Adore.

Wear these shoes and that dress. Put on this new necklace and borrow my gold bracelet. I love you in that gloss, take it with you and come with me to get a new one. Did you hear about her? She got out using this diet and eating nothing but kale and shrimp. Her mother was blonde, but now she's a brunette. You should try a new shade. I want sunglasses, a new bag, and my old shoes. I love the gym because we eat ice cream on the way home and fake it in pilates. I have ideas on how to break in, as if we'd ever do it. Drinking gin in teacups and wearing lace to the library just to see the guy behind the counter blush. You are too shy, who cares about your thighs. Men only like girls who do this, that, and those, but not these. NEVER these. Does this have sugar? I'm on carbs again because I almost got fired when I stopped. I cry every time I see this movie, even though it's about a subject I don't get. What is with that look?! Who does she think she is, US? You laugh too loud, I chew my gum like a girl from the block. You have an ass, I've got boobs. If we were older, we'd still be hot. We're just going to stop eating and spend every dime shopping. If I can walk from midtown to the LES I'll burn enough to go to Max Brenner. Will you quit it? I never sleep. That's for you because you're lame. Cats itch me but your dog is like my nephew, I'll pet him through the hives. I can't get over it with you. Think he'll call me? If he doesn't let's drink cheap champagne and eat popcorn. I love you and your guts. I bought you a pack of these because I know you didn't need this. When he gets here, hide the ugly plates, those are only for you. What are you gonna do this Summer? Can we go skiing? I know you don't know how, but fake it. I pretended I was someone else so he wouldn't see me.

There is no one I love more than my friends.

Shoot First.

So it was an epic disaster, we thought there should have scoreboards.

I sat. Directly across from you. I. Was. Absolutely. Crushed.

But life goes on and I'm a soldier by now. You've got to carry on, you've got to come through, you've got to stay smiling even when it kills, pretty girl. Smile up and on, and laugh the loudest. No one likes a pout.

In a way, I want you to know. I wanted you to feel as rotten as I did, whether or not you deserved it. I don't care how stupid that is; and all of my friends can say what they want to about me. I needed to bring you down even if that was the only place we'd even have any contact. I never told you, never will. (unless you asked?) The words seem so foul I'll never say... you go first. I ran away because I can't hide my facial expressions yet, I'm still learning. I refused to let you near me because I needed you to go away. I needed to make you not exist. I don't care if you don't understand. I know you don't know me well enough to understand.

Do you?

If I could, I'd tell you. I'd tell you how sorry I am I hurt your feelings back then, how seeing you there this week made me understand. I'd tell you that you fascinate me, that I get such a kick out of you. That I can't find comfort when you're around, just hoping you notice me. That I'd love to know you beyond the ridiculous shallow conversation we share when we aren't arguing simply for the hell of it. I want to know your stories, what makes you cry. I want to know what makes you get up in the morning, what you dream of doing. Who you admire. Have you ever been embarrassed? What was the highest moment of your life? I want to know what makes you laugh. I want to know if you like the rain, the color green, your favorite book. Are you ever afraid? You once told me no one listens to you.

I want to tell you I'd listen for hours, if only you'd talk to me, not at me like we always do.

I don't trust easy, and don't give away my time or affection at all. After years of feeling nothing, I don't want to hang on the arm of anyone. And, the truth is, I am happy. My friends will tell me, what a shame. I say I am, at last. I finally am. Seeing my own name on the setting at last, it feels differently than the plus one they strive so ferevently for.

But sitting across from you, surrounded by people in the crowd, the only person I could see with us was her.

And you were gorgeous.

And, it was then, there, I was alone.

I really am sorry, and not just because you hit back. You have no idea at all what I'd give to take it back. To erase every horrible thing I ever did to you. To go back to the day I met you and change it all.

But, I can't. I couldn't. So we sat, at a stalemate.

Stalemate.

I'd even try saying something terrible now, just for movement. Just to know I mattered in some way. To know I could still get under your skin, could get where I used to be.

At one point, I looked up and across. You smiled back as we locked eyes, you had been looking at me. I looked away, immediately, thanking whatever gods may be my makeup was thick enough to hide the extent of my blush.

Did you see me?

I think things will get better. I know so.

