LIVING DANGEROUSLY
It’s over, she realized, staring down at her yellow-stained hands. Not that it’d ever really started. He was laughing at her.
Good-bye to the Jackson-Emma couple concept.
It took less than a minute, but she pulled a recovery and burst out laughing, too. Grandma Grace had taught her this back in elementary school. She’d always preach, “If you can’t make it better, laugh at it.” Grandma Grace was a big believer in being able to laugh at yourself. And Emma had to admit this was funny. If she couldn’t laugh at herself now, then when?
She stopped laughing when Ivana pulled out her cell phone and began snapping photos. “Whoa!” she cried, raising her arms in protest. It wasn’t post-all-over-the-web funny.
“Back down.” Charlie stepped in front of Ivana.
“But she looks so precious!” Ivana smirked, turning up the collar of the fitted leather jacket she wore over skinny black pants.
“And yellow!” cried Lexie.
“There’s more yellow dye where that came from,” Charlie warned. “You’ll be looking like SpongeBob’s twin sister if you don’t delete those photos.”
Ivana narrowed her eyes. “You wouldn’t.”
Charlie shrugged. “If you want to live dangerously….”
Emma was impressed. Charlie had never stood up for her like that before.
“What’s going on?” Jackson’s gaze darted between Emma’s dripping yellow-ness and Charlie all up in Ivana’s face.
“I had a little fabric dying accident.” Emma smiled. “Crazy, right?”
“How do you figure in?” Jackson nodded toward Charlie.
“Trying to supervise, man. Not easy. Home pigmentation is a perilous business.” Charlie stepped away from Ivana, who’d tucked her phone into her blue suede wristlet.
“I don’t get it.” Clayton ran his palm over his buzzed hair. “Why do you reek like curried chicken?”
“I used a spice to color the dye—” Emma began.
“Who cares? It’s gross,” Lexie said. “You can’t expect us to sit with you. You smell.”
“Emma’s going to jump in the shower, aren’t you?” Holly raised her brows meaningfully at her friend.
“There’s no time.” Lexie turned to go.
“She’s super fast. She’ll be ready in seconds,” Holly promised.
“Please! She needs a spin cycle in the washing machine” Ivana raised her arms, shooting the cuffs of her electric blue top from her jacket. “Shannon and Kevin are meeting us. We can’t be late. We’ll get bad seats, and I hate bad seats.”
“She’s right,” Clayton agreed. “Plus the opening sequence is supposed to be killer.”
“We’ll go.” Lexie linked her arms through Jackson’s arms. “You guys could try to meet us. Or not.” She pulled Jackson out of the kitchen. Ivana followed with Clayton.
“But Emma will shower fast.” Holly’s voice came out high and pleading, as she followed behind. Emma knew she was calculating the potential damage of leaving Clayton with Lexie, Ivana, and Shannon.
“You go,” Emma nudged Holly toward Clayton. “Go to the movie now.”
“You’ll be there?” Jackson reached out to touch Emma’s wet sleeve.
“Sure.” Emma stared down at his hand.
“Really for sure?” His voice was quiet, so the others couldn’t hear as they left the apartment.
“Really for sure.” She had no interest in watching a movie with the Ivana-Bees, but she’d ditched Jackson once already. He seemed to really want her there. She had to show this time. “I promise.”
“Okay.” Jackson grinned and left with the others.
“Awkward much?” Charlie asked when they were, once again, alone in the apartment.
“I’m toast if Ivana posts those photos.”
“You’re probably toast on Monday with or without the hard evidence,” he pointed out.
“Wonderful.” Emma dashed into her parents’ clean bathroom and did a power scrub in their shower, while Charlie watched TV in the family room. She knotted her wet hair into a fishtail braid and threw on her favorite worn jeans, and the three layered tops she’d planned along with tan suede booties. She added a last-minute accessory—a fuzzy gray scarf that she wrapped around her head like a hoodie to hide her yellow-infused hair. The shower hadn’t completely erased her turmeric tinge. She wondered if now wasn’t time to come up with a new design of the burka—the full body covering Muslim women wore—for when girls like her needed to conceal as much skin and hair as possible.
