by Michelle Tea
Bernice motioned to the pile of clothes, all inside out and tangled up in themselves. She handed me a basket of hangers. It would be my job to smooth and zipper the rejected clothing and arrange them on the racks to look unworn. So that the next lady in search of a canteloupe-colored scoop-neck T-shirt could try one on confident that hers are the only sweaty armpits the fabric had ever clung to. Her boobs the only boobs to ever warp the fibers. Bernice grabbed the feather duster from under the register and walked over to the jewelry rack to stir some dust. She hummed along to the music coming in from the speakers. Circle in the sand, goes round and round…never-ending love is what we found…
I let myself get lost in the work. The clothes stopped being symbols for all I hated about life, they became just shapes and colors and fabrics. I began to feel affection for some of them. A skirt that felt particularly soft. A specific and peculiar shade of blue. The way the pink stitches on a sundress surprised me. It’s not that I wanted to wear them, it’s just that I stopped holding their prettiness against them. So they’re pretty, so what? What’s it got to do with me? I was just slapping them on hangers, trying my best to tune out the music because if you let that noise in it’ll colonize your brain and you’ll be singing Belinda Carlisle songs in spite of yourself for days. I just focused on the clothes because it made the time go by faster, and the faster the time went by, the sooner I’d be able to take my half hour and that meant food.
It was because I was such a diligent worker, such a focused caretaker of consumer goods, that I did not notice my nemeses, the feared and inevitable Katie and Yolanda, strolling into the store ’til they were practically on top of me. Katie with her long and deliberately windblown hair. Kristy has gone so far as to suggest that she positions herself in front of a fan and hoses the mane down with hair spray, but Kristy’s just starting rumors. You know Katie’s family doesn’t have fans whirring in their house, you just know they’ve got air conditioning. Anyway, there’s Katie and her tremendous hairdo, and also her tremendous lips, great big lips that are even more 3-D thanks to a generous slathering of deep red lipstick. Katie Adrienzen is all hair and lips. Her sidekick Yolanda is quieter, both visually and also in real life. Katie’s a real talker, she’s pushy and loud and used to start fistfights all the time in junior high, was a scary sort of female, but since high school she has taken up a new reserve. All that anger is still in there, though, just boiling her brains and giving her that enraged hairdo. Yolanda is tall, towers over Katie, and perhaps has compensated for the space she takes up by cultivating a meeker personality. Yolanda’s dark hair was pulled back in a tight ponytail that bobbed and swayed with each loping step, and she was wearing some experimental eyeshadow job, gray misty clouds around each eye, sort of racoonish but lighter. Her eye shadow literally looked like eye shadows. I supposed she was trying to look high fashion or something. In Mogsfield. These girls were hilarious. I would have greeted them with a wall of attitude, except the longevity of my new retail career weighed on their stylish shoulders. It was Katie who looked at me first, and Katie’s eyes that narrowed into mean little slits. It was Katie’s pinching fingernails that clamped a thick lock of her unruly hair and tugged it back sharply behind her ear, giving her an unobstructed view of me at my humble rack, placing garments onto hangers and giving them delicate little pats, shooing away any dust or grime they might have picked up languishing on the floor in the creepy communal dressing room. It was Katie who charged toward me, and Yolanda who followed. Sometimes I thought of girl cliques as Russian nesting dolls. It was like Kim Porciatti was the main doll and inside her lived Katie Adrienzen and then inside Katie nested Yolanda.
Hello and who are you? Katie demanded. I considered saying I was Bernice O’Leary’s cousin from New Hampshire, down for a summer in Mogsfield. I was opening my mouth to formulate this whopper when Yolanda piped up softly and said, You’re Kristy Driscoll’s sister. My story went right out the window. I was even going to throw in something grand like, my parents died on a white-water rafting trip and Bernice was taking care of me. They have white-water rafting in New Hampshire, right? I think that if you’re going to lie you might as well lie outrageously. Plus, people don’t know what to do in the face of tragedy. All the different emotions make them uncomfortable so they scoot away fast. That story would have gotten rid of them ASAP, but Yolanda called me out. I had to just be me. I nodded my head. Yeah, I said, I’m Trish. I remembered what Rose had said, about names that stick. Trisha, I said.
