Something in the Way You Move [O'J]

An Eventful Afternoon

Callie's POV

I follow Jessie into the bathroom. She throws open a cabinet that's filled with make-up. "Okay, can you explain why Danny just happens to have a cabinet full of make-up in his bathroom when he's...you know, a guy?"

"Yeah, it's mine, I just keep it here in case I stay over," she says casually, pulling various things out of the cabinet. After a minute, she cries, "Ah, here we are! Skin bronzer!" She shows me a bottle and I give her a confused look. "It'll make you look more tan so people will have a harder time recognizing you." She gives me the bottle and instructs, "Okay, so what you're going to do is squirt some on your body and then rub it around with your hand. I'd have done that for you but I don't want to accidentally hurt you or to make my hands tan...that'd be a giveaway if someone noticed."

"Alright...so how much of this do I use?" I ask, already pumping some onto the backs of my hands. I rub it in and it makes a weird sizzling sound and tingles a lot. After a moment, it's all rubbed in, and I'm surprised at how much darker my skin got.

"About that much for an area that size, now. I'd do it at least up to your elbows and knees, as well as your face and neck and ears," she says. I shrug and continue to bronze myself. After about fifteen minutes, all that's left is my head and neck. I have to be very careful with this so I don't get any in my eyes; that'd probably be bad. I turn and look in the mirror and carefully apply the bronzer. After five more minutes, a tan version of me stares back at me through the mirror.

"Okay, we're not going to put make-up on your face since you're so young. I'd give you colored contacts to put in to disguise your eyes, but I don't have any. Maybe Danny does; he wears contacts." Jessie hurries out of the room and I hear her talking with Danny. A few minutes, and a lot of swearing from Danny, later, they enter the bathroom. Danny shows me a contact case and says, "I've never worn these, but I get them every time I get a new order of contacts, kind of as fall-backs in case I lose my regular ones. They'll make your eyes brown or hazel. Do you know how to put them in?"

"Not a clue."

"Alright, I'll show you." He takes out his contacts and tosses them. "They were old, anyways. I needed to change them." He pulls out a set of contacts from a cabinet under the sink and puts some eye-drops in his eyes. He hands me the bottle and says, "Here, put a few drops---only one or two, now---in your eyes so they don't dry out when you're wearing the contacts." I take the bottle from him and let a few drops fall into my eyes. "Good. Now here's the fun part..." He shows me exactly what to do, and within the minute I've got a pair of Danny's contacts in. "You're eyes might hurt because it's my prescription," he tells me.

Immediately after he says that last bit, my eyes explode with pain. I squint my eyes shut and the pain fades somewhat. I slowly open them and the pain returns. I go to press my hands to my eyes but Danny grabs my wrists. "Don't rub your eyes! It'll be murder with contacts in; trust me, I've done it a few times."

"You need these...to see...?" I ask as I start to get used to the pain.

"Yup."

"You have awful eye-sight, then. What's wrong with your eyes?"

"Nearsighted." I turn to look at myself in the mirror. After squinting at myself for a few seconds, I can see that my eyes are now a deep hazel instead of the usual green. "See if you can walk without bumping into anything," Danny suggests. I turn and stumble out of the bathroom, narrowly missing the door frame. I skim the door and walk almost full-on into Danny's bed.

"Yeah, I don't think I can," I observe dryly, falling onto Danny's bed. I hear the two of them chuckle and walk over to me. I hear one of them whisper to the other before she starts gently rubbing my back---I can tell because her hands are much smaller than Danny's. I can hear Danny shuffling around until he wanders back over. I'm rolled over by someone and a pair of glasses is pushed carefully onto my face. Everything becomes a billion times clearer. "So what's up with these?" I ask, tapping the glasses.

"They're my brothers; he left them here a while back. He's farsighted and, since I'm nearsighted, they balance each other out. But it still gives you a disguise," Danny tells me. I nod, looking around. Everything's crystal clear, thankfully. "So is everyone ready to go?" I ask.

Danny and Jessie both tell me that they are, indeed, ready. Jessie says, "Okay, Callie. You'll be coming with me and we'll go get you clothes and personal items while Danny goes to get food and such."

"Okay," I reply, sliding off the bed. We all grab coats (Danny loans me one of his older ones, but I still have to roll the sleeves up four times for it to stay on my arms) and head outside to catch a cab. After an uneventful cab ride, we get out in front of a shopping mall and grocery store. Danny and Jessie talk for a minute before they kiss each other good-bye. I turn away, not wanting to intrude on them. Just kidding I don't want to see them kissing, with or without tongues. After they're done with the couple stuff, Jessie grabs my hand and leads me inside. "We're going to meet Danny back at his flat once we're done," she explains. I nod and she leads me into a clothing store.

She has me try on a million things before asking me which ones I liked best. I pick out three tops and two pairs of pants before we pay and move on to the next store, where the process repeats itself. For each and every store we go to, almost a dozen, we repeat that process. Sometimes I get a lot of stuff and sometimes---most times---I get nothing. We get to what Jessie promises me will be the last store after four and a half hours. I notice with disgust it's a dress store. "I'm not getting a dress," I state flatly.

"You need one for fancy occasions!" Jessie protests, ushering me inside.

"I have dress pants and nice skirts!" I am not getting a dress. I've dug my heels in and Jessie's not going to change my mind.

"Just one dress, Callie, that's all!" It's funny how she thinks she can win an argument against me.

"Just give it up, Jessie! It's not going to happen." She's about to protest some more before I add, "Remember, I'm a stubborn Irish girl. You're not going to change my mind."

After a moment of thinking, Jessie says, "I have an idea. Let's call another certain stubborn, Irish person and see what they have to say." She takes out her phone and calls Danny, putting the phone on speaker. "Danny? Hey we're having an argument and need a solution."

"What's the argument?" He sounds highly amused.

"If she needs a dress or not."

"I don't!" I quickly say.

"Yes, you do!"

We end up going back and forth for a few seconds before Danny buts in, "Hey, hey! Stop arguing! How's about this: you guys go into the store and look around. Callie, you don't have to get anything, but look around and if you see something you honestly like, try it on. If nothing catches your eye, then you don't get anything and move on to...wherever you're going next. Sound fair?"

Jessie and I both murmur agreement before hanging up. Reluctantly, I walk into the store and start looking around. After half an hour, I don't find anything, even after combing through the whole store several times. We leave the store and re-arrange our bags so that we each only have to carry two instead of two hundred. We hail a cab and head home. Jessie pays the cabbie and we head inside, just as it's starting to rain. We put the bags in my room and I collapse on the couch afterwards. Danny's in the kitchen, scribbling something down rapidly. Jessie and I assume it's important, so we don't talk. After a few minutes, he puts down the pen and asks, "So did you end up getting a dress?"

"Nope!" I say happily.

"You sound crushed," Danny observes dryly.

"Oh, definitely," I assure him. Jessie sticks her tongue out at me. "Thanks for taking me, Jessie! Just...just never again!" They both laugh and Jessie says, "No problem, love. And if we ever had to go shopping again, it wouldn't be as long since now you actually have clothes."

"Still...never again. I just want to lay here and sleep."

"You're gonna miss dinner if you do that," Danny tells me.

"What are we having?"

"Takeaway?" He looks at Jessie to see if she has any other ideas.

"Yeah, that'd be good. Can we get Chinese?"

"Sure. Callie, you okay with that?"

"Yeah."

We all place our orders and after a few minutes, I doze off.