Charlie gave an exaggerated sniff as she entered the room. “Interesting scent. A woody, Oriental perfume with undertones of curry.”
“Okay, so I couldn’t completely mask the smell. But it’s better, right?” Emma gave a hopeful smile. “The bottle promised an air of mystery.”
“Yes, one could say this whole night is quite the mystery.” Charlie leaned back onto the sofa cushions.
“You’re coming with me?” Emma asked. “You’re not sending me into that movie theater alone like this?”
“No way! You ordered the popcorn, not me,” Charlie said. “No movie, but I will walk you to the theater, but only because it’s on my way home and because I’m a good friend.”
“I’ll remember that,” Emma said, as they walked the three blocks in the unseasonably warm January night. Emma knew she should hurry. The previews were probably wrapping up. She admired the extra-long grey cashmere cardigan sweater the woman ahead of them wore. The soft material was laced with threads of silver that glimmered in the streetlights. A cocoon with style. Exactly what Emma could use tonight.
“Ivana-Boy and the crew of clones awaits you,” Charlie said as they reached the movie theater.
“Don’t call him that. He’s nothing like Ivana.” Emma hesitated on the sidewalk, staring up at the movie posters promising action and adventure. How had she ended up as part of this group outing? This was so not her thing. Could she slip in unnoticed? Would Holly and Jackson care if she didn’t?
“I’m thinking I’ll take a pass.” Emma fidgeted with her faux fox mini tote that held her keys, peppermint gum, and lip gloss and looked about for something to justify wimping out. She saw the folding table at the corner. Immigrant street vendors selling fake designer handbags, umbrellas, hats and scarves were a common sight in the city, but this one was different.
“She has serious style,” Emma told Charlie, pointing her head at a tall woman with skin the color of hot chocolate, who stood regally over the rickety table. She wore a striped gold, navy, and avocado head wrap and a long shift with a tribal, geometric pattern in the same colors. Emma couldn’t help herself. She hurried over, wishing she had her sketchbook to play with the colors and patterns. Then she gasped. The woman displayed the most amazing beaded jewelry Emma had ever seen.
The beads were teeny-tiny. Small crystal tubes. Round milky seed pearls. Faceted teardrops in sapphire, ruby, and emerald hues. German glass balls in pale pink and orange. Lucite cubes in topaz and cobalt blue. This table was coated with every color of the rainbow, all shimmering up at Emma’s appreciative eyes. Some were fashioned into intricate hoop earrings or long multi-strand necklaces. Twisted strand chokers, and thick patterned cuffs. All beautifully crafted. All enough to make Emma forget her yellow hair, her faint odor, and her crush, sitting in the theater right in front of her.
“These are art,” Emma told the woman. She held up a choker made from hundreds of seed beads in pale gray, ivory, and seashell pink with sparkling crystal charms dangling from it.
The woman held out a pair of tasseled beaded tortoise shell earrings. Up close, Emma realized how young she was. She couldn’t have been older than twenty. Emma inspected the earrings. The craftsmanship was amazing. She never saw stuff this good on the street. “I have a thing for beads lately. Did you make these?”
The woman nodded. “Me and my three sisters.” She spoke with a thick, musical accent.
“They’re insane,” Charlie agreed. “How do you know how to do it?”
“Our family has been beaders for many generations. My sisters and I were taught to string beads before we could walk.” The woman introduced herself as Adja. She and her sisters had come to New York only a year ago from Senegal in Africa. “In our village, beading was an honored way of life, but here, it is different. No one understands.”
“What don’t they understand?” Emma asked.
“The value. Each bead, each color, each pattern has a meaning. Pride, beauty, power, identity. They express ideas and communicate hopes and dreams. Great thought goes into every piece. Great thought and great time.”
