In My Shoes (19 page)

I was actually looking forward to getting to
Nicole’s. I was hungry, and I was hoping Nicole’s mother would have
dinner ready.

After that, I would shower and get ready for
tomorrow. I did have to get out of this French Braid. After two
days, it was starting to get uncomfortable. I’m surprised Nicole
hadn’t mentioned hair styles today, but I guess she’s had a lot on
her own plate to think about. I’ll see if I can figure out how to
do her hair on the internet. It doesn’t seem like it should be that
difficult to do.

I arrived at Nicole’s house, parked and
walked in through the garage. Nicole’s mother was in the
kitchen.

“Hi Sweetie!” Dinner’s almost ready. Go tell
Dad he’s got five minutes.”

“Sure.”

Nicole’s father was in his office, working on
a project and singing a song he had playing on a stereo.

“Hey, Nikki! How are you doing, Pumpkin?”

“I’m good. How are you doing?”

“I’m great! I’m just finishing up a project
I’ve been working on for work. Is dinner almost ready?”

“Yeah…Mom…asked me to tell you it will be
ready in five minutes.”

“Okay. I’ll wrap this up and be there in a
few.”

He smiled as he went back to his work. I went
back to the kitchen to help Nicole’s mother.

“Is there anything I can help with?” I asked,
as I washed my hands for dinner.

“You could put the potatoes on the table,”
she offered, smiling.

That wasn’t what I had in mind, but I was
happy to help. Truth is, I enjoy cooking for my mother. It’s just
one more reminder that my life has been turned upside down lately.
We sat down to dinner with Nicole’s father at one end of the table
and Nicole’s mother and I sitting across from each other. Nicole’s
father said grace and we began eating.

“So, how was your day, Nicole?” her father
asked.

“It was fine,” I said, trying to sound
upbeat.

“Hmmm,” he said.

I looked up at him, afraid I had said
something wrong.

“Is something wrong?” I asked.

“I was going to ask you the same thing,” he
said.

“Why?”

“You’ve just seemed different the last few
days. And usually when I ask you about your day, you’ve got lots to
talk about. You’ve seemed quiet and more reserved lately.”

“It’s this new boy…Jake, right?” her mother
asked, nodding as though she understood. “You’ve been spending a
lot of time with him.”

“Well, yes…I’ve been spending a lot of time
with him, but it’s not like that. I didn’t realize I was being
quiet. There wasn’t really much to talk about from school today. I
went to Jake’s house after school to study. Then I came home.”

“What are Jake’s parents like?” Nicole’s
father asked.

“Well, his mother is really nice. I really
like her. His father left home when he was really young.”

There was a look of concern on their faces.
This conversation was getting uncomfortable.

“So, is anybody there at his house during the
day?” her father asked.

“No, his mother works during the week.”

More look of concern showed on their
faces.

“Nicole,” he said after a moment, “you know
we trust you, but we don’t really know this boy very well yet. I
know you’ll use good judgment, but it concerns me a little that you
are over at his house with nobody else there in the afternoon.”

I looked at them both. I guess I understood
why they were saying this, but they were talking about me. I was
trying hard not to take offense to what he was saying.

“It’s really not like that. We are just
friends, and Jake is a good person. You don’t have anything to
worry about.”

“He may be a great person, but I still don’t
know him very well. All I know is that my daughter is spending a
lot of time with a boy who doesn’t have a father and whose mother
isn’t home during the week. That makes for a lot of time for him to
be raising himself.”

He was keeping his tone calm and respectful,
but his words still hurt a lot. I could feel my face turning red,
and my eyes start to water. I didn’t know what to say. I mean, it’s
not like Nicole’s mother is always home during the week. I decided
not to say anything. They both seemed to have noticed, because the
tone of the conversation seemed to change after that.

“Nikki,” her mother said softly, “your father
is just concerned for you is all. I don’t think he’s telling you
not to see this boy…”

“Not at all,” her father said comfortingly.
“I just want you to be careful. Be smart. Use your good judgment.
And…if you happened to spend more afternoons here than at his
house, that wouldn’t be so bad either.

“That said,” he continued, “you’ve never done
anything to take away our trust, so I’m not telling you that you
can’t go to his house. Yet,” he said smiling.

I guessed he was being playful. I tried to
give a convincing smile. I don’t know that it worked.

“Sweetheart,” her mother added, “you know we
love you. We don’t want you getting hurt. Jake seems like a nice
boy. I’m sure we’ll find that he’s a good person, just like
you.”

I finished eating, and asked to be excused. I
went upstairs and into Nicole’s room. My head was spinning. I
didn’t really know what to think of all of this. I didn’t really
want to think about it, but their words kept popping back into my
head. My chest felt heavy.

