THREE

 

“Don’t you have any shoes that don’t make you look like a hooker?” asked my auntie. “I swear, you are not going to work for Harmon Holt and embarrass me.”

She acted like she knew Harmon Holt personally instead of just having seen him on Oprah’s show about the top ten black businesspeople.

“Just my school shoes,” I answered, pulling off my mom’s spike heel boots. “You’ve got some boots that look just like these.”

Denise snorted. “They may look the same to you, but believe me there is a world of difference.”

Denise can be so irky, but I was looking sweet as pie when she turned around. I wanted to look like Denise when I went to this internship, not my mom.

Denise fussed around with a million different tops, skirts, and pants. She didn’t listen at all when I told her which ones I liked. Finally, she had a pile on the bed.

Then Denise whipped out her sewing machine and fixed a couple of skirts—for “your skinny little butt,” she said.

The whole time she was telling me what to wear together.

“And don’t take the jacket off when you wear this skirt. Else this fix I’m making will show and you will look like a charity case,” she said, pins in her mouth. “Be useful, Destiny—fold up that stuff careful and pack it in that case there. I’m not having my stuff messed up on the bus.”

I didn’t point out that I’d be wearing her clothes on the bus when I went to work. I packed everything up in one of her flight attendant rolly suitcases.

She handed me the last skirt to try on and grabbed a pair of shoes.

“What’s your shoe size?” she asked.

I told her. She stuffed some tissue in the toes of her shoes.

“Try them on and walk.”

She shook her head watching me. “Girl, you better practice that before you go in public. And don’t scuff them, or you’ll be paying me back.”

When I was on my way out the door pulling her suitcase behind me, Denise put a hand on my shoulder.

“I’m going to Atlanta the day you start, but I’ll be back by Thursday. Call me, okay? And remember—this is more important than babysitting for Lil D. You let your mom figure that out.”

She squeezed my shoulder. “Go get ’em, baby.”