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I hang up a couple of dresses and take them out to the rack where people leave what they don’t want. I wonder if I’ll ever look good in clothes like these again—form-fitting dresses, crop tops.
“You okay out there?” I jump, startled, when Tatum pokes her head out from the dressing room. “You got super quiet.”
“Oh, I’m fine. Distracted, I guess.”
“Worried about your dad?” she asks before closing the door again.
I wasn’t until now after she mentioned him. “Yeah, a little, although that’s nothing new.”
“He hasn’t gone back on saying he’s okay with you and Dad being together, has he?”
“No. I can tell he’s not thrilled, but he hasn’t said anything.” He sure will once he finds out about the baby. He’ll have plenty to say. I just don’t think I’ll want to hear it.
“He’d better not if he wants to keep his balls.”
“Tatum…” I have to laugh at how fierce she sounds. All she ever wants is to defend the people she cares about.
“Sorry, but it’s true. You’re obviously happy,” she grumbles a little to herself, behind the closed door and out of sight. “With my dad. Which is kind of gross.”
“Uh, I heard that.” I tap the door with my knuckles. “I’m standing right here.”
“I mean, gross in the way it’s gross when you have to think about your parents as a person and not, like, a mom or a dad. It’s not like he ever really dated before you two got together, so this is kind of new territory to me.”
“But… you’re okay with it? Right?” Asking a question like that is easier with a door between us. I strain my ears, wanting to hear anything she might whisper or mutter under her breath.
Turns out, I don’t need to worry. She flings the door open just as I jump back to keep from getting hit then she wraps me up in a hug. “I’m okay with it,” she whispers in my ear while squeezing me. “I don’t want you to ever think I’m not. I’d feel so bad if I thought you were worried. All I care about is your happiness, and if you guys are happy together, so am I.”
I wonder if she understands how important it is for me to hear that. “It’s important we’re still okay. You’re the only one of my friends who bothered to stick around once…”
Her hold tightens, probably because she knows I’m thinking about Lucas and how he alienated me from everybody else in my life. Lucas, whose parents are half crazy with grief this very minute. Stop. You have to stop thinking about it.
It’s like she can read my mind. “Do not blame yourself.” When she pulls back and holds me at arm’s length, wearing a stern little scowl, it’s like I got my best friend back. Finally, with her eyes blazing and her cheeks flushed. “You hear me? I want you to say it. I do not blame myself.”
“I do not blame myself,” I whisper.
“Yeah. That’s believable.” She lets go of me and grabs the rest of what’s left in the dressing room. “Come on. I’m starving. Give me a minute to buy this stuff and we’ll have lunch.”
“Sounds good.” Even though I don’t have much of an appetite; it’s been touch-and-go the past couple of days. I know I need to eat, but the idea doesn’t appeal to me. I wish I had somebody besides the internet to ask questions. I don’t know if any of this is typical or if there’s anything to make me feel better. I’ve read that peppermint seems to help, but my faith in it working is low. Everything makes me feel worse. Gah, I miss my mom. I wish more than anything she was here now to offer me advice. She would know what to do.
It’s when we’re in line at the register that the onset of sweating hits me. Suddenly I feel like I’m standing directly in front of the sun. “Is it warm in here?” I ask shyly.
“Not really.” Tatum looks me up and down. “Are you feeling okay? You look a little green.”
Once we move closer to the register, the feeling gets worse. Only once the girl behind the counter reaches for Tatum’s clothes do I realize it’s Tatum’s perfume that sets me off. The stronger the smell, the sweatier and more nauseated I get.
“I’ll meet you outside.” Nothing in the world matters more than getting out of this store. The glass doors are my sole goal, and I walk toward them as calmly as possible, even as my insides start churning. Stupid me, thinking if I never got sick like this before now, I’d be one of the lucky ones who never had to go through it.
I burst through the double doors to the outside, sucking deep breaths into my lungs. The sunshine is so bright, glaring off the concrete, but there’s an awning over the wide front window, and I take shelter beneath it. A few minutes pass, and the nausea seems to pass with every breath I take. Shit. Suddenly it occurs to me that I have a new reason to be nauseated. What if she knows? I can play it off, I think. I’ll tell her I didn’t have enough breakfast or something and started to feel dizzy.
