18 Years

The Preparation Of Beij's Boldness

Sebastian

Gravity, they say you can't fight it. Well, I disagree. What if love was stronger than gravity?

- Adam from Upside Down

     I walked to school today with Sharky, as usual. I was still thinking about what Beij told me last night, but we'll get to that later.

"I really think I should dye my hair blue." Sharky cheered, while licking his watermelon sucker.

"Why? What's brought you to this conclusion." I said in a confused tone. I took a lick of my cream soda sucker.

"It just looks cool! And besides, your tips are dyed red!" Sharky shot back.

"I've told you this Sharky. I dyed my hair three years ago and now it won't come out!" I said with a laugh. It's true, I didn't actually mean for my hair to be red. I tried to wash out the cheap hair dye millions of times, but the tips of my hair still have some pigment. I quite like it now, though. Sharky was just about to say something but he stopped short. We were walking side by side but now he had stopped a few paces back. His finger was in the air, pointing directly at the back of some girl who looked like she was about to go on a date. I noticed she had curly blonde hair, and had a few tattoos. Wait. That was Beij. She's actually going to go through with it. 

~The night before~

Sharky and I were blowing bubbles with our Big League Chew and playing ping pong when my cellphone rang. I didn't usually get calls, so I just thought it was a telemarketer. Sharky and I continued to swat the ping pong ball viciously at each other with our paddles when my phone rang again. A text popped up on the glowing screen. Beij's contact was in bold. A single message said:

"need u 2 come over now. urgent."

Sharky and I looked at each other with a mixture of terror and puzzlement. What if she was hurt? What if someone said something to her? What if she was pregnant? A million thoughts were swimming in my head as I put my car keys into my red truck's ignition. I tore out of the driveway like a bullet, and made my way to Beij's house. Sharky and I sat in panic, thinking up horrible scenarios in our heads.

~

Beij's mom opened the door with a big toothy grin on her face, like nothing happened. She must have saw our panic-stricken expressions before we clearly wiped them off our faces, because her smile turned to a frown.

"What's the matter with you boys?" She said as she led us into the kitchen. She pointed at a plate covered with a massive amount of brownies, expecting us to take one. I almost did, when I remembered that Beij's mom makes baked goods with pot. Beij says that the drugs don't really effect aliens, but after one bite we would be as high as kites. I guess it's an alien thing. I slapped Sharky's hand away from the baked treats, and told Beij's mom we were here for Beij and that she didn't need to worry about anything. She just shrugged and went about washing dishes.                                                                                                                                                                                         
     We found Beij in her room, surrounded by heaps of clothes. Sparkly skirts and shoes were stacked mountain high. Cardigans, pullovers, and sweaters of every color were strewn on her bed. Her neon purple lava lamp had a some sort of bralette thing thrown on it. Her usually tidy room looked like a clothes tornado barreled through it.

"Beij?! What the he.....elllll!" Sharky said, stringing out "hell" as his big blue eyes took in the ocean of fabrics and colors. Beij turned her head, and Sharky let out a small squeak of fright. One of her eyelids was covered in shimmery blue and silver powder, and the other was heavily coated with black eye kohl. One half  of her lips was smeared with a dark red, and the other with a sheer pink. One of her eyebrows was filled in. She looked like a makeup tutorialist that took too many tabs of acid.

"Sorry it's a mess, I just really need to talk to you guys" Beij said, ankle deep in clothes.

"Uhm, why so much clothes?" Sharky asked. Face it, we were all thinking it, even if it sounded kind of rude.       

"Last year I had this obsession with buying all of the newest stuff, and look at me now. I look like a fucking hoarder." She said, her big, glassy, sad eyes filling with tears. She lay on her bed, almost in defeat.

"Well, what seems to be the problem?" I said in a gentle tone.

"I AM IN LOVE WITH CLYDE AND I'VE FINALLY REALIZED IT." Beij yelled, throwing a pair of leggings onto the ground. Black eye makeup ran down her cheeks.  Sharky and I looked at each other in shock. We both kind of knew she had a thing for Clyde, but we didn't know this would happen.

"We kind of knew that, we just didn't want to push you to do something you weren't comfortable with. And what does that have to do with piles of clothes?" Sharky asked, raising his blond eyebrows.

"I'm, I-I'm going g-going to t-t-to tell him tom-to-tommorow at school." Beij sobbed, wiping makeup off her cheeks and sucking in her breath. She was a mess. I leaned down and wiped her tears away. She looked pretty right then, all raw and damaged.  I guessed that when she was going to profess her love to him, she wanted to look nice. Even I understood that.

"So I'm thinking you want to look really cool when you say it," I said, trying to raise her spirits. It must have worked, because there was a new twinkle in her eye as she beamed at Sharky and I.

"Can you help me then? I mean, by picking out an outfit?" She sputtered, her small voice full of hope.

"Well of course we can! I'm gay and he's bi, so you've called the right people!" Sharky crowed. This is the moment in the movie where the film editor inserts a cheesy montage of all of us modeling tight dresses, throwing bras at each other, trying on four inch high heels, and laughing so much we felt like our faces would fall off. To be honest, that's almost exactly what happened. In the end we picked out a soft red skirt, a tight black sweetheart crop top thing, a pair of black combat boots, black tights, and a face of makeup. It turns out Sharky could very well do makeup for famous celebrities I figured out. As we were heading out the door, I swiped a brownie for Sharky and I to share.

~Present time~

    "Her outfit looks really good, Clyde is going to absolutely love it," I admitted. Beij disappeared behind the large class entrance door to the school.

"Well, we must wish her luck on today. And love has to win this, right? Clyde can't possibly say no." Sharky replied. We clinked our suckers together, like a toast to Beij. We popped the soggy sticks back into our mouths before we walked into school. Love wins everything, right?

-R