Ree's hips swayed softly, rustling her skirt along her thighs in a excited whisper. She stood in front of a full body mirror, humming to Frank Sinatra's smooth voice that crooned from her iHome as she ran a brush along her cheekbones.
She blamed Emily for her new-found obsession with classic oldies like Frank, Dean Martin and and Bobby Darn, but the mute girl had just winked and giggled when the older girl had admitted it. Ree sighed now, giving a small shake off her head as she grinned, passing the eyeliner over her top lids. Her stomach fluttered with a giddy excitement as she set her liquid liner down on her vanity and gazed at herself in the mirror.
A soft girly navy skirt lay across her hips and kissed her mid-thigh and Ree wanted to spin around and make the small white polka dots turn to little blurs. It was topped with a creamy beige sweater tucked gingerly into the waistband of the skirt, the scoop neck adorned with a necklace with a gold sparrow hanging from it. Her feet were hidden in cute black ankle boots with beige and gold buttons, and she was a little taller thanks to their umph of a heel.
Satisified, she turned away from her reflection and tucked her red Covergirl lipstick into her over-the-shoulder tan leather bag. She glanced at her iPhone and gently worried at her bottom lip, double checking Cole's message to make sure she had the time and place right.
After Dr. Patterson's group session, Cole and Ree had met up afterward and really talked as he walked her to the coffee-shop to meet up with her mother. He admited why he was even there and her eyes had watered and she had grabbed him by the arm to stop him from walking, and embraced and scolded him. She was embarassed, because you don't just hug a stranger, but she hated that he had tried to ended his own precious life. After that awkward and sad note, he bought her a coffee and gave her his number written on a napkin before heading off to his car. Of course she immediately put it in her phone, saved jokingly as "Co-Co".
Later on, as she paced her floor nervously, biting her thumbnail and staring at the contact, she made up her mind. Her finger hit the dial button as she held her breath, listening to it ring before she heard a click and a smooth "Hello?"
They talked for hours, and by the end he asked if she would like to go somewhere this Friday after their schools let out (unfortuantely she was in her senior year of High School, while Cole was in his first semester of college). Ree had caught her breath and her eyes widened to the size of milk saucers, and she heard herself say "Sure. Did... did you have anything in mind?"
So now she was happily skipping down her stairs, humming Dean Martin's "Ain't That A Kick in The Head?" Her mother smiled tiredly, and Ree's smile faded a bit when she remembered who she was. She was the sick girl who started chemo in three days, not a normal teenage girl. Sarah, her mother, seemed to notice and she sighed and kissed her forehead, and truely smiled at her.
"You look beautiful, baby." Ree smiled at her boots.
"Thank you Momma."
Her father walked in, eyeing her up and play scowling. "Now listen here, missy!" He wagged a finger at her and Ree rolled her eyes and giggled. "If that boy, Corban-"
"Daddy, his name is Cole."
"That's what I said. Anyway, if he tries anything funny, I swear I'll be a jail bird by sunrise." The dramatic man put his right hand to his heart and raised his left in a three-finger salute. Ree went red in the cheeks.
"Daddy!" She swatted at his chest as she squealed this, and the forty-something year old chuckled and hugged her. Suddenly the ring of a bell sounded, and she pulled away, holding her fathers hand before smiling at him and letting go, eagerly opening the door.
