Authors: Kate Rockland
Andrea stopped jumping and threw her arms around Shoshana. “I know, I know!” she said, sighing. “But I seriously can’t go to work tonight. For one, it’s snowing. And two, I have a date.” Sinatra had a momentary freak-out, barking like crazy and jumping in little leaps around Andrea, who still hadn’t forgiven him for taking a poop inside her favorite fake Chanel purse last month.
“Yo, your dog is a spaz,” Andrea said, watching him warily.
Shoshana sat up. She was wearing a gray Yankees T-shirt, size extra-large. Her breasts felt heavy on her chest. Her long auburn hair stuck out in all directions from her face. “I’m not going to do you any favors if you insult my furry son.” She walked over to the window, raised her pink shade with a frilly white tassel, and blinked. “It’s snowing?”
“Yup! Since early this morning, lazy bones.” They stood shoulder to shoulder and surveyed the street. The snow covered everything: telephone poles, cars, sidewalk.
“Okay, forget I asked. I’m going to need my sunglasses just to get out of this bed.” She groaned. Then, noticing the big grin on Andrea’s face, she asked, “So you have, like, a
date
date? With whom?”
“Shosh, you are the only person I know who says ‘whom’ correctly in a sentence.”
“Grammar is rad, what can I say?”
They both sat back down into the bed.
Andrea excitedly got into a cross-legged position. Shoshana did the same, and their knees touched, making a figure eight on the bed. “All I can think about is this guy! It’s nuts. I think I might be falling in love. Seriously.” Andrea said she was falling in love with someone new approximately once a month.
“Tell me all about him.” Shoshana put on a fake deep fatherly voice. “I’d like to meet the young man, find out what his intentions are.”
Andrea giggled. “He’s actually kind of, um … young for me. I met him at work. He’s parking cars while he finishes school.”
“Oh, my god, is he in high school?”
“No! You pervert.” Both girls giggled hysterically. Shoshana was used to this; she started most mornings with one of her roommates ensconced in her bed, giving her the latest gossip, filling her in on their lives. It was only natural in a house with five women. “He’s a junior at Stevens, he’s majoring in, like, bioengineering or something. I don’t know what it means, but it sounds really smart. He’s twenty. I think he wants to design weapons, like Robert Downey, Jr., in
Iron Man
.”
“Well, that only makes you six years older. That’s not bad. And besides, men date younger women all the time! The only downside is he’ll have to wait around outside when we go to the bar. We can tie him up to a lamppost next to Sinatra.”
They both giggled.
“Yipes, I didn’t think of that.” Andrea shrugged. “I’ll wait it out. He’s only got six more months until his birthday.”
Shoshana giggled. “Right on, sister. Rob that cradle!”
“Besides, he has a six-pack! How many guys our age have six-packs?”
“How did you see his stomach? I thought he parks cars at work. Wouldn’t he be wearing a uniform?”
“Um, well, we kind of did it already in the coat-check room. So this is sort of our first
official
date.”
“Ah, I see. Well, sometimes you have to find out if he’s good in the sack before you do the whole calling-in-sick-to-work bit for a guy. What’s his name?”
Andrea turned red. “Marty. I know, I know. It’s a really dorky name, but it was his father’s and he’s kind of stuck with it.”
“I think it’s a perfectly nice name,” Shoshana said. “Besides, he’s got to be better than your last boyfriend, who had a hole in his car near the pedals so he could throw his weed out in case he got pulled over. What was his name? Jeff?”
“I think so. Oh, my god, remember? I used to think how crazy it was that I could see the road rushing by while he drove. It felt like I’d roll right through and end up flattened on 287.” Andrea shook her head.
Shoshana petted Sinatra, who was sprawled on her lap on his back, his tiny paws in the air, his spotted baby belly puffed out.
“Soooooo … are you going to call Asshole Boss Man or not?”
“Of course I am,” Shoshana said. “So what will it be this week … still the Lyme disease? Or have you a migraine?” She rubbed her eyes, her auburn hair framing her face like a lion’s mane.
“You look like the exorcist,” Andrea told her.
Sinatra saw something outside the window he didn’t approve of. Possibly a stray cat; Hoboken was full of them.
