Is Bridgeport big enough for Kae, Robyn, Alex and Jasmine? They're all beautiful, captivating, and a little bit crazy... but there can be only one It Girl.
[ Based on the It Girl series by Cecily Von Ziegesar ]
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Robyn yawned and tried to psych herself up to get out of her cozy beanbag, but the vodka she'd drunk during the WOB meeting had made her limbs heavy, and she quickly gave up. Dave had, as promised, come bearing gifts—in this case, three bottles of Stoli, wrapped up snugly in sweatshirts in his backpack. Much to the delight of the ladies, he had worn a long blond wig and told everyone he was the new Swedish exchange student, Inga. There was always something bizarre about football guys using Halloween as an excuse to wear cheerleader outfits and stuff balloons up their sweaters, but Dave had been a natural Inga, in his normal boy clothes and gorgeous head of long, silky blond hair that he kept stroking throughout the meeting. At 9:10, just before Angelica generally started doing her pre-curfew rounds, the Women of Bridgeport meeting disbanded, the girls rising reluctantly from their cushy beanbags.
"Ladies." Dave bowed graciously, the hair of his wig almost touching the ground. "It has been a real pleasure."
"Looks clear." Alex had her entire torso stuck out Yara's open window. She pulled herself back in and took another sip from her not-just-Arizona iced tea. "You should get out of here." To everyone's surprise, she gave him a quick, drunken hug before unceremoniously shoving him toward the window. Robyn raised an eyebrow. Since when did Alexandra Crane deign to touch sleazy Dave East?
Once Yara closed the window behind him, the other girls started to trickle out the door, still buzzing with excitement and a little tipsy. The discussion topic for the night had been love, and everyone had something to say about it, especially when their tongues were loosened by Dave's vodka. But for most of the meeting, Robyn had just nestled into her beanbag and nursed her spiked Country Time lemonade. It was great that Zendaya and Teyana and Keke could all talk about their crushes and loves and heartbreaks and all, but Robyn wasn't exactly in a position to share what was happening with her, no matter how relevant her current goings-on were to the subject at hand.
"Coming, babe?" Teyana kicked her socked toe into Robyn's beanbag and giggled, her thick hair neatly in place behind her small, diamond-studded ears. Even when Teyana was drunk, she never managed to look it. "You need to get upstairs and dry out."
Robyn sighed heavily and started to get to her feet, but the room immediately started spinning like an evil merry-go-round, and she sank back into her seat. She rested the back of her hand over her eyes and wished everyone would just go away. She peeked through her fingers to see if Teyana was going to bug her more, but she was already headed for the door. Alex and Yara were standing at the door, their heads together, whispering. Great. They were probably complaining about her drunkenness, how they were stuck with her. Bitches. But then Alex gave her a smile that looked sincere and disappeared out the door.
Robyn sniffled miserably and noticed for the first time a run in the knee of her gray nylons. "Fuck." She fingered the snag, wondering if she'd gotten it from sitting on that stinking hay in the stables. An almost unbearable wave of longing washed over her as she thought about how just a few hours ago she had been alone with Chris, and she'd only let him kiss her as they said goodbye. It had taken an almost groundbreaking amount of self-control on her part, and she knew that if he were in front of her right now, she'd throw herself at him and devour him with kisses. Why the fuck had she been holding out for so long? He was in love with her—finally. And she loved him. "Why does anything else have to matter?"
"What?" Yara, who had been stooping down to pick up an empty cup off the floor, stood up and looked at Robyn quizzically, her cheeks flushed with alcohol.
Robyn certainly hadn't realized she'd spoken out loud, but once she did, it was like the seal was broken. Although her tongue moved slowly in her mouth, she couldn't stop it. She re-crossed her legs so that she couldn't see the snag anymore. "You know. Why isn't love ever enough? Like, why do other things matter so much?"
Yara nodded her head slowly. Robyn felt a touch of warmth for Yara for not staring at her like she was insane, instead ignoring the probably drunken sound of her voice and listening to her words. That was sweet. She was sweet. "What do you mean? What other things?" Yara asked.
"You know," Robyn repeated, leaning back into her chair, enjoying the noise the little beans (or whatever the hell was inside) made as they shifted to accommodate her. That's more like it, she thought drunkenly. "All the hiding your real feelings...and sneaking around. Just so people don't get hurt...when all you want to do is just be in love." She felt herself waving her arms about her, but they seemed to be doing it on their own, without any sort of signal from her brain.
Yara flopped into a chair next to Robyn and put her elbows on her knees. She was wearing a flattering chocolate-colored tunic with bell sleeves over a short black skirt and black tights. It wasn't really a look Robyn would go for herself, but it seemed to suit Yara well. She took a swig of her own drink. "Wait, so what exactly are you talking about?"
Robyn pushed a tangled piece of hair back from her face. "Um, you kind of have to swear not to tell anyone, okay?"
Yara's friendly eyes seemed to smile at her as she nodded solemnly. She reminded Robyn a little of a girl who had been her best friend way back in the second grade. Alena something. Yeah, Alena was nice. "I swear."
Robyn lowered her chin a little, her head starting to feel heavy. "Well...Chris and I are sort of seeing each other again."
Yara's mouth formed a little O of surprise. "Oh, wow." She exhaled loudly. She crossed her ankles and Robyn caught a glimpse of her anklet—a tiny, worn-out leather strap with a peace-sign pendant on it.
"I mean, I know it's really shitty," Robyn continued quickly. "Because of the promise I made to Kae and all...which I really meant to keep." She dug her long nails into her scalp. "But it's just too hard. I still love him. Am I supposed to, you know, fight it? Forever?" She pictured herself as a glamorous thirty-something interior designer or big-shot editor in the city, owning her own swanky uptown apartment and having weekly salons and soirees where exotic and brilliant movie stars and writers and artists came to get drunk and flirt. Then one day, raggedy starving-artist Chris would turn up on her doorstep and tell her he still loved her. And she was supposed to turn him away even then? It just wasn't fair.
"No," Yara answered emphatically, surprising Robyn. She wasn't sure why she was sharing this with Yara, when Yara and Kae were kind of buddy-buddy. But something about Yara (maybe the way she looked kind of tortured herself?) had compelled Robyn to open up. That and the vodka. Obviously. "I mean, you have to be a little sensitive, of course, because there are a lot of people involved." She shrugged her petite shoulders. "But if you're in love...that's out of your control, right? We don't get to pick the people we fall in love with. And it's really nothing to be ashamed of, is it?"
"Not at all." Robyn nodded. She raised her iced tea bottle toward her and they drunkenly clinked glasses, both giggling. "There aren't that many real things in this world, you know? And love is one of them," she slurred, sounding like a cheesy pop song—or a prolific stoner.
"You know..." Yara cleared her throat after sipping her drink. "I'm kind of...seeing someone in secret too."
It was Robyn's turn to be shocked. "Just tell me it's not Dave East, okay?" Dave had sat next to Yara all night, kind of staring at her with his googly eyes, like he was picturing her naked. Because if she had to listen to Yara talk about being in love with skeezoid Dave, she'd probably vomit. Which, admittedly, she'd probably be doing pretty soon anyway.
Yara laughed. "It's not Dave. But you'll promise not to tell anyone either, okay? I mean, it would be really...weird if this got out."
Robyn nodded as emphatically as she could in her drunken state. Her stomach was already started to gurgle, and she knew—unfortunately—from experience that once you started thinking about vomiting, that meant it wasn't too far in the future.
