"'kay, now you _really_ have to get up," Cammie tells
me. She has a glass of water in one hand, a glass of lake scum in the
other, a dress draped over her arm and a coil of rope around her neck. I
sit up blearily and consider inquiring about the latter.
I decide not to. "Give me one good reason," I
suggest.
She smirks. "David's coming to take you out to dinner
in an hour."
"WHAT?" I leap out of bed with true Barishnikov
panache, and snatch the glass of water out of her hand on the way to the
shower. "I should have been up hours ago!"
My room-mate follows me, thoughtfully picking up things I might
need along the way. Like, you know, a towel. "I tried to wake
you up, but you just-"
"Yeah, I know. Maybe I should call David and
cancel..." I wonder.
Cammie shakes her head so vehemently her scrunchy flies off across
the bathroom and lands in the tub. "Not a chance. Do you
realize what today is?"
My alcohol-fogged brain churns out a short alphabetized list of
holidays, but none that could really concern Cammie, David, or me.
"Um, Sunday?" I try.
She nods encouragingly. "It's your anniversary!
Remember?"
I stare at her stupidly. "My anniversary was in
February, or in April, depending on whom you ask. And anyway, I somehow
doubt that David would be…oh. You mean the David and me, anniversary."
"Yeah."
"That's today?" I push her out the door, but not
before she shoves the glass of pond scum into my hand.
"Yes," she says from the other side of the door,
"and drink this. It'll help."
I take a sip. "Wow," I comment, gagging, "the
flavor of road kill and the unexpected color of your run-of-the-mill garden
mulch. Cam, you've surpassed yourself."
"Shut up," she says good-naturedly. "If
you're not ready by the time David gets here, I may take him!"
To be perfectly honest, I almost wished she would. It would
save me so much trouble.
Does that sound bitchy? Uncharitable? Perhaps.
But let me give you a quick over-view of the bad knitting-ish qualities my life
has recently taken on. Starting from the beginning, I have a
boyfriend.
What, you ask? Why isn't Donnatella Moss leaping for
joy? Why isn't she shouting it across the city? Could it possibly
be because she doesn't really care? I'd like to answer your question in
two parts - first, shut up, you're really starting to sound like Josh, and that
just bugs me, and second...okay, there's just the one part. I'm getting
there.
I'm calling David my boyfriend because after two months of rather
sporadic dating, he finally kissed me - properly kissed me - yesterday at
lunch. Although this would have been much more romantic and sweet had he
not actually kissed my twin sister, thinking it was me.
All the same, from where I sat, the kiss looked very pleasant.
Secondly, Josh...
I sigh and step into the shower. Josh. Josh Josh
Joshua Josh Josh. Josh has been acting strange. I mean, he's
usually acting strange, whether it's buying me flowers at the wrong time or
covertly burning the White House down. But this is a whole other kind of
strange. This is staring off into space, forgetting what he's talking to
me about kind of strange. I actually caught him skipping down the hall
from the mess two days ago.
This troubled me.
The next confusing aspect of my life is that I have a twin
sister. Actually, this has confused me for nearly thirty years, and
generally confused everyone else, too. The current problem I have with
this is that she originally showed up to beat up my boss (call me a pacifist,
but I just don't like people doing that) but ended up making out with my
boyfriend on a public street.
Don't look at me like that. I only asked her to fill in for
me at lunch, not stick her tongue down his throat.
After successfully stirring up my life like a small boy on an
anthill with a stick, she traipsed off to Vegas to elope with her
occasionally-employed Scotch boyfriend.
This I could have dealt with. Up until this point, I still
had some degree of control over my life. But after this point...Oh, I
just don't want to talk about it.
I sigh, step out of the shower and wrap a towel around
myself. For a moment, I have a flash back to my childhood. Until I
was, like, eight, I used to have to take baths with my sister. We would
sit there and play mermaids with our Barbies, our toes turning into prunes,
until our mother would bustle into the unheated bathroom. I remember
thinking at the moment when she whisked me out of the tepid water and wrapped
me securely in a thick towel, that I would like to stay cocooned like that forever.
Well, maybe that wasn't my precise thought - I was seven years old
- but it was somewhere along those lines.
It occurs to me that I may be becoming sickeningly sentimental in
my old age. But since it looks like I'm going to an anniversary dinner, this
is probably just the right age to be stuck in. If I can manage to tear
myself out of my comfortable towel cocoon, that is.
For the moment, I can't. Instead, I walk over to where
Camilla Brown's Super Hangover Remover is watching me, and upend the glass over
the sink.
Nothing happens. The sludgy contents remain firmly lodged at
the bottom.
Just the idea of drinking this stuff on a regular basis would be enough
to turn me into a teetotaler. Cammie, who actually does drink it, must
have the digestive capabilities of a small hippopotamus.
Eeew.
Sorry, that was just me thinking about digesting anything.
The very concept of food nauseates me at the moment. I wonder if I can
ask the waiter for a plate of Saltines. That probably wouldn't go over to
well at any of the places David likes to take me - he really likes those fancy
French bistros. As long as I can avoid ingesting any type of creature
that spends it's days under a rock, I think I'll be okay.
Oh, augh.
Studiously ignoring the toilet, I sit down on the edge of the tub
and remember how I got into this state. It fits in nicely with Josh's
recent strangeness. It's directly related to Josh's strangeness. I
can, in fact, blame every tap-dancing elephant in my head on him.
He told me he loved me. And then passed out, drunk.
Of all the cruel, thoughtless things he's ever said to me, that
takes the cake.
