Chapter Six – F is for Fashionista

I probably would not have remembered my dream, except I was woken up right afterward by the first of many frivolous arguments Sam and Six would have with each other.

"Please tell me you're not really going to wear that," Six said critically.

"Does it offend you?" Sam asked.

"No. But it's very inappropriate."

"Inappropriate? I didn't realize there was a dress code."

"Take it off now or I'll take it off for you."

"Promise?"

My eyes fluttered open pulling me away from my victory over the Mogadorians just in time to witness a very brief struggle in which Six used her powers to rip Sam's shirt off his torso. I sat up a little to watch as Sam grabbed at the material in a futile effort to keep his shirt. But I knew the battle was over before it even began. Beside me Bernie Kosar barked and wagged his tail as the shirt floated through the air into the open hand of Six.

"Give it back," Sam yelled charging toward Six, who simply held him back with her telekinesis. "Oh come on!" Sam yelled when he realized he wasn't getting anywhere near her. "That's one of my favorite shirts."

"Give it back to him," I said to Six through a yawn. "It's just a shirt."

"Just a shirt, aye?" She gripped the material in both hands holding the shirt up so I could see it.

The shirt was black with a large Holstein cow on the front. The cow was holding a glass full of little green men. The caption above read "Got Aliens?" I couldn't help laughing.

"Really?" Six said accusingly. "You think it's funny?"

"Yeah." I found it hilarious.

Six shook her head in frustration. "Wear this," she told Sam throwing one of my shirts at him. Then she threw another shirt at me. "Get dressed. We're going shopping."

"Shopping?" Sam looked at her in revulsion. "For what?"

"You need new clothes."

"No, I don't."

"Yes, you do."

They volleyed back and forth for awhile, but in the end Sam lost (again) and an hour later we were in the parking lot of the local mall. It was early and a weekday, aside from a walking club full of middle aged women we were the only ones there. Six was several feet ahead of us looking at the large directory of stores.

"Abercrombie or GAP," Six asked, directing the question at Sam.

"I order all my shirts from Tshirts dot com." Sam crossed his arms over his chest with finality.

"GAP is closer," Six said, ignoring Sam's childish sulking. I followed behind her as we headed toward the escalator which would take us to the second floor. We were just about to get on when we noticed Sam wasn't with us. Six and I both looked around and then I saw him. He'd stopped just outside the store window of a videogame store and was playing the demo.

"Humans," Six remarked to me as her right hand flexed discreetly in fron t of her. At that same moment the video screen went black. Sam looked around in confusion. He shook the game paddle, banged on the monitor, even jumped up and down in place trying to get it to work. One of the store employees came out and checked the plug and the outlet. I glanced over at Six who wore a poker face.

"Do you do things like that a lot?" I asked her.

"Never hurts to practice," she replied cracking a slight smile.

Sam looked over his shoulder and saw that we were watching him. He frowned again, then slumped his shoulders and dragged his feet as he slowly made his way to us. On the second floor we made a left and GAP was the third store. Sam and I followed Six inside and to the men's section. Beside me, Sam was muttering under his breath. I didn't catch all of it, but when he said something about "even alien girls love shopping", I had to laugh to myself.

"What size are you?" Six sifted through a stack of plain tee-shirts.

"Medium," Sam answered. Six pulled out a black one and tossed it against his chest. She pulled out a grey one and a charcoal one too and threw them his way as well. "Here," she threw a dark blue one at me. "Try this on."

"Okay," I replied, wondering how I'd become a part of this.

"Bootcut or Relaxed?" Six moved over to the wall of jeans, thumbing through the various styles and shades.

"Pants, too?" Sam whined throwing his head back. "It's like I'm in hell."

"This isn't even close," I told Sam. "Try going shoe shopping with Sarah Hart." I thought back to the one time Sarah and I had gone shopping together. She'd been looking for boots. Five hours and eleven stores later, she still hadn't found anything she liked. Even though I loved every moment I spent with her – that day I kinda wished I had stayed home.

