Seven
Plan Mom
A knock at the bathroom door startled me.
Ugh. I couldn’t let Momma see me like this—she’d go into an ecstasy fit. I grabbed my robe to throw over the dress.
“Kenley? You in there?”
With a breath of relief, I opened the door to Cinda. “Hey. How was class?”
“Good! You going out tonight? I love that dress.” She crawled onto my bed and sat criss-cross applesauce in her shorts and Tech t-shirt.
“No. Just trying it on—you want it?”
“What? No—it’s yours. Someday the real you is going to come back and want her clothes,” she teased.
“This is the real me,” I protested, peeling off the incriminating red dress and pulling on a pair of ratty dorm pants and a sweatshirt.
“Um, are you the same big sister who used to dress me up and cover me in makeup for pretend Top Model photo sessions? Who founded our high school’s fashion club and kept all of Teen Vogue’s sponsors in business?”
I gave her a sheepish eye-roll. “Okay, but I’m not into it anymore. And I refuse to use all that stuff to try to lure some rich guy into marrying me. I just want a nice guy who likes me for me. I’m done with Plan Mom, and I hope you’re not buying into it.”
She laughed. “Have you met me? Of course I’m not—I’ve just perfected the art of playing along and ‘yes ma’amming’ her until I can get the hell out of here. You know I don’t care about fixing up, and I’ve gone out of my way not to meet the rich boys at school.”
Georgia Tech had its share of those—it was a pricey school. Cinda was only there because of grants (Momma preferred the term “scholarships”) and work study and because she saved the cost of housing and a food plan by living at home.
“Believe me,” she continued, studying her short, unpainted nails. “I wouldn’t be killing myself getting a double-engineering degree if I wasn’t planning to support myself.”
“Good.” I nodded and put the red dress away, taking one last look at it before switching off the closet light.
“I always feel kind of bad for those guys—well, not for Mark—but for the rest of them, you know?” Cinda said.
“How do you mean?”
“Well, like, how would you feel if someone targeted you, tried to make you like them and fall in love with them, not because they were interested in you as a person, but because of how much money you were going to make, or how much your family had? Like that Larson guy? I’ll bet he’s been dealing with it his whole life—people who are interested in him because he has money and famous parents. It’s probably hard for someone like him to know who his real friends are.”
“Yeah, I guess you’re right.” I kept my tone casual, trying not to reveal how deeply Cinda’s words had struck me.
I’d never thought to feel sorry for Larson. But I had actually overheard people at work scheming to get close to him—guys hoping to gain access to cool parties or at least hook up with the women who always hovered around Larson’s vicinity at work.
And the women, well, enough said. They acted nothing short of ridiculous around him, laughing extra loud if he said anything remotely amusing in the news meeting, touching his shoulder or his arm whenever they spoke to him at his desk.
It bugged me so much I had to look away.
Cinda gave my suitcase a significant glance. “So you’re going?”
I shrugged. “I guess. Maybe. I’m still not sure. It’s a great opportunity to get some experience field producing and to show the bosses what I can do. But… you know.”
Delving into a drawer, I pulled out a colorful stack of panties—cute underwear was the only part of my former life I hadn’t let go of—and why should I? No one but me was going to see them.
“You like him, huh?”
“No,” I snapped.
Then I sighed, placing the underwear into a pocket inside the suitcase. “Well, I guess he’s pretty nice, and he’s attractive and everything, but I just feel more comfortable maintaining some distance with him. We work together, and he’s…”
“Like Mark?”
I stopped what I was doing and looked at Cinda, my shoulders sagging. “Maybe. Maybe not. I don’t know. I’m just not doing it anymore—I’m not some rich guy’s arm candy—I deserve more. I can do better.”
“Of course you can. I’ve always known that.” Cinda fished a loose, rather dowdy-looking blouse out of the suitcase—one of the new things I’d purchased for work. “But…”
“But what?”
She held the blouse up with a wrinkled nose. “I’m not sure this is what you are, either.”
I grabbed it from her and threw it back into the suitcase. “What do you mean?”
“You love clothes. You always have. And these past couple of months when you stopped wearing makeup—that’s like the first time you’ve not worn it since you were what—twelve? You even put on beach makeup and pool makeup.”
“That’s how I used to be. I’m different now.”
“Why can’t you be both? Why do you have to give up the things you love? Can’t you be a girl who loves fashion and makeup and a smart, serious career woman who doesn’t need a rich man to take care of her?”
I was growing tired of this conversation. Well-meaning though her remarks were, they were getting on my nerves.
“Look—I appreciate it must look strange from where you’re sitting, but I’m not ‘giving up.’ I… like these new clothes, I like not fixing up. I feel better about myself this way.”
“Do you?” Her tone was full of doubt. “Because you spend most of your time outside of work these days just sitting at home, and you seem to have lost a little bit of your… I don’t know… your spark or whatever.”
I gave her a frown.
“Don’t be mad—I just want you to be happy. You don’t seem to be moping over Mark, but you seem sort of… repressed or something.” She slid off the bed and hugged me. “But I don’t want to nag you like Momma. If you tell me you’re happy, that’s good enough for me.”
“I’m happy,” I growled.
“Obviously.” She laughed. “Okay, I’m heading down to help Little Miss Sunshine get our dry leaves and low-cal bland protein ready for supper. See you down there.” She waggled her fingers at me as she left the room.
By the time I went downstairs and joined everyone at the dinner table, Momma had already cheerily reported my Nashville trip opportunity to Daddy.
“Sounds like it might be fun—what do you think, Kens?” he said.
“Well, I don’t know about fun, but my supervisor said it could lead to a promotion.”
“It could lead to all kinds of things,” Momma said with a suggestive raised brow.
I suppressed a snarl. “All I care about is what it could mean professionally.”
Momma sniffed a laugh, so sure she would eventually get her way where Larson was concerned. I cut my small piece of grilled chicken breast with more vigor than necessary.