Living in Non-Existence

Ch.10 Cry, Beautiful, Cry

It was taking the longest time I had ever known to get ready for this latest date with Marc. Normally, it was something simple where I could wear jeans or shorts and a crop top and I would look fine, but not this time.

"Babe, just wear something fancy and you'll be good," he had said chuckling on the other end. "Yeah, I know, you said that already but where are we going?" My voice was whinier than I had expected but that was the point. A girl dressing up needed to know everything, locale, ambiance, type of place; not just one word.

"Have you ever heard the expression: curiosity killed the cat?" I rolled my eyes, Marc was always trying to reason with me, in the end he was always right. "But Marc..." I began before I was promptly cut off.

"Antoinette Jordan Nathan, you are going to look gorgeous in whatever you wear. Now go get ready because I'll be there at five." I heard the dial tone of the phone. Marc knew me too well to expect no further questions. Awesome, I had called Marc for further information and ended with the exact same amount.

So that is why, at four in the afternoon, I was sitting at my bathroom mirror trying not to poke my eye out with the pencil eyeliner. Marc had mentioned a few times that my eyes were his favorite part about me and he couldn't look away from them.

When I was younger I never really paid attention to my eyes because they were just that, eyes. Meant for looking, I didn't really think they were meant to be looked at also. But around age fifteen, I noticed exactly how green they were, like trees after a rainstorm, luminescent and clear. That's why, now, at seventeen, I was making sure that my eyes would be the most noticeable part of me.

The green orbs stared back at me in the mirror. Crazy to think that one never knew what they truly looked like. Think about it. A mirror acts as a source of image identity, you see yourself and you identify that that is, in fact, you.

Now think about this, when you're in front of a mirror you smile, or you pose abnormally or contort your face as you put on makeup or cream or anything of that sort. However, you cannot look at yourself in the mirror and see the same things others see about you.

You do not notice the fragile quiver of your mouth as you burst into a smile, or the way your eyes blaze as you read adventurous tales of an immortal boy fighting pirates or a wife trying to remember her husband. No, mirror do not show the true incandescent, irrefutable, candid beauty of a person.

But maybe, once in a blue moon, the facade shatters and your true self bleeds through the gaping holes in the mirror. To see bits and pieces of you that were perfect and right and oh, so beautiful. That, is what I believed had happened to show me my eyes. The reality of them had bled through so I could love something about myself.

The soft tread of my feet almost echoed through the house. Walking to the closet, I softly thanked God that I was always prepared for fancy and crazy impromptu events. When your family has friends in high places, you learn to adapt to their way of life rather quickly and that, for me, meant ball gowns and heels.

My hands smoothed down the fabric of the dress I had put aside for the evening. A beautiful emerald green that had taken months to custom make. With the silky fabric and soft spaghetti straps, it looked like the definition of modern class. It was a dress of romance and hope, a dress so unique that it could only belong to me.

My hair, already curled, slipped over the fabric on the sides. The zipper swooshed upwards on the side. The green covered my knees but as a twirled, it lifted higher and higher into its tornado of fury. I smiled reaching for the shoes now. A gold pair that had one too many buckles but just enough sparkle. The look was completed, not a second too late.