Chiara [PUBLISHED] ✔️

Eleven

I have never been this nervous in my entire life. In my head, I replayed the memory of the last party I attended. The same party where drunk Chiara talked to me. The memory was enough to send my nerves spiralling. I glanced at the message she sent in the morning.

8PM, my room. Wear something dashing!

Dashing seemed to be the hardest to find. All of my dresses were simple and loose and comfortable. None of them fit the word 'dashing.' Steph desperately tried to flatten my hair as I desperately stared in the mirror.

"I feel fat." I said looking at the tight, beige dress that seemed a size too small on my curvy body. Bryan insisted I wear something at least slightly girly. This was the first dress I tried on and none of us were satisfied.

"You're not fat." Steph rolled her eyes.

"But I feel fat, which might be worse than being fat." I stopped and looked at Steph's reflection. "Was this fat-shaming?"

"Only if we tell on you." Bryan pulled clothes out of my closet and threw them on my bed.

"God, I hate Instagram, I hate thin, perfect models in their perfect pools with their perfect tans and their perfect boyfriends, setting impossible standards for us mediocre, plain-faced, fat-assed girls next door." I whined and Steph grabbed my head to keep it firmly in place. My hair was gradually turning from puddle-like to flowy.

"Don't envy them." Bryan looked over one of my black shirts and frowned. "They're all deeply frustrated and dissatisfied because of those precise standards. You're falling for fake lives."

"Not everything is fake." Steph said and I glanced at their reflections in the mirror.

"Fake is the new norm." Bryan threw my shirt away. "Look around the school. Fake nails, fake lashes and fake personalities."

"But very real designer purses." I nodded.

"You're just cynical." Steph rolled her eyes at his reflection and Bryan smirked, grabbing another one of my shirts.

"Girls that look good in tight, beige dresses are sent from the devil to destroy humankind." I still stared at my fat thighs.

"Only if the devil is an overachieving, narcissist mother with a drinking problem." Bryan said.

"And a Xanax problem." Steph added.

"Guys, I can't go to this party! Everyone there will be perfect and rich." I whined again, feeling totally out of place.

"Maybe you can ask Chiara if you can borrow one of her dresses." Steph suggested.

"Yeah, if you want to be wearing something that's worth more than your kidney." Bryan said and grabbed a dress from the bed. "Wear this one, it'll hide your thighs and it goes well with the whatever colour of your hair."

"It's auburn."

"It's shitty."

I feigned anger as I took the white dress from his hands. It was one of my favourite dresses, it saved my ass when I had nothing to wear more than once. The dress was strapless and tight around the chest, but flowy around thighs and the hemline ended just above my knees.

"I bet I'll look ordinary." I said, looking at my reflection.

"Most likely." Bryan agreed. "But everyone there will be too obsessed with the way they look, so you're in the clear."

"I feel so out of place." I mumbled. "This is literally the first time I see the differences so clearly. I am completely aware of the wealth I'm about to stumble in."

"There's always differences. When we're on the right side of them, we don't see them. Even in the most casual place in the world, someone will show up wearing Zara and someone else can't afford it." Bryan, ever the philosopher, went through my makeup bag and looked exasperated. "You literally have no makeup, what about you, Steph?"

Steph shook her head and Bryan dramatically spread out his hands and looked at the ceiling. Then, he proceeded to get his makeup bag.

"I'm scared." I told Steph as Bryan exited the room.

"No reason to be." Steph smiled gently, still working on my hair. "Chiara invited you, which means she wants you there. And nothing else should matter."

"But everything does matter!" I exclaimed. "Everyone will stare at me and I'll be uncomfortable all night long at best."

"If you feel so bad about it, why are you going?" Steph's huge eyes widened even further, she was genuinely curious.

"I told Bryan I would try to get inside Chiara's inner circle to dig out some of Josh's secrets." When I said it out loud, it sounded kinda stupid.

What the hell was I thinking? I didn't know how to act or spy or be charming.

"Be careful, okay?" Steph sighed as Bryan entered the room again, wearing a huge Chanel bag that seemed to be full of makeup.

"Do you wear that?" I pointed at the brushes and eyeliners sticking out.

"Don't yuck someone's yum, Jackie." Bryan narrowed his eyes and put the bag down on my bed. Steph immediately skipped over to it and frowned as she pulled out designer brands out.

"You know what, Bryan?" Steph murmured. "You shit all over the wealthy in the school, but you seem to like the same stuff they do." To prove the point, she waved with luxurious brushes.

"I'm a diva, Stephanie." Bryan simply blinked. "Also, I never said you're not allowed to be rich. But people are conflating owning things with being happy."

He made me sit on the bed and began applying foundation to my face. I guessed this was the closest I'd ever get to a personal makeup artist.

"You're forgetting I spend most of my time digging through their garbage. Just because they own fancy cars and visit cool places, doesn't mean they're happy." He continued, his eyes fixated on my face. "I see a lot of people lost in the idea sold to us, through money, yachts, beautiful sunsets and other idealistic pictures of happiness. We are blinded by the idea that everyone around us is happy and we're isolated in our own struggling lives. Our own sadness, tragedy and failure start looking rare; like we are the only loser in the world."

Steph and I kept quiet as he talked and poked my eyes.

"So, we work on our image, status and the general 'seeming' of happiness," Bryan said, "but we're never truly working on ourselves, thus continuing the cycle."

"Are you sure you're 18, and not 80?" Steph asked and I chuckled.

"It's like I'm talking to a wall." Bryan murmured, still attentively staring at my face and poking me with brushes and all kinds of makeup instruments.

After a few minutes, he stopped, frowned and shrugged. I guessed I could pass as average.

"Shit," I checked my phone, "I gotta go. I'm meeting Chiara in her room for champagne."

"Oh là là!" Steph giggled.

"I have to admit, though," Bryan mumbled, "she seems to want to hang out with you."

"You doubting that is doing wonders to my self-confidence." I shot him a mean look.

"You have that?" Bryan raised his eyebrow and I rolled my eyes. "Oh, come on, I'm kidding. Have fun, Jackie, I mean it."

I grabbed the small black purse from my bed and glanced in my mirror one more time. The dress was the best I could pull off; my thighs were hidden and my relatively slim waist emphasized. Bryan hasn't overdone it with my makeup. He put a darker shade on my eyes and it made them deeper, more mysterious. A matte, beige rouge was on my lips and my cheeks were only slightly blushed. I was satisfied.

"I can't believe I'm doing this." I sighed and squeezed my fingers; anxiety threatened to overwhelm me. I was going to sweat through the makeup.

"You'll be fine." Bryan pushed me out of the door. "Make sure to look at everyone with disinterest. It'll hurt their ego so they'll try to impress you."

And with that, he closed the door in my face.