Not for nothing, but how did you get a job here? She looked me up and down. A lot of girls want jobs here. And our friend actually works here already and I hope you didn’t steal her job, ’cause she didn’t quit. She had an emergency.
Listen, I Know About Kim, I said. Katie’s head moved back in an offended wave, like my breath was rancid.
Who are you? Trisha? You don’t know Kim. I’m Kim’s best friend, I know who Kim knows, and she don’t know you.
I snuck a look at Yolanda, to see if she was hurt that Katie just professed best-friendness with Kim and not her. I know how competitive these girl friendships can be. I’ve seen talk shows about them. Yolanda looked like regular, mysterious Yolanda Peters.
I Mean I Know Who Kim Is. I said this with a strain on my voice, like I was trying hard to be patient with her being such a simpleton.
Everyone knows who Kim is, Yolanda said.
Yeah, really, Katie rolled her eyes.
I Mean I Know About All Of It, Okay? I was getting real exasperated but had to keep this whole thing low lest Bernice be lured over by the commotion and make the scene even uglier. I Know This Is Her Job, I Don’t Want It. I motioned to the rack of clothes I had just been feeling so consoled by. They’d reverted back to being stupid, showy clothing for stupid, showy people. One of the dresses I’d been fawning over was almost identical to the flowery thing Katie had on. You Think I Give A Shit About This? I hissed. I Am Doing Bernice A Favor. The two girls were straining to hear me. Their heads craned toward me on their long giraffe necks. I Told Her I’d Help Her Out ’Til Kim Could Come Back. She’s Got A Store To Run Here, I said. The Frigging Mall Doesn’t Shut Down Because One Person Tries To Kill Herself.
She didn’t try to kill herself! Katie gasped phonily.
Seriously, Don’t Bother, I said.
Um, Yolanda said. She looked worried. Her sister is Kristy. Kristy the hairdresser.
I smirked tightly and nodded. Hairdressers Know Everything About Everyone, I bragged.
Katie sighed. I could have gotten a lot of pleasure out of that moment, but truthfully I was still scared. With them in the store and Bernice lurking about, my lie was jeopardized.
I’m Going To Leave The Second Kim Is Better, I pledged to Katie. I’m Just Doing This To Help Bernice, Then I’m Gone. Okay?
I’ll make sure of it, Katie threatened. I let her have that one.
Please Don’t Talk About It To Bernice, Any Of It, I said. I said it not like a question but like a statement. She Is Torn Up, You Know. About Kim. Just Don’t Talk About Me Being Here ’Cause It Reminds Her That Kim Isn’t.
She’ll be back in, like, a week, Katie spat. I shrugged.
Whenever, I said.
Where is Bernice? Katie said, snapping her attention away from me. Bernice? She spun her head around, her hair fanning out from her head in glossy sheets.
Yes? I heard Bernice clatter away from the stand of jewels, and I booked it out of there. I grabbed a cluster of hangers and dashed deep into the store, getting low behind a fat rack of capri jeans. I crouched anxiously and worried about fainting again. I was proud of myself for not flipping out on Katie and Yolanda. It’s hard to restrain myself when I’m in such a state and I thought I’d kept it together quite well.
Did you say hello to Trishy? I heard Bernice chirp. Katie’s voice was lower, a muffle. Oh, well, just until Kim returns, of course! God, Bernice couldn’t help being loud. It’s like she was deaf or something. There was another stream of murmur, and then Bern
ice chanted, Of course, of course! But her voice had a little catch in it, a little note of concern. Well, I thought hiring one of you girls would be the best thing to do, just to get me through the coming weeks… Bernice trailed off. I peeked around the corner of the capri jeans. Katie and Yolanda were looking at each other. If my life were a comic book, they would have big question marks hanging over their heads. If my life were a Saturday-morning cartoon, you would have heard a loud kerplunk as my stomach dropped. My poor starving stomach. It was under such stress already, and now this.
Well, yeah, Katie started, her head nodding, shaking all that streaky hair. She was gesticulating with her hands, motioning. Her voice had gotten low again.
