CASUAL AFFAIR; brendon urie

Chapter Fifty-Five

The girl in the mirror let out a soft sigh, wide brown eyes blinking, lips parted in a painted pout as if she were in thought.

Meagan's face joined mine in the reflection as she came up behind me, and put her hands on my shoulders. She smiled encouragingly at me, as she fussed with my hair - down, in dark, honey dipped waves, save for the front, which Meagan had expertly twisted into a pretty French frontal braid. "We can always just not go and order pizza and two litre bottles of coke and watch all the Spiderman movies..."

"But?" I prompted her.

She looked like she might say 'no buts', but instead, she said "But ..." she put a hand on my jaw, and tilted it to the side to show different angles. "It'd be a shame to waste all this war paint."

"It would." I said, admiring Meagan's more than capable handiwork in the mirror. Besides my hair, she'd painted my lips a shiny, cute pink, went heavy and smoky with the eye makeup, and rouged in sharp cheekbones. I'd also let her help me pick an outfit out, too, right down to my underwear (I was planning on wearing my pink and white striped girl boxers in ode to the fact there wasn't going to be any more surprise hookups, but Meagan had convinced me into a pair of pale pink lace panties) trusting her keen sense of fashion, with her being a professional clothes horse and all - a dress with a white fitted bodice, and a pink skirt that started at my mid-stomach and flared put to my upper thigh, to go along with pale pink heels, a thick pale gold bangle and a pale gold statement necklace of interlocking flowers. I knew she was proud of herself for it - and rightly so. She herself was wearing a very fitted long sleeved grey cotton dress, the skirt ending sexily at her upper thigh, black heels and a black bowler hat, her own hair in carefree bohemian waves down her back, her makeup minimal and grey smoky.

Meagan's expression became softer, and she rested her chin against my shoulder. "I mean it, though, Flo. We really don't have to do it, if you don't want."

"No." I said firmly. Sure, my mind had been skittering about it, but I'd settled now. "I said I'd go, and I'm going."

Meagan smiled - the kind of are you sure you're sure? Smile, before straightening, and wandering back through into her bedroom. I could hear her tinkling about with my nail bottles, and decided to give her a moment to see if she'd get any ideas about what she wanted. Meagan was hair, makeup and styling, and I was nail-art-girl, a pretty fair trade off we'd decided upon.

I looked at myself, really looked - past all the makeup, the outfit, the hair ... to Florence, eight months since the first party of the year. This version was different. No doubt about it. Not just physically, cheekbones slightly more prominent and frame slightly slimmer, skin a little more tan, and of course, hair color, but, of course, emotionally. At the start of the year, for lack of a less dramatic term, she'd had nothing left to lose. Now, she'd gained something important, and had lost it, and now, though on a different board, was right back at square one.

Meagan and I had been spending a lot of time together in the past two weeks or so, having lunch, telling each other of woes and even just stupid little stuff. It had been ... nice. Breezy still visited a bunch, but even she could tell that ... I was alright. And of course, I missed Jessa like mad. But I didn't dare call her because, call me stupid, I couldn't handle another rejection.

Meagan had asked me, a couple of days ago if I'd wanted to go this little house thing that Pete was throwing. "It's not gonna be a wild rager, or anything. Intimate, enough, coupla guys from the music business, friends, stuff like that."

I'd initially said something along the lines of "Oh, that's sweet of you, but..."

Before thinking but what? What excuse was I going to give now? I wasn't ready? I didn't feel like it? I was busy? Why was I saying but, when the idea of another night in my house alone made me want to bang my head on the table? No buts. "I mean ... Yeah. I think I will."