Judgmental Morons

6. I realise the importance of a wallet while buying milkshake

“With that amount of lipstick, you could paint a fucking zoo.”

I was currently at the mall with the girls. We’d been dragged out here by Michelle, who insisted she was out of lipstick, which apparently was a national fashion emergency.

This may come as a surprise, but I’m not particularly fond of make-up shopping.

“Oh c’mon honey,” Michelle laughed, “I’m almost done. Besides, you should look for some stuff yourself.”

“I have two whole tubes of lipstick. I think they’re enough. And I’ll always have the museum you’re setting up just two streets away from me,” I pointed out. Michelle, however, replied with a twinkle in her eyes.

“You have to start making an effort, now that good-looking people are taking you to fancy restaurants and symphonies and other rich-people dating destinations.”

I facepalmed as everyone else sniggered. “It was just a dinner,” I growled, “and a very dismal one, at that.” 

“Dismal?” Jenna asked wide-eyed, “They serve cold food at Vincent’s? That’s definitely gonna hurt their rep…” her voice trailed off as we stared at her blankly.

“Jenna, dismal means small. Insufficient. It doesn’t mean cold,” Terri tried to say this in the gentlest way possible, and I held back my chuckle so as to not hurt Jenna’s feelings. She was sensitive about…well, everything.  

“But why would it be dismal?” Terri asked seriously.

“I don’t know,” I sighed, “it’s just that there were really little portions and everything was slimy.”

The three girls blinked at me, clearly unsatisfied.

“Well, you know how I find it hard to consider something food if it isn’t cheesy or doesn’t contain spicy meat or tomatoes or jalapenos or something,” I added a bit defensively.

“Oh yeah,” Terri giggled. “Remember the veggie regime?”

I shuddered at the memory. Last year, Uncle Tom had suddenly become very worried about my unhealthy intake of calories, so he decided to reconstruct my diet. It consisted of “healthy food” according to him; to me, it was all tasteless crap. He’d even revoked my pocketmoney and called all my friends’ parents, thinking I’d try to sneak food out from them. However, since the fridge was stocked with things that didn’t fall under the category of food in my dictionary, I went a whole week without a single meal, which prompted Uncle Tom to let me go back to my normal dietary habits. Apparently he hated the idea of my dying from starvation more than the idea of me becoming obese.

“Well, you should get used to it,” Michelle warned me, “That’s his lifestyle, and it’s sweet that he wants to share it with you. Besides, you said so yourself, you guys have so much in common!”

I hadn’t really figured out how I felt about that, though.

As the conversation moved on (Thankfully) to other topics, I let my gaze wander. My eyes soon found a killer drum set displayed in front of a shop on the other side of the building, well away from the make-up department.

“Hey guys? I’m just gonna go check something out, ok? I’ll meet you at the entrance in fifteen minutes.” With that, I jogged out of the store and headed towards the drums that had caught my attention. A stranger must have found it very weird to see someone like me staring longingly at a drum set. I was dressed in a pale blue T-shirt that said “Three Days’ Grace” in large grey letters over a grey pair of skinny jeans, my hair loosely braided to one side and rectangular glasses perched on my nose. Apart from the name of the band, I didn’t exactly look like drummer material.