“Do you want my help or not? Sinatra,
please
stop barking. We all know you’re very tough and masculine and scary.” His high-pitched barking coming from a pint-sized throat was definitely
not
helping her slight hangover from the wine she’d consumed last night. She wasn’t a big drinker, but she loved to have a good time and try different types of reds from the Tuscany region. She and Andrea would sip out of the pretty, stemless glasses their roommate Jane got as an engagement present for her upcoming summer wedding, and make up wine reviews such as, “This merlot has a distinct flavor of tree bark.”
Andrea sat behind her, braiding her hair. Shoshana had beautiful, stunning hair. A cross between brown, red, and spun gold, she’d not cut it since middle school and it looked prettiest up in a messy ponytail, as it was naturally wavy and tendrils would fall throughout her day and loop around her face like a mermaid’s. She rarely wore it down, but would from time to time take it out of its rubber band, letting it swing down her broad back nearly to her waist. Her skin was luminescent, a smooth white, causing people to state that most annoying of all idioms, “You have such a pretty face!” as if having a pretty face meant she held some kind of responsibility to be thin, as if she were throwing away a genetic gift.
“I was thinking chicken pox,” Andrea said.
“Andrea, no one over the age of five gets chicken pox. Asshole Boss Man will never believe you!”
Andrea chewed this over.
Shoshana suspected Andrea had ADD and therefore waitressing was the worst possible job for her friend, but she’d never say so, as it wasn’t encouraging. Andrea had to wear a black miniskirt that was so short she couldn’t bend over to put people’s drinks on their table, placing them in their hands instead.
“Okay, okay,” Andrea said finally. “The Lyme disease, then. Web MD says four weeks after the initial red rash I’d start developing flulike symptoms, so maybe you can tell Asshole Boss Man that I’m throwing up and feverish?”
“You looked up symptoms on a health Web site to obtain more information so your made-up disease would sound more believable?”
Andrea nodded. “Of course,” she said, like it was the most normal behavior in the world.
“Okay, that’s just sick,” Shoshana said, laughing. She started gathering up empty wineglasses and a bottle friends had strewn around her room.
“What are you blogging about today?” Andrea asked, changing the subject, her dark eyes wide. One of Shoshana’s biggest supporters, she often read and helped edit her posts before they went live. She’d once written a very popular story for
Fat and Fabulous
about Latin men and how they appreciated the rounder booty. And how she appreciated them appreciating it.
“I just posted a column on how pedicures are the friend of the Fat,” Shoshana said. “The concept was that even if people are making me feel like shit about being a big girl, I can go get a pedicure and the sun comes out and birds chirp and a rainbow suddenly fills the sky.”
“I know what you mean!” Andrea said. “I love pedis. I’d give up sex before I’d give them up. I’d give up
orgasms
for pedicures.”
Shoshana laughed. She had a loud, infectious boom of a laugh, which filled the room and bounced off the walls. “Liar.”
“Hee, hee. You got me there. Now you have to call Asshole Boss Man.”
“Okay, okay,” Shoshana said, shifting over and feeling around on the ground for her purse. “Can we just call him ABM from now on? Saying the whole word takes too long. What’s his real name, anyway?”
“No idea. I almost called him Asshole Boss Man to his
face
the other day, it was crazy-town. That’s the trouble with changing waitressing jobs every month; your bosses’ ugly faces start to blend together.” Andrea’s jobs were short-lived, mainly because she was known to tell off customers if they got on her bad side, not to mention her unreliability when it came to showing up for her shifts.
Shoshana finally found her purse under the bed and lifted it up.
“Ew, what is that bag
made
out of?” Andrea asked, pinching shut her nose.
“Um … it’s hemp. Why?”
“It smells funny.” Andrea was on a mission to rid Shoshana of her hippie attachments. She’d once thrown Shoshana’s Birkenstocks down the garbage chute in college.
“Do you want me calling or not? Because I have a life.”
“Okay, we both know that’s a lie, but I do need the favor. Pretty please? I’ll bring you breakfast in bed.”
“Done.”
Andrea scurried off to pop a bagel into the toaster. The toaster had been another one of Jane’s engagement presents her roommates apprehended for general use. In addition to the wineglasses and toaster, they’d recently held a romantic-yet-ironic Taco Bell dinner with candles from Tiffany’s (a present from Jane’s grandmother), eaten Triscuit crackers with Cheese Whiz on a Bloomingdale’s silver platter while watching a Giants game, and taken long, luxurious showers, then wrapped themselves in Jane’s new fluffy Bloomingdale’s towels. “Grown-up stuff,” they’d whisper reverently, excited to finally have nice things, even if it didn’t
exactly
belong to them.