“I understand that,” Emma said. That was how she designed.
“Then you are the rare one.” Adja clasped her hands together. “Americans do not want to pay for such time investment.”
Emma pulled out the little white paper tag attached to a necklace and looked at the number written in ink. The price was high. Much higher than any other folding-table, street-jewelry vendors she’d come across.
“You need to be selling in a store,” Emma said. “Upper West Side, Soho, or Tribeca.”
“Ah, I cannot afford rent of a store.” Adja shook her head. “As it is, my sisters and I share one mattress on the floor of my great-auntie’s small apartment. But I do not despair. As they say in our village, ‘However long the night, the dawn will break.’”
“I like your positive vibe,” Charlie said. He glanced down at his phone. “My mom’s going to the theater tonight.”
“Something good?” Emma asked. His mom had once been a Broadway star.
“Another experimental off-off-Broadway show. This one’s about singing Emperor penguins or a singer who lives with Emperor penguins or an emperor who owns singing penguins. Hard to know.”
“So you’re just going to sit by yourself tonight in your apartment?”
“What of it?”
“Oh, Charlie, please, please, walk in with me.” Emma begged. The smell of artificially-buttered popcorn had snaked out of the theater to remind her why she was there in the first place. “Safety in numbers and all that.”
“Do you want to buy?” Adja asked. “These earrings are very pretty, no?”
“Very pretty, but I have no money,” Emma confessed.
Adja tilted her head. “I know the feeling.”
“Let’s go before I change my mind.” Charlie stalked toward the theater.
“Good luck,” Emma called to Adja as she ran after Charlie, yelling, “Thank you, thank you, thank you!”
The movie had already started. Emma strained her eyes against the darkness. On the screen, a broad-shouldered guy in a charcoal suit scaled the side of a skyscraper with only one hand. The other hand gripped a leather briefcase, which Emma guessed must be important because the camera kept panning to it.
She inched her way down the aisle with Charlie right behind her. It didn’t take long for her to find the group. They took up a row in the middle. Holly sat next to Clayton. Then came Ivana, Shannon, and that boy Kevin, who she’d never spoken to at school. After Kevin, there was an empty seat and then Jackson and finally Lexie.
Had Jackson saved that seat for her?
The thought made her fingers tingle. Maybe it wasn’t so crazy to come, after all. Side-by-side at the movies. Hand-in-hand. And it was dark enough for him not to see her yellowness.
Charlie shook his box of Raisinets impatiently, and Emma instantly saw the problem. Where would Charlie sit? She’d dragged him here. She couldn’t abandon him.
What now?
Lexie caught site of her and sighed, making it clear that she was so totally done with Emma.
That did it. Even if Charlie wasn’t here—and of course, he was—she’d never give Lexie the satisfaction of climbing over her long legs to get to Jackson. She spotted two empty seats in the row behind and led Charlie to them.
Jackson twisted around, noticing Emma. “There’s a seat here.” He pointed to the empty one next to him.
“I’m good,” Emma whispered back, nodding in Charlie’s direction.
“Oh.” He gave Charlile a long look then turned back and faced the screen.
Was he angry? Did I hurt his feelings by not sitting next to him? Should I say something? Emma wondered
“Rasinet?” Charlie pushed the yellow box under her nose.
“Who likes Raisinets?” Emma asked, pushing it away.
“Chocolate-covered dried grapes. What’s not to love?” Charlie poured a stream of candy from the box directly into his mouth.
“Shhh!” Lexie said loudly, giving Emma a glare forceful enough to scatter the feathers from within her down jacket. Then she deliberately placed her hand on Jackson’s arm. And all Emma could do, the entire movie, was watch her hand on his sleeve. The hand he left there. The hand he seemed to like there.
“Ivana-Boy,” Charlie muttered, following Emma’s gaze.
For the first time, she wondered if he was right. Was Jackson really that shallow? Had she been wasting her time liking him?