The Dress

Susan chose the dress carefully. It was the seventeenth one that she had tried on, and the girl at the store, barely twenty, tired and run ragged by rude customers and the scrutiny of her supervisor, was on her last knees. But Sue knew that she had found something special when she caught a glance from that poor girl - a glint of understanding, an envy at the way the light caresses her body enrobed in that dress.

Sue spent the last of her meagre paycheck at the counter. She recounted in her mind the sweets that she will have to give up, the dates that she will need to demurely demand to be paid for by the other party. Oh what we give to make ourselves pretty, she thought. Her face was aglow - an angel basking in the simple pleasures of finding something finally, that she coveted and desired - herself.

She was at the mall. Walking back along the oft tread route to the bus stop, she glanced here and there, at the multitude of people rushing by, shopping, eating, talking, looking. A monochromatic scene unfolded in her mind's eye, everything and everyone around her bland shades of gray, with only her dress, wrapped snuggly in its box, the purest black behind a thousand galaxies that only reveals itself in the Strathcona of her childhood, when she looked to the skies and saw what God had painted in India ink.

As she walked, thinking of whoever would be dining with her, she glimpsed at the edge of visibility a young girl, brilliant and outshining the family and friends who surrounded her. Crystal eyes hang above great grinning smile, and the boy nearby winked at her. The girl had on the very same dress that she had spent hours looking for. Only it made her look so mature, so beautiful, and paired with the sparkle of youth forming the most unusual, the most amazing combination of happiness.

Sue disappeared. Her shoulders grew inward. The frown on her face increased. Her furrows deepened, face ashen. The dress that was hers, found with time and effort, paid for by sacrifice, now adorns another. And she couldn't possibly be seen in it now. It makes her look embarrassingly young, like she's trying too hard.

She went home, put on the dress in front of the mirror, and started crying into her hands. Her hands came up to her face, as she struggled to unzip the back - Oh why must they make it unzip at the back? It's some perverse thing. There is no one to enjoy the dress with her and no one to tear it to shreds with her.

At that moment, she was utterly alone. With what little strength she had left, she shed the dress leaving it behind in the orange light of her bedroom.

She reached into her closet, and found a t-shirt and her jacket--old, threadworn leather from her days at the Bomber bar, when she only had to smile and robins would come. With a pair of jeans, she left for her birthday party.

- April 25, Easter Monday, 2011