"Can I help you?" a woman asked us. Her name tag read "Liberty".

"They need to try these on." Six held an armload of clothes in Liberty's direction.

"Right this way."

We walked to the back of the store where Liberty unlocked two doors. I went into the first one and dropped the clothes onto the small bench inside before I began to undress. In the room beside me I could hear Sam cursing up a storm. In my opinion Sam was over-reacting. Getting new clothes was not the horrific experience he was making it out to be.

The shirt fit fine and so did the jeans. I opened the door and stepped out to show Six. When she nodded her approval I went back inside to change. Sam's door opened and I heard him tell Six he was done.

"You can't possibly be done," she said skeptically.

"Well I am," Sam answered. "Can we go now?"

"No. I need to see it."

"Ugh. Why?"

They argued again, mostly mindless stubborn remarks. Sam wanted to leave. Six wanted to make sure everything fit properly. As I was buttoning my pants the door opened again. This time I heard both Sam and Six's voices in the room beside me.

"I can get undressed by myself." Sam's annoyed tone was accompanied by a thump against the wall our rooms shared.

"You have sixty seconds." There was another thump and then the door closed.

When I came out of the room Six was timing him using a wristwatch from a nearby display. I stood there with the shirt and jeans laying over my arm. Liberty asked me how everything fit, smiling when I told her it was fine. Eagerly she took the clothes up to the counter for when we were ready to be rung up.

"Three, two, one," Six counted aloud. "Time's up, NASA."

The door opened a crack, and our human friend peeked his head around it. Six walked over to get a better look at him, shaking her head disapprovingly as she headed back into the store.

Curious, I walked over to take a look at Sam. Unhappily Sam opened the door a little further. The jeans were so big in the waist that he had to hold them up to keep them from falling down. They were so long that they completely covered his feet plus a few inches. I had to bite my lip to keep from laughing.

"Whoa," I said to him. "They're a little big."

"I hate shopping," he told me before slamming the door closed.

Six came back with an arm load of jeans. She reached for the handle to open the door but it was locked.

"Open the door," Six took a step back and waited.

"No," Sam replied. "I'm done shopping. I'm getting dressed and then we're leaving"

"Open the door," Six repeated.

"No!"

Frustrated, Six grabbed the handle. This time it turned and she was able to open the door.

"What the hell!" Sam exclaimed. "I'm naked in here."

"You're not naked," Six countered throwing several pairs of jeans at him before shutting the door again.

"Awww.. Come on!" Sam yelled. "Don't they have a limit to how many things you can try on! There's like a hundred things in here!"

Six walked away from him and to a rack of shirts. She casually began looking through them. I stood there watching her, wondering what she was doing. Then I heard Sam yelling again.

"Hey! Hey! Watch the zipper! You almost got my…! Hey!" His voice became muffled, like something was covering his mouth. "You can't do this!" His voice was clear again. "This is assault!"

I looked at the door then back at Six who was browsing innocently through another rack of clothes. I closed the distance between us quickly and leaned down to whisper into her ear. Before I could say anything, she spoke softly just loud enough for me to hear. "Manipulating objects you can't see is always challenging," she smiled my way. "You should practice too. Dressing rooms don't have security cameras."

With that she walked away, meandering toward a display of sunglasses. I watched her go in simple disbelief. Was she telling me to use my telekinesis to undress Sam in the fitting room? Because that was pretty fucked up. Maybe I did need to work on my Legacies but it wasn't going to be stripping clothes off another guy.

Looking down at the plaid shirt hanging on the rack in front of me, I closed my eyes and concentrated on unbuttoning the shirt. When I opened my eyes I found that I had actually ripped off one of the buttons. Shit. I really did need to practice. I closed my eyes and focused again.

I'm not sure how long I stood there but it was long enough that I was able to button and unbutton the shirt with my eyes closed. It was a small milestone, but one I was very happy about.