Jane’s fiancé, Andrew, did something mysterious for a hedge fund and made a crapload of money—neither he nor Jane cared if everyone used their stuff. As she could never get a straight answer about what he did for a living, Shoshana liked to start the rumor that Andrew was probably running a Ponzi scheme, which Jane would then laugh nervously at, also in the dark as to what her fiancé did.
Shoshana rooted around in her hemp purse, which she could admit
did
smell a tad like dirt, and found the cheap cell phone that had come with her phone plan. It had a
Fat and Fabulous
sticker with pink lettering on the back of it.
As she flipped open the phone it rang, playing Sheryl Crow’s “Leaving Las Vegas.” It was the ringtone she’d programmed for her lawyer friend Greg, who loved to fly to Vegas on a whim (he could afford it) and play blackjack, often taking his girlfriend of the week with him. Shoshana and Greg dated during their freshman and sophomore years at Summit High, realized they had very little interest in ever seeing each other naked again, and remained close friends ever since. Greg was handsome albeit short, about five-foot-seven, with soft, receding brown hair he wore cut close to his head. He had a large, hooked nose, olive-toned skin, and a sculpted body from all the time he spent in the gym. His intelligent hazel eyes were his best feature. He came from a wealthy, old-Jersey family and had nice Jewish good looks. Shoshana had practically lived at his house in high school. She loved Greg’s mother Shirley, a real wiseass who often said she would trade Greg for Shoshana as her child any day.
“I think my mom likes you better than me,” Greg would complain.
“Of course she does,” Shoshana said. “I visit her more.”
“The problem with her liking you so much is she acts rude to all the girlfriends I bring over to meet her.”
“Well, what can I say? You can’t top perfection,” Shoshana would say, running her hands over her plump body, her eyes twinkling.
The fact that Greg was short didn’t put off the models he dated.
Shoshana’s mother, Pam, once said her youngest daughter was good at “collecting people,” and it was true. She always stayed friends with ex-boyfriends, much to the astonishment of her roommates, whose relationships ended with the occasional restraining order or car-egging.
“Hey, Greg.”
“Hey, Shosh.”
She smiled. He sounded hungover also.
Andrea wrung her hands and left the room, shooting annoyed looks at Shoshana.
“How’s it hanging?” he asked.
“Oh, you know, shriveled and a little to the left as always. Sounds like you have the Irish flu.” She leaned over and turned on her iPod. Strains of Feist began to play.
“A little. How’s the crazy henhouse?”
“Gregory, just because I live with four other women doesn’t mean it’s a henhouse, you misogynist pig.” His mother called him Gregory, and Shoshana did as well, because she knew it annoyed him.
“Well, how’s it anyways?”
“Crazy.”
They both laughed.
“I hear you’re listening to your usual vagina music,” Greg said scornfully.
“Okay, seriously? I’ve been telling you this for ten years. Just because I only listen to female musicians doesn’t mean it’s vagina music,” Shoshana said. “And please don’t say ‘vagina.’ It just sounds weird coming out of your mouth. Sorry I don’t like frickin’ watered-down nineties rock.” She imitated his voice. “Oh, I’m Greg Hirsch. Excuse me while I turn the ladies on with Three Doors Down.”
Greg laughed. “I prefer Spin Doctors.”
“Of course you do. So enough chitchat. How was the date?”
As a lawyer in the district attorney’s office in Trenton, he often dated other lawyers, and went out last night with an attorney who worked on child custody disputes. That was all Shoshana knew about her, but she was eager to learn more. “By the way, points for not dating another model. Those girls were sweet, but I’m glad you’re starting to broaden your horizons.”
“Well … it went okay, I guess. But I don’t think I’d see her again.”
Shoshana sighed. Greg was ridiculously picky when it came to women. She still couldn’t believe they’d once dated, as they’d been so ill matched romantically and physically. (She was at her heaviest in high school, at nearly three hundred pounds.) Greg was the only short guy Shoshana had ever gone out with. Her dream boyfriend would look like a cross between Keanu Reeves and Zac Efron, and be strong enough to pick her up and swing her around.