Bernice cocked her head like an easily confused dog. Well, she’s so close with you and with Kim, I thought it was a good choice. I didn’t mean to hurt your feelings —
She’s not! Katie exclaimed. Her head swung back and I ducked back behind the capri jeans but fuck, I knew she saw me. Saw me ducking and staring, saw me spying and creepy and scared. Fuck. I wondered if I should just drop the clothes I was still clutching to myself in a giant hug. I’d ruined their arrangements on the hangers. Maybe I should dump them and split, head home, start the long walk back in my skank attire, hit a packy along the way and ask some grown-up headed inside to grab me whatever alcohol the three bucks in my plastic pink purse would buy. Spend the rest of the summer lying low in my bedroom and with any luck I’d never see Katie or Yolanda ever again. Maybe I’d even conjure up an illness and join Ma in the living room for the rest of my life. The end.
I’m not getting involved in your tiffs now, Bernice said scoldingly. This is a very intense time right now, we’re all going through a lot with Kim —
She doesn’t care about Kim! Katie’s voice was a hard laugh.
Katie, we can’t have this talk here. I’m sorry you’re upset, but this is a business. Is there anything I can help you with? Do you have anything on layaway, Yolanda?
I placed the bulky load of hangers onto the floor ’cause now I was shaking. I just didn’t have the strength and I was nervous. I didn’t want to lose my job already, not like this, chased out by these awful girls.
We were here to get Kim’s cell phone. She said she left it here. Katie’s voice was raised. Now that she had entered the yelling zone it was going to take her a little while to drift back down to her normal range.
Well, all right, Bernice said in her accommodating way and then she was flinging shit all over the counter, the bags of candy, the boxes of cards and coin rolls and inky pens and gnawed-up pencils. I don’t see it, she said, and came back up with handfuls of register tape. I left the clothes on the floor and stood to my normal height. Bernice’s hand came up with my pink purse, her terrifying fingers toying with the zipper. Is this Kim’s —
That’s Mine! I screamed toward the register, jarring the frantic gang of them, turning them toward me. My Purse! I yelled, and smiled. I ducked back behind the capri jeans, as if I was working.
I don’t know, I heard Bernice say regretfully. Nothing else down here. Katie murmured and Yolanda’s murmurs flowed into them and then Bernice said, Well, I really hope you girls all work it out. And you tell Kim I’m waiting for her, kay, girl?
I heard the shuffle of Katie and Yolanda heading down my aisle, and I got low real quick and crab-scuttled to the side, a weird back-bend crawl in a crooked direction. I just wanted to stay out of their path. It was like being in a forest, low on the linoleum of Ohmigod!, the clothes stretching up all around me, hemming me in and hiding me. I located one of those circular racks and dove inside it. The chiffon dresses cloaked me, they fluttered with my breaths. When me and Kristy were little we would play hide-and-seek in stores just like this, and being encircled by a rack of clothes was my favorite place to hide. Cut off from the chaos of shopping around you but solidly in its center. I hugged my bare knees to my chest, balled up and waiting for the two to leave. I could hear them making their way to the exit. They seemed to be right by my hideout.
That fucking little liar, Katie was fuming. Her voice was sputtering like a car with a banged-up muffler, angry spurts. She fucking lied, did you get that? Did you get all that?
It’s really pathetic, Yolanda agreed. Yolanda had more class than Katie, more dignity. You could tell that Katie would grow up into one of those road-ragers who gets court-ordered to take anger management classes. They stomped and shuffled by me, so close their wind stirred the smocks. I held my breath and counted to twenty, mentally chanting “Mississippi” between each number, giving them ample time to clear out. And then I clambered out of my hiding place. It was like being reborn, the dresses sliding over my face and revealing the stark riot of Ohmigod! I stood up straight, shook myself out, tossed my ponytail, yanked my miniskirt down and turned to face Bernice O’Leary.
Trisha, what are you doing? Are you hiding? Are you hiding from those girls? Her face was an angry smear, she was huffing. Talk to me, girl, what is wrong with you?
I…I’m Not Friends With Them, Bernice. They Don’t Like Me. There didn’t seem to be any other way out, really.
Yeah, clearly. What about Kim? Does Kimmy like you? Are you even friends with her?
