I
was surprised to find that Denise McLean’s house was so close to my
college. I seriously could have walked
there if I felt energetic enough.
Anyway… the house came into view and I smiled. It was a nice little two-story number with a bricked
driveway. There was no gate, and I
sighed with relief. I didn’t want to
have to convince her I really was bringing papers from her son. I pulled into the driveway and parked my
car. I grabbed the manila envelope and
then slowly made my way up to the front door.
My hands were sweating as I knocked
on the door I was so nervous. I don’t
know why I was, I just was. I heard a
small dog go nuts at the noise my fist made on the wood, and a woman in the
background yell “Hush-up Vegas!” Then
the door opened. Let me just say that
AJ’s mom is s-h-o-r-t. I was like five
inches taller than her, and I could see the top of her head, no joke. She looked me over and kept a smile on her
face. “Hi, can I help you?” she asked,
and squeezed a squirming Vegas. I
looked past her and saw little bitty Jack Daniels waddle into the foyer. “Actually, ma’am… AJ asked me to give you
these,” I said, and held out the papers for her. She took them and opened the envelope. “Oh… yeah,” he face fell, “These. Well,” she said, and resumed smiling, “Would you like to come in
for a minute? I just made come coffee,
and you’re welcome to it.” I smiled and
accepted.
“So how did you and my son meet?”
Denise asked. “Are you an assistant up
at the clinic?” I took a sip of my coffee.
“No ma’am, I-” “Please! Don’t call me ma’am! It makes me feel so old!” she laughed. “Call me Denise. Or Ms. McLean if you have to.”
I smiled and nodded.
“Alright. No, I don’t work up
there. I was with a friend, visiting
another friend, Josh, and he and AJ obviously got to know each other.” Denise smiled and gripped her mug, the
papers under it. “Well, he’s getting
out in a week. I hope you two are still
friends after he gets back around his crowd again. You seem like a very nice girl.”
I blushed and smiled crookedly.
“Yeah, that would be nice. Then
again, I don’t really know him that well.
He might just want to get back to his life. But I’m glad we’re friends right now.” We sat in silence for a moment while Denise looked over AJ’s
evaluation sheets. After a few ‘hmm’-s
and ‘oh’-s she looked up. “You know,
Alex doesn’t have many women friends.
The ones he does have are entertainers.
Do you sing?” she asked, and I could feel suspicion in her
question. She thought I might be using
him? No way in Hell could I let my
friend’s mother think that. “No
no! Oh no… I dance. I’m studying to become a veterinarian at the
university. I dance though, that’s why
my name is Jazz…” I saw relief flood
over her, and I felt it flood over me also.
“I was wondering about your name!” she laughed, and I smiled, glad to
know I had not made a fool of myself this evening.
Before I left, I told Denise
everything her son had wanted me to tell her.
“He said he loves you, and he wanted you to know, straight from
him. He’s doing really well. He still smokes like a freight train,
though,” I said, and Denise smiled and shook her head. “He just wont quit that! I’ve told him a thousand times, but children
never listen to their parents, you know.”
We exchanged goodbyes, and then I hopped back in my car.
~*~Sunday~*~
It took me four hours to finally get
out a batch of edible chocolate chip cookies.
Don’t let it ever be said that all women instinctually know how to
cook. Some of us can’t even follow
directions on a package. This was
proved when Celìne tried to tell me she knew what she was doing. “Oh yeah!
I’ve made cookies like… a hundred times! All you do is…” I will
never let her help me do anything ever again, I swear. We made a mess in the dorm’s tiny ‘kitchen’,
but all was good when the third batch of cookies came out of the oven. “Perfect!” I yelled, and stuck the blazing
hot disks into a gallon sized plastic bag.
The melted chocolate chips were searing my flesh off as they attached to
my fingers, but I couldn’t have been happier.
It was done. “Now… we have an
hour to get ready,” Celìne reminded me.
“Oh yeah! And you do remember
that this is the one night a month that the patients can leave the clinic,
right?” she asked as I scraped cookie dough from bowls. I froze.
“No. No. Aw, shit!
I thought…” I stuttered around a
sentence. “Well AJ’s gonna be going out
with friends, I’ll bet. Shit. So I made these for nothing,
basically.” I was very unhappy. “You know what? Who cares? I’ll just go out with you and Josh. I mean, if it’s ok?” I asked, and she
shrugged, popping some errant dough into her mouth. “Yeah, come with us. We’re going to club Moomba.
You know the one *Nsync had their release party at? Yeah, Josh has the hook-up, so we’re going
there,” she said excitedly. I smiled
warily, dreading the thought of having to dance with and around a bunch of
drunken frat boys. “Yeah, sounds like
fun,” I said, and sighed.
“You aren’t gonna wear THAT, are
you?” Celìne asked me as I slipped on a black stretch top and a black
mini. “Um, I WAS, but not anymore,
thanks,” I said, and started to pull the top off. “No, I’m just saying…
wear this,” she suggested, and threw me one of her dresses. It was her white lace mini dress. “No way am I wearing that out in public!” I
cried, and flung it far away. She
retrieved it and brought it back to me.
“Honey, if anyone can pull it off, you can. Just try it on, please?” she begged, and I knew it was either
give in or hear complaints all night.
“Fine. I’ll put it on,” I
griped, and slipped the flimsy material over my white satin under things. Then I looked in the mirror and gasped. It was hot.
“Oh my God… I love it! But I
don’t want every guy I meet trying to fuck me!” Celìne just laughed. “That’s the point, dumb ass! You haven’t gotten laid in so long it’s
starting to make you bitter and un-fun.
Now wear that tonight, and wear these,” she said, throwing me her white
spike heels. “You’ll get some in half
an hour or less… guaranteed.”