admit, I was giving the once-over too. But I did it inconspicuously, so I wouldn’t get punched by the big guy.

“It’s hot, Pam. It’s a bit long, though. Not that it matters. You won‘t be wearing it for long.” We both laughed, but I didn’t do it too loudly. The boyfriend might think I was laughing at him. Pam smiled and giggled. She tossed her hair and flashed more thigh before twirling back into her changing room. I rolled my eyes. Another mindless flirt. Another example to support my theory that Knockout Nina’s is magnet.

The guy nudged me with his elbow. I quickly stopped rolling my eyes. I didn’t want them blackened for me.

“We’ll be busy, know what I mean?” he said, laughing. I smiled back, and we laughed again. I turned to see if Kelly had come out yet and saw her looking at me over the top of the door. She opened it quickly and came out of the changing room. I looked at her as she limped out. The new pair of jeans were still very tight, and just barely reached her hips.

“What took you so long?” I asked.

“Stupid jeans were too tight,” she answered, not looking at me. She was looking at the boyfriend. She narrowed her eyes a bit, then looked at me.

“So, why did you try to put them on?” I asked her.

“I dunno,” she said. She was trying to find an excuse. “You did suggest I try them.”

“But if they don’t fit…” I wondered how long she’d been looking at me over the door, and if she had known a size eight would be too small for her. Was she stalling?

“Well, anyway, I have a shirt left to try.”

She disappeared. Pam came out of her room and started toward the counter to pay for her skirt. The boyfriend got up. Then I did something completely out of the blue. I don’t really know why; maybe things would have turned out differently if I hadn’t.

“Don’t forget the condoms,” I said to him. He looked at me and smiled.

“No time to put it on,” he said. “She’s all over me all the time.”

I nodded and laughed. He turned to join his girlfriend. The Devil was putting the skirt into a bag and giving it to Pam.

“Have a great day!” she chirped, to Pam alone. She gave the jock a demonic frown.

“Whatever,” replied the guy as they walked out, his hand already on Pam’s butt. I smiled. At least his trip into Hell had been worthwhile. Wow, he could go home and reap the reward for his excursion.

I turned as Kelly came out. She was wearing a red shirt and her own jeans. She looked troubled. I used the answer I had prepared for when she what she was trying on wasn’t short, tight, or both.

“I think it’s nice, Kel-”

I’ll never forget what she said when she interrupted me.

“John, I think we should see other people. I guess I’m just too sophisticated for you. Sorry it took so long for me to tell you, I was waiting for the right time.”

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