She's pretty, I thought. She looks nothing like me, my thought continues on. I'm not tyring to do anything except trying to tell a story.
I'm not trying to describe my emotions or how I felt, how I felt at this moment, or how this person made me feel; I'm just trying to tell a story. Of course, she's pretty because she looks nothing like me. We have a different body type, different shape of face, different color hair, different heights; we are opposites. She looks nothing like me but I wonder if she could like me for that.
So pretty and I'd like to watch as she strides down the street putting on her own air of grace. It's not like my grace, if I had any. Time for my hair cut. Besides, I don't want her to catch me staring. I don't want her to look at me and analyze what I look like. I'm not a lesbian, after all.
So I walked into the hair dresser down the street in the other direction from where she was heading. I smile at the receptionist and tell her my name, Natalie. She says Karen will be right with you dear. Don't call me dear, I think, you don't even know me. People who think they know me call me dear and it bothers me.
I sit down and pick up a magazine.
I page through it for 2 minutes before feeling the urge to puke up all the shallow thoughts permeating my mind.
I reach into my ragged leather purse and take hold of the one book that I was carrying with me at this time; I'm always carrying at least one book with me at every given time; you can never be too prepared. I didn't even get to open it before bleach blonde Karen read my name with big white fake teeth, Natalie!, off the receptionist's sign-in sheet without lifting a pupil in my direction. I sat on the black, shiny cushion.
So
Pause
Whatdya want?
Well, I want it short. It's spring and it's getting warm. I'd like something stylish.
Well your hair is thin so I can angle it but it won't look stylish. You have such thin hair. I can angle it if you want.
With pinched lips I nod, hiding my disdain. Hairdressers always
know best. Even if it's not what you want. Even if it's your own head. I opened my mouth but she beat me to it,
It would look like this! She said, a Barbie, so excited and directed my blonde hair with her hands in the direction she'd take it with the scissors.
Well that's not what I was going to say I thought but hell, whatever.
It's my hair, it's your job. I don't know what even looks good on me anymore.
Ok, I say quietly so it seems sweet even though it's bitter. The woman didn't look at her face as she absorbed herself in the job of cutting her hair. Snip. snip.
The chunks of strands fell straight to the ground without floating around too much. Chop. Chop. So straight.
And with a straight faceboth of them.
Pinched lips, as I stare back at the mirror, wet hair making my face drag and making sad eyes seem empty. A young face to drag. The hairdresser grabbed for the blow dryer.
Oh you don't have to dry it I said scratching my neck.
Are you sure?
Of course I'm sure I thought it's my own hair and my money, but I only nodded. She removed the plastic apron and a few scraps of hair floated thinly down, so tiny and beautiful in the afternoon sunlight glowing through the clean glass windows above the exotic plants. I couldn't tell if they were real or not.
I wanna be a writer I thought to myself as I walked up to the register, sad-eyed. Sad eyes see empty. I pulled out my teal wallet tucked away safely within a zipper pouch in my brown leather purse. First a five, then another five, and another five. Then two ones for a tip. Karen didn't need a big tip. There was nothing special done to my hair. 17 dollars later and a right turn after the glass door and I was in the open air again, a little crisper than inside. A little free-er too. No hairspray lingering in the atmosphere and through her nostrils. Step. Step. Step step. Step step step. Step and my momentum gets going, but not too fast.
No need to hurry. Maybe a cup of coffee would do. I have nothing better to do right now and I'd like to sit down and drink something warm before the sun sets. I might like to watch a few people. Starbucks is always good for that, everyone knows that, even the un-observant people. I run my hands through my wet hair in brisk up and down movements. Some water spews off in tiny spurts. I hope my hair will dry fast. God, I hate the feeling of wet hair. [1]
Natalie opened the door to America's hot coffee hell, glad to be away from the ever-cooling breeze that goes along with the end of the day. She was thinking about her bad haircut, trying to forget it, and letting her mind wander to other things.like that crush.
He was cute and all but she didn't really like him. I mean not really. It was like in elementary school when you really like someone, but then you realize later that you didn't really really
like him or her, you just thought you did. Anyway, he was cute and all but her feelings were too complicated. Not as simple as she'd like them to be.[2] She put these things out of her mind and looked at the menu. She forgot why she bothered looking because she wanted a venti, regular coffee and the biggest size, pretty simple, pretty plain, but oh so satisfying. And oh so caffeinating.
Leave room for cream?
Yes. She said, agreeing, harmonizing with the consistent pattern expected of your average customer. Not that she ever put creamer in her coffee before. It was always milk. There was something about the cream that disgusted her especially at a place like Starbucks. Two dollars.