I take those three words very, very seriously. Maybe, you
wonder, it's because somewhere in my tragic past, no-one ever said them to
me? No, actually. I come from a very verbal family, and they never
for a moment let me think I wasn't loved. It's just kind of...it's really
weird. It's just that _I_ can't say it. I can't say the words
"I Love You" unless I really mean it.
Yeah, I know. I have the emotional maturity of a six-year
old. But there's no real turning back from "I Love You".
Those words can't be laughed off. They don't go away. So when
someone whom I've been close to for years tells me he loves me and smells like
beer - let just say I've been down that path before.
Once, just once, I'd like a man to be in his right mind before
making me a promise like that. I deserve that much, don't I?
No, that was an actual question. You can go ahead and
answer. `Cause I'm beginning to wonder.
I wrap a robe around myself and pad to my bedroom. Across
the rumpled quilt lies a short, shimmery, pale blue dress. It has a
scooped neckline and happens to be one size to small.
"Cammie!" I holler. Surprisingly enough, my head
does feel better. "Why is your dress on my bed?"
"Because you're going to wear it!"
"It's too small!"
"It'll look great!" She pokes her head once again
in the door. "Trust me on this, Donna. It makes _me_ look
provocative. On you it will look—"
"Unbearably seductive."
"It's six inches too short!"
"It looks great on me," she replies.
"You're five feet tall!"
"It'll drive David nuts. In fact, I think you should
seriously consider garters."
"Go away!"
As usual, she doesn't. "Dress for sex, Donna!"
I stand there and gape at her for a moment. Eventually I get
my vocal cords working again. "What?"
"Tonight is the night, Donna."
I wince. That sounds painfully familiar. "The
night for sex?"
"Yep. I think you've waited long enough, don't
you?"
"No!" I screech. She looks startled, so I try to
tone it down a little. "I'm David's first relationship since his wife
died in that freak accident."
"Things like that happen. He should get on with his
life."
"Things like that do _not_ happen! She was crushed by
an elevator while she was jogging. An accident like that simply does not
happen. That's like being killed by a...a...vending machine or
something!"
"So you're really only concerned about David, huh?
You're taking it slow for his sake?"
"Yes," I tell her defiantly. I slip the dress over
my head and enjoy the feel of the cool cloth against my skin.
"It has nothing to do with-"
"No!"
Her green eyes crinkle skeptically. I sniff and dig around
in the closet for a pair of heels. It's true, I insist to myself, I just
don't want David to get hurt.
"I think he is."
I look up, curious. "Who's what?"
"Big Bad Deputy Man. I think he's in love with
you."
"You're a lunatic!" I gasp. "But -
wait. How did you...?"
There's the Cheshire grin again. "'Donna Moss Tells All
Under The Influence'," she says, sketching the headline out in the air.
"He was drunk."
"And your point is...?"
"He didn't know what he was saying. He probably doesn't
even remember it."
Cammie crinkles her eyes again and leaves, letting me complete my
beautification process in peace. I take meticulous care with my make-up,
more out of absent-mindedness than any intention to wow my date.
Although, I think, surveying my face in the mirror – I _do_ look pretty good.
I hear the doorbell ring and rush out to get it. Outside in
the hall David stands in slacks and a polo shirt, suddenly making me feel
ridiculously over-dressed. He _does_ stare at me in impressed shock, and
that makes up for a lot. That, and the fact that he has a dozen red roses
in his hand.
Yes, he brought me flowers.
Fortunately for the dress, he doesn't. He holds the flowers
out to me. "Beautiful flowers for a beautiful lady,"
`Wait,' says a snide little internal voice that sounds like (of
course), Josh. `I heard that line on AMC last night!'
`You don't even watch AMC, you dork,' I retort. "Thank
you, David! They're absolutely beautiful! I don't know what to
say!"
`That'd be a first,' says snide Josh.
"Why don't you run and put those in some water,
sweetheart? Then we can go to dinner."
I turn back into the apartment and obey. Outside the kitchen
he's still talking. "I know you don't really like the fancy places,
so I got us reservations at Tony's. I hope that's okay?"
Tony's. Me and Josh used to go to Tony's every once in a
while, sometimes just the two of us, sometimes with Sam or CJ and Toby.
Of course, all of that stopped since the MS hit the press. "Yeah,
that's great," I call back. I quickly arrange the roses in the vase
- the same one that my last batch of April flowers came in. As I turn to
leave the kitchen, it the top-heavy flowers tip it over and spray across the
floor.
"I'll get them for you, Donna," Cammie tells me from her
spot next to the stove. "But I think it's a sign."
I raise an eyebrow. "A sign?"
"That he loves you."
I got the feeling she wasn't talking about the man out in the
living room. I shake my head. "Sometimes, Cam..."
"Sometimes what?"
"Sometimes I fear for your sanity." She opens her
mouth to make a smart remark, but I talk fast and back out the door.
"I'll be back later. See you!"
He doesn't love me, I tell myself. Just saying it in my head
makes me wilt a little more. But I'd bet money that he doesn't even
remember anything that happened.
David gallantly offers his arm. I take it and try to force
myself out of my strange mood. "Shall we depart, mi Donna?" He
says poetically.
I smile at this; he really is such a ham sometimes.
`Oh, gag me,' says that annoying voice.
"Shut up," I tell it.
"I beg your pardon?"
"Oh, sorry David, not you. I was talking..." To
the Josh in my head? Oh, that'll go over well. "Never mind.
Let's blow this popsicle stand," I say in my best Bogart voice. This
makes him laugh. And it makes the Josh in my head smile.
Remind me to apologize to Cammie when I get back. It turns
out _I'm_ the lunatic in apartment 42C.
