FICTION

The Hope We Carry

In the span of a typical night

“The girl in white,” that’s what they called me.

To be fair, in my airy midi-length dress, with long sleeves and a rough trim, I did stick out like a sore thumb. Everyone else looked ten years younger, grooved seamlessly to the echoing techno beats, and the bright pink light bounced off their rhinestone-covered eyes. Damn you, Euphoria.

Mike started me off with a beer, as I was a polite regular and a well-paying customer. He cut me off often too, which was definitely not fun. But, well.

The black sink was sparkling clean and smelled of chemicals. The beginning of the night was easy, and I didn’t want to return here when the floor would be smeared with puke. I blindly reached for my lip gloss while checking if my bangs held up and my hand grazed on a zip-lock baggie.

I shot off a quick text to Blake, “Thanks, MOM.” She’d packed me crackers for god’s sake. I felt a flash of anger; I was tired of being treated like a child, but I brushed it off. She was the only constant, the only one who knew.

It was weird for someone to have a signature color for their night outs. But I had one, despite its high potential to stain. By now I’d gotten quite good at laundry and I could afford the expensive dry cleaning. Somehow it worked.

When my future partner told this story, of the night they met me, I wanted them to describe me as ethereal. As that weird girl who wore a white dress to a club and that they couldn’t take their eyes off me. Our first conversation was magic and it made them feel like they could never let go.

I scanned the room again and sighed. I didn’t bother to slap on labels and was at ease with myself. It was them liking me back — that was the problem.

“You know what surprises me more, than the fact you made it home in one piece? That your makeup’s still intact.” Blake remarked when I walked in, throwing my shoes off, before flopping with a big thud on the couch.

“It’s all in the baking. I can show you”.

She flipped me off. Blake had moved on from this — from following societal norms, cakey makeup, searching for great love, and the night outs.

“What was my night girl up to?”, I ask, batting my eyelids goofily.

“Writer's block. I was wandering through the halls like a ghost when you showed up. But I am not worried, it’s just 3 a.m. The night’s still young.”

“How goes the search for the other half?”

I buried my head in my fingers, massaging the top of my eyelids. I honestly didn’t know how long I could keep going. It was supposed to have happened by now. I had a good job, went running every evening, and cooked most of my meals. It was time for the second protagonist to enter.

“You know how it is,” I say, with a fake smile, she immediately recognizes.

“No, tell me.”

“I talked to two people and got their details, but I am not excited. There’s a pattern. In the beginning, they are overzealous and stalk me online. They want to know me and make me feel like every word coming out of my mouth needs to be written down. They are elated to meet someone real.”

“Then the layers start peeling back. They see the weirdness, the unprompted darkness, and the contrasting hopeless romantic. Suddenly the quirky turns into spooky and they run towards the door like a cartoon.”

“The messages become formal, “Nice to meet you,” Let’s see I’m a bit busy..”, and finally taper out. I don’t see anything different happening this time.”

Blake doesn’t respond. She moves over to the couch and puts my head on her lap. She starts talking about the story she is writing tonight, and how her structure is all muddled up. She doesn’t know where it’s going yet.

Five years ago, I’d have crashed already. But at 33 my body wasn’t as forgiving. I took off my makeup and completed my ten-step skincare routine, after a quick, scaldingly hot shower. I ate a grilled cheese.

My pajamas were softer than usual and smelled of our new fabric conditioner. I redid my bed and arranged the pillows around where my body would soon lie. After picking a book, I wandered to Blake’s room to say goodnight. She was sitting at her desk, staring out the large window.

“Any plans to sleep?” I asked her, leaning against the door.

“You know me, I can’t rest till the birds start singing. I am thinking 7 a.m. should be fine. You should sleep, your eye cream won’t fix those bags.”

I smiled and started to turn around when she stopped me with her arm.

“I know you’re tired, but one day when we’re old and gray, you’ll look back at this time fondly.” She says in a whisper, her brown eyes still and focused.

“You mean when we are sitting by our deck overlooking the sea?”

“Don’t do that. You know I don’t like that version.”

“Okay fine…” I continue sheepishly. “When we’re sitting in the nursing home, in standard issue sweats, licking the bottom of the jello cup.”

She shoots me her trademark smile. Soft, content, and genuine.

“By the way, you’re not weird. It’s the definition of normal that’s fucked up.”

“It’s okay I don’t mind,” I reply shakily, averting her gaze. I like to pretend that I chose this label for myself — that I owned it. But I couldn’t fool her. “You’ve got a weird thing too, which makes it better”. This part was true.

“What, the vampiric hours and shut-in lifestyle?” She asks in between chuckles. It’s her who looks ethereal, even in two-day-old baggy pants.

“No. That you think I’m perfect.”

I woke up the next morning with a mild headache. 50 notifications waited to be addressed on my phone, my latest conquests had had a busy night.

“They can wait,” I said out loud, before making my way into the kitchen. The quiet footsteps were second nature to me, and I considered the quickest breakfast I could make for myself before diving into emails. Mondays were the worst. When I opened the fridge to take out my cold brew, I saw a bag.

There were bagels from my favorite store. And on them a yellow note.

I neatly fold it and keep it in my back pocket. Then I start the microwave and set the mise en place. Seasoning, fruits, cream cheese, and a knife.

2 minutes is a long time for an anxious mind to wander. My headphones were in my room and my body ached too much for me to make a second trip. Dancing is for the young, I thought to myself for what seemed like the hundredth time. And of course, I couldn’t play anything loudly on speaker.

Blake was the only person who didn’t laugh at me. The one who stuck by me for years, after seeing me at my worst — and that stuff is worse than your nightmares. The people who had me rejected me, but she didn’t.

She didn’t agree with everything I said and didn’t often have answers. But she listened, to my constant complaining, my frustrated rants, and all my weird theories about why the world is so screwed up. She got me.

I glance at the note once more while my laptop boots and push it into my drawer, with the others. I mean to organize them, but nothing fits.

“I don’t just think you’re perfect. You are perfect”, it read.