She's out $19 for the day she thought, no more. I'll have to make dinner at home tonight. No more spending today. She gladly wrapped her hands around the familiar white paper cup holding on just before the heat of it got to be only a little too much. She had to set the cup down quickly on the opposite counter where she removed the lid and poured in her average milk. Some splenda too. That tastes good. She wrapped her button-down sweater a little tighter around her body put the cap back on the cup and her jeans made a swishing sound as her converses carried her to the area where the round tables were just waiting for her, her books, and her coffee.
Oh my god there she is Natalie thought.
There is Ms. perfect from earlier today.
She must have come into Starbucks as I was on my way to the hairdresser.
Her exterior mien conveyed none of the tension she was feeling on the inside. She walked past her and sat in the next table, facing the window opposite of her.
She couldn't deal with facing a girl so much more beautiful and probably better than herself and perhaps even be forced to look at her or compare herself to her. No. She'd face the window. If she got bored she could watch the passers-by. [3]
Geena is reading the New Yorker. She has longer hair and artsy glasses. She sees Natalie, tries to catch her eye, and never even catches her name.
She thinks, It's a bad hair cut really. I mean, she can't help it. She just doesn't have great hair. It's too thin and straight to be short unless she wants to look like a lesbian.
Whatever drink she got is a tall size and she is down to the bottom her Dasani water bottle. She has the newspaper under the white paper cup. She may or may not be quite pretentious. She might be boring but she fascinates me enough to talk about her brown shoes and comfy-looking jeans on her upright, slender but healthy body.
She can't be a student here, no way. Too mature, unlike me who scribbles this stuff down in my journal while drowning out the world with my headphones turned up. She takes a sip. The newspaper must really interest her now. I can't stand reading the news. I can't force an interest in current events. Her socks don't match. She has a green long sleeved shirt and a fairly boring thin chain silver colored necklace. She likes simple, rugged jewelry on her hands and wrists and not too much of it.
Oh no. Why did she just turn around? Could she tell I was watching her and writing about her? Of course not, nobody can see what I'm writing, I made sure of it. I don't even care if she saw. I wish she would just sit down at this table and drink her boring coffee with me. Ok, I would like to read the newspaper now. [4]
Geena just got up and asked Natalie if she was finished with that newspaper. Natalie looked up with these big eyes.
Yeah she said.
Mind if I read it?
No, here.
She gave Geena the paper and that was all.
That was pretty boring Geena thought.
I don't really know what to do now. So she sat and opened up to the comics. At least they'll keep my mind slightly occupied till I figure out what to do next.
I got through to Garfield, my favorite, and glanced up again expecting to see a bad haircut but the table in front of me turned un-occupied since I got the paper.
A prick of anger stole Geena's stoicism. Why would she up and leave so quick? She couldn't have finished that huge coffee yet. Oh god. Well there goes my day, another boring one. Tempted to up and leave herself (she had finished her coffee as of 20 minutes ago, before Natalie's entrance-which Geena took sharp note of), Geena forced herself to finish an adequate journal entry worthy of sharing with class tomorrow.
she would just be a nerd and go to class as cooler grad-students and employed graduates walked mysteriously in and out of Starbucks and her life.
I can't go back there.
not back to my dormroom. She might be there. why couldn't we just choose our own first year roommates, I often wonder this to myself with no productive outcome. I just keep thinking negative thoughts until they become me. Until they become my roommate. Until they force me to find other places that are not my room or my roommate's room or my roommate's space. I will walk away.
[1] The character's name is Priscilla. I am not sure if the abrupt shift into second-person point of view is telling or confusing, so let me know if this shift needs to occur a different way.
I've never really played around with changing pt. of view before so I'm not sure how this will work. She walks into Starbucks but doesn't notice that the pretty girl she saw at the beginning is already sitting at one of the little round tables.
[2] Not that her feelings are all very complicated, but it's always hard to say exactly how this girl feels. She finds Geena very pretty and admires her air of "grace" or self-confidence, but you couldn't really say that Priscilla has a crush on Geena or is a lesbian just for thatit's a little more complicated than that.
It may be more like a "friend crush" which is sort of what Geena has for this girl. I'd like to just hint at them being lesbians and kind of play with that idea but they're not. They're thoughts might make them seem that way, but it's not because they are. They are probably both just looking for other friends-that-are-girls.
[3] Now my intention is to introduce Geena, the pretty girl. She begins observing Priscilla, who she never noticed before but is not strangely intrigued by her. She is mostly just writing in her journal observations. I'd appreciate if you kept this confidential for the most part b/c I have a friend named Gina, pronounced the same way, and I would hate for her to think this is about her, it's not at all, I just think it's a cool name and it can very well change. I'm also up for name-change suggestions seeing as I either think up a name on the spur of the moment or I can't think one up at all.
[4]The italicized parts are character's thoughts. They are either Geena's or Priscilla's-It depends on whose point of view it was prior to the italics. Let me know if this is confusing. In the first part, Priscilla's thoughts contrast what she says because it is in her first person point of view. Now that I'm in second person point of view, the only way to show thoughts is through italics.