How To Be A Lady (Sometimes)

in which lydia gets stuck on top of yet another thing

C H A P T E R  O N E

 

         The scraping sounds of metal hangers being pushed across a metal rod are the soundtrack of the boutique Lydia Abrams and Rabiya Anastasia Lodi are occupying themselves in. Faint music they don’t know the words to plays from hidden speakers and Rabiya won’t stop picking up dresses.

          “What about this?” Rabiya asks while holding up a red one as Lydia studies it attentively. Rabiya swirls it around and grazes her eyes over it herself, her eyes catching a scalloping detail at the hem only to promptly shake her head in disapproval, scrunch up her button nose and throw it back into the rack along with all of the other (seven? Eight?) dresses she’d discarded throughout their time there.

          “Why would you put that away? It was nice,” Lydia says and rakes her fingers through her fringe bangs.

          “Because that’s what it was. Nice. I look like a child in scalloping,” Rabiya says but does not make eye-contact with her best friend and instead looks through the 9 dresses draped over her left arm. “I’m going to go ask the clerk lady. It’s her job to tell people what she suggests, right?” and before Lydia can give her two-cents, Rabiya already not only answers but agrees with herself and begins strutting towards the back of the store. Lydia giggles to herself in response to her friends’ self-assurance because as much of that she has herself, nobody compares to Rabiya. She’s fearless, which is something Lydia can only aspire to be and she’s so confident it makes the boys weep, however Lydia has no struggles with that aspect.

         At all.

        The two are most definitely the dynamic duo and if Lydia wasn’t the business woman and responsible one of the two, she would be Rabiya’s sidekick instead of vice-versa.

         Lydia catches up behind Rabiya and zeros into the conversation Rabiya most likely initiated with the sales clerk. Her dresses are placed on the counter ranging from pink to red to both to plain black and Rabiya is saying, “So, alright, Martha? That’s what your nametag says I believe. Martha, I’m going to a party and I have all of these dresses and if I can’t choose one I’m going to end up buying them all which would be very hard for my junior-in-high-school self to pay for so I need your input.” Rabiya’s hand is on her hip and her other is making motions to correspond to her words and Lydia has to refrain from laughing at the look of utter intimidation on Hello, My Name Is Martha’s face.

         “O- oh,“ Hello, My Name Is Martha sputters. She shakes her head and picks up all of Rabiya’s potential outfits one by one and guides her to the dressing room as Lydia follows close behind. “I suggest the pink one,” Martha says as she drapes a dress over the top of the room’s wooden door, “or either of these black ones,” she says piling three more dresses on top of the one already there. “Come out after each one so I can see.”

         And so, Rabiya does, and all of the black dresses either get a “meh” or a flat out no from both Martha and Lydia, leaving only the pink one which gets a unanimous yes from all around.  Rabiya pays, thank you’s are exchanged and Lydia giggles all the way out of the store.

         “You’re gonna give yourself hiccups if you keep laughing, Abe,” Rabiya says while unlocking her car with the button on her keys.

         “Hey,” Lydia says pointing her finger, “don’t call me that,” she finishes in between laughs.

          “Why are you laughing so much?” Rabiya questions to Lydia as she’s walking around the front of the car to the passenger seat.