Yeah, Totally, It’s Just…Her Friends Hate Me. Because Kim Likes Me So Much.
Bernice sighed. She chewed the inside of her cheek. She blew her bangs from her eyes and stared me down. This could be true, right? Girls got in weird jealous fights over shit like this all the time. Who’s best friends with who and all that. I saw it happen at school. One day there’s this cluster of girls and they’re all swooning over each other and then, wham, one of them has a burst of humanity and says hello to the wrong person in the hall and next thing you know you can’t go into the bathroom to take a piss because the whole gang of them is having a huge fight, filling the place with wild drama, and that girl will never sit with them at lunch ever again and there will be new graffiti penned into the stall walls, about her having genital warts and being a blow-job queen or something. It’s like Wild Kingdom, the world of girls.
I don’t know, Trisha. I think this was a mistake, you working here. You’re a new friend of Kim’s?
I nodded.
You’re new friends with Kim and you hang out with that girl Rose and now Kim tried to kill herself and all her nice friends hate you. Her eyebrows had come down low across her eyes, like storm clouds. I could see her trying to jam all the pieces together into an ugly puzzle that revealed me having some sort of suicidal influence over Kim Porciatti. And what the hell is that? She nodded at the pile of clothes I’d left dumped on the dusty linoleum.
I’m Sorry, I said, and dashed over to the the heap, struggled to pull the clothing up into my arms but the pieces were sliding from the hangers and the hangers were jabbing at me.
No, no! Bernice stomped her foot like a horse. Just forget it, Trisha. This isn’t a good mix. A good fit. She took a breath. I don’t think you’re Ohmigod! material. I’m sorry.
No, Bernice! I can’t believe I was whining. Maybe pleading — pleading doesn’t sound quite as desperate, maybe it was just a plea but I fear it was a whine. We Just Got Off To A Bad Start. Really, I Can Work Really Well Here —
You’ve gotten into an argument with customers, you’re throwing our merchandise all over the store, Kim’s friends claim you don’t even know her, the girl you hang out with is a little — well let’s just say she doesn’t have a good reputation in the mall and her mother, I happen to know, is not normal, and you stink like a smoker and you passed out! For all I know you’re on dope and you’re pregnant or something. No, this is a bad match. I really love your sister but you have to go.
Whoa. I stood there and stared at Bernice. What a fucking bitch. Did Bernice O’Leary just tell me I smelled bad? Did Bernice O’Leary just accuse me, in so many words, of being a giant douche bag? I flashed on Rose. This would never happen to a girl like Rose. Partly because girls like Rose don’t get hired to work at places like Ohmigod!, but st
ill. I couldn’t imagine anyone ever trying to make Rose feel small. You know why? ’Cause there’s a crucial part of girls like Rose who simply don’t show up for it. They’re just not available for humiliation. Maybe because they’ve been raised by lesbian mothers who are totally persecuted all the time so they know how to watch their back. Maybe because they haven’t spent their teenage years locked in their room drinking beers and avoiding everyone. Girls like Rose don’t avoid anything and so they know how to handle everything. They know how you’re supposed to react when some loser like Bernice O’Leary insults you to your face. I didn’t know what I was supposed to do. It seemed like not crying would be a good start. I could feel my eyeballs swell and bulge with the onslaught of tears and I was like, fuck that. No fucking way was bitch Bernice O’Leary going to make me start crying like a baby. No way was I going to burst into tears in fucking douche bag Ohmigod!, where a tiny school of girls had gathered, hesitant, on the edges of our confrontation, pretending to be interested in some ugly bikinis but totally spying on our drama. I dropped the clothes hanging in my arms to the floor and gave them a kick.
Fuck You, Bernice, I said. Kristy always tells me that swearing like that just makes you look trashy and dumb, like you don’t have any better, more intelligent comebacks to fit the situation, and the truth is I didn’t. “Fuck You” seemed perfect and Bernice had already decided I was some sort of skank so fuck it. I gave the clothing pile a more savage kick.
Really, I said. Fuck The Fuck Off. Go Fuck Your Fucking Self.
The school of girls burst into laughter. I shot a glare at them to see if they were laughing at me, or at Bernice, and I couldn’t tell so I told them to fuck off too, just in case.