Just shoot first.

Ain't No Rest for the Wicked

Love, who are you fooling? There's been ones like you before. You're not the first playing this role. I'm over you, you bore me with your ridiculous antics. I'm not going to dinner with you, I'm not going to meet your mother. I'm not going to see you at all. Don't ask me for anything. You disgust me, pathetic sir. Talking to me brings you back to a time when you felt free. That time has gone, and it isn't coming back. What makes you this unbelievable? You can have all the expensive cars you choose, the suits that cost more than I make in a month, the resume that fits a manuscript, and it doesn't amount to a paperboy's salary.

Unlike your foolish girls, I don't come at a price. They break too easily.

I wonder if C and J all fall for your nonsense? You go to your parties on the rooftop. You drink your drinks, you let your staff feed us at your extravagant expense, my friends danced at your club - it's in all the news, you insist- the envy of all those girls in heels they starved for. They don't know who they're dealing with. Nor do you. Give it up, chief. You reek of the drugstore and the gym, you tan in the Almalfi until you are the color of a finely polished shoe, you sit in the sun smoking your cigarette and offering all the girls whatever you think will do the trick. Do you think you're something new?

Even L has, quite possibly, jumped on the bandwagon. You'd be perfect, she says. She doesn't know; I've no desire to be near you. At all.

Your persona shines with the undeniable sheen of polyester. You slip around the room like a greased eel. Seeing you brings to mind the yogurt I let rot in my fridge. I didn't even like the stuff when it was fresh.

I will never date you, the girls can protest as they rightfully so may, perhaps pitying me into falling for your slippery kindness. I will have nothing to do with any of you. There's a society of men like yourself, you know. You ought to see it. You are no different than all the gold-toothed figures of my childhood, hawking their pills at kids with blue hair. Dad said to watch those men; stay away because they get you nowhere. You're nothing new. Just like them.

I'll smile at you, perhaps even laugh at your jokes. You know, it's the same game we're playing here, you just don't know how to hide your hand. Sitting in your gold-guilded bathroom, I thought it was so tacky you sleep in a place with lilies in the yard and a shower littered with Jameson. There are Stargazers in the dining room, you say.

My favorite flowers.

Wasn't it you who sent me the roses with the odd little note: "To melt the heart of my Ice Queen, and if these die, I'll get you shoes."

You even left an emoticon.

Don't you see? You barely know me. But I know you.

(I'm not, and never will be, or was, your anything. I'm not frigid, you just overwhelm me with your irrepressible heat. It's so ubiquitous. You picked me because, you say, I like your face. It makes you look good. In reality, you picked me because you can't understand me.)

I'm not walking in anything from you. I'm not going anywhere where you may be. You remind me of everything I hate about this place.

I'm not interested in your cheap ploys. I don't care about your watch. Tell me something that matters, tell me something I can think about.I shook your hand before I left, I didn't want an air-kiss, and you frowned. Vapid.

I look at you and know I don't care about what makes your world turn. It's too tangible.

Ugly Duckling

I took out all the old photos. Just to see her, the girl I used to avoid in department store mirrors.

I look at her, fat, thin, worried, happy, pimply, clear faced, long hair, short hair, all the same. I feel her. I see her. I am her. I realize those days are gone, but I'm still her. She is still me, I see her in the rejection and daily minor failures, both perceived and real. She is the reason for my self doubt, for my hate of form fitting dresses, for my sadness and fear of just never being enough. She can't tan, just like me. She has hair that has no color, no shine. She has eyes that are muddy green and have such poor vision on their own. I see her in a lot of people. I see her in other girls, younger and older. In my assistant, in the people I interact with, my awkward teenaged cousins. I want to hug her. To tell her she wasn't as bad as she believed. She wasn't alone.

She may be gone, but she lives on in me, around me.

She gave me my empathy, something I'm complimented on. She gave me my humor, my vigor, my extroversion. I owe to her many of the times I'll recount when in need of a laugh, the awful taste that drove me to my career, the plight I shared with my current best friend back then, the run in with a bully turned long term boyfriend years later. She made it possible.

Every woman in fashion was like her once. She;s my best kept secret and unlikely closest ally.

And it is to her, I am, eternally grateful.