"Much better."

I heard Six's voice and turned around to see Sam standing amidst a pile of discarded garments in a black fitted shirt and blue jeans.

"Thank God," Sam folded his hands and held them up prayer over his head.

Six ran her hands over his shoulders and along his chest. I gave him the thumbs up sign when she ran her hands along the back of his pants. He grinned broadly, wiggling his eyebrows as though something more was going to come of Six's touching.

I walked around the store a little while Liberty folded the clothes into a neat pile at the counter. There was a rack of spring dresses, light pastels with flowers. They made me think about Sarah and what we would be doing right now. It was almost lunchtime, so I'd be in class counting down the seconds until I could rush out the door to meet her at her locker. I never thought I would actually miss being in high school.

"Do whatever you want to me," Sam commented as he came up beside me. "But there's no way in hell I'm trying that on."

"But yellow is your color," I told him removing a dress from the rack and holding it up against him.

Sam backed away, shielding his eyes like the yellow was blinding him. With his eyes covered he backed into another rack of dresses, knocking a few onto the floor. I leaned over and helped him pick them up when Sam took one of them from my hand.

"The perfect revenge," he said to me as he walked to the counter where Six was standing. I followed behind curious to see what he was up to, even though I was pretty sure I already knew.

Sure enough, Sam was trying to convince Six to try on the dress to which she flatly refused. I joined Sam in trying to persuade Six to try it on. She ignored both of us. Luckily, Liberty (who I think might have been working on commission), added her opinion about how amazing it would look on Six and how she should just try it on but Six declined once more.

I thought that was going to be the end of it, but then Sam started whining. And I mean whining. He made a Kindergartener seem mature. He hung on Six's arm, then knelt at her feet begging. He was so obnoxious that two employees came out from the back to see what was going was going on. Hell, if Six hadn't given in – I would have tried the damn dress on myself just to shut him up.

We stood outside the dressing room where Six was, Sam smiling incessantly. In Six VS Sam - the score was two to one. Six was still in the lead, but the battle was just beginning.

"Are you done yet? Are you done yet?" Sam asked, rapping his knuckles against the door. He was a having grand time bugging Six, until his pants mysteriously fell to the floor, revealing his briefs to Liberty who was standing nearby.

"Shit!" Sam stooped over yanking his pants back up. "She did that didn't she?" he looked my way. I shrugged helplessly. I watched Six take out quite a few Mogs. My best friend was biting off a little more than he could chew picking a fight with her.

After he buttoned his pants, he pointed to the doorknob and mouthed "open it" to me.

"No," I mouthed back shaking my head.

"Come on," he mouthed again, reminding me in pantomime what had just happened with his pants.

I shook my head again. There was no way I was getting in the middle of their little game.

The handle clicked and the door opened a crack. "I'm finished," Six said flatly.

"Then come out and model for us."

"Absolutely not."

"Why not?" Sam asked. "John and I both did."

"I'm not coming out there."

"Fine," Sam rolled his eyes and walked over to where the door was partially opened. "Wow!" His eyes opened wide and I could see every tooth in his mouth his smile was so big.

Then the door shut, leaving Sam with nothing but his goofy grin. "Sooooo hot," he mouthed to me puckering his lips into a whistle. "You have to see her," he continued.

I shook my head again. While I was sure Six looked very nice in her dress, I had no desire to see it. I was in love with Sarah Hart. She was the only girl I wanted to see. But Sam had other ideas. He pulled me right up to the door, gesturing for me to open it.

I didn't want to start whining again so against my better judgment, I did.

Using my powers I turned the knob and opened it just enough to poke my head inside. And I did see Six. Her back was to me and she was stepping out of the dress, so the only thing I really saw was the thong underwear she wore - which was the same cherry red as her Ducati.

I shut the door quickly and quietly.

"So?" Sam looked at me expectantly.

"Definitely Wow," I told him, not mentioning that red was now my new favorite color.