Not having my father around is something I’ve
had to deal with most of my life. I’ve had times when it hurt a
lot. Most of the time, I deal with it just fine. I don’t feel like
I’m missing out on a whole lot, but being in this house makes me
realize how different my life is from Nicole’s. It makes me sad
that her parents are concerned about me because I don’t have a
father. I don’t know if that’s a natural parental thing, or what.
There are lots of kids out there who are still good people even
though they only have one parent.

After thinking about it for way too long, I
got up and tried to finish my studying. It took a lot longer than
it should have. I was easily distracted tonight. It was eight
o’clock by the time I finished. I had hoped to have more time. I
had to take a shower and get dressed for bed, but I needed to find
a way to do my hair for tomorrow. My hope was to have some time to
research it on the internet and surprise Nicole. If she could see
that I learned how to do her hair without her showing me, I thought
she might just be impressed.

I undid the French Braid, showered, dried
off, got dressed for bed and blew my hair dry. Nicole has a
computer at her desk, so I sat down and got on the internet. I
searched for ‘hairstyles for teenage girls.’ I didn’t find a lot
there. One website had lots of pictures of popular teenage
hairstyles, but no instructions on how to style the hair.

After about an hour, my head was spinning. I
had been to a ton of websites and learned a lot about hair. Nicole
apparently had medium length hair with no bangs. Usually, she wore
her hair with a part either down the middle or off to one side.
Sometimes, her hair was straight and sometimes it was wavy.

Nicole had several different hair styling
accessories. I looked them all up, and identified what they were
and how they were used. After everything I learned tonight and with
what I learned the other day, I was sure that I could easily do her
hair. I was wrong.

After practicing for a while it was passable,
but not nearly as good as I would have liked it. Once I felt
somewhat competent with doing her hair, I turned everything off and
crawled into bed. The bed felt nice after the long day. Nicole’s
bed was definitely more comfortable than mine, not that I’d say
that out loud.

It’s been so difficult to process everything
going on around me. There have been so many changes, it was hard to
be sure that we were keeping everything together. I don’t think we
are forgetting anything important, but I wasn’t confident. The last
few nights, I’ve been so exhausted by the time I’ve climbed into
bed, that I was out as soon as my head hit…

I opened my eyes and let out a sigh. At some
point, we have to turn back into ourselves, right? I mean, we can’t
stay like this forever. Whatever it is out there that made us like
this wouldn’t make us stay like this forever. I have dreams, and
most of those dreams don’t center on me being a girl.

I woke up a little early today so that I’d
have extra time to do my…well, Nicole’s…ugh, my hair. I feel like
I’m having an identity crisis. I mean, it’s Nicole’s hair, but it’s
mine right now. If I start calling
her
things
my
things, am I going to lose the ability to recognize myself as Jake?
It makes me nervous because I want to be comfortable fitting in
Nicole’s shoes, but I don’t want to become too comfortable to the
point that I don’t see myself anymore. I wouldn’t think that could
happen, but after living in her shoes twenty-four hours a day for
more than four days now, I am starting to feel more like her than
like me.

Maybe I’m just being grouchy. I think I’m
coming down with something, because I’m achy and my skin feels
sensitive. That’s probably not the right word. Agitated maybe. I
don’t know. As I’ve learned what is
normal
for Nicole’s
body, I’m aware that I don’t feel right today. It’s probably
nothing.

I trudged out of bed and headed for the
closet. Sure enough, I found the clothes that Nicole had organized
for me. She had a dress laid out for today, just like she said.
Uh-oh. She had some heels going with it. They were very low and
wide heels, but they still made me nervous. I figured I would have
to wear them at some point, but that didn’t make it any more
appealing.

I took off my night shirt and put it into the
laundry basket. Next I grabbed the clothes and laid them out on the
bed. Nicole had only set out the dress and the shoes, so I needed
to find a matching bra and socks. I went to the dresser and found a
bra that was similar in color and she had socks that seemed to be a
perfect match for the dress. I put the bra and socks on and went
over to the makeup table.

Nicole told me I should do the hair first,
and then do the makeup so I don’t sweat, so that’s what I did.
After I finished the hair, I was glad I had given myself the extra
time. I needed every minute of it. When it was done, I felt at
least good enough about it that I could leave the house. Next I put
on the makeup, which still took me twice as long as Nicole. It came
out pretty good, though. I mean, I thought I looked pretty, so it
must have been okay, right?

I put on the dress and strapped the heels on,
grabbed my things and headed downstairs. Nicole’s mom was in the
kitchen already.

“Morning, Nikki. How did you sleep?” she
asked.

“I slept okay, I think.”

“Would you like an omelet this morning? Your
usual?”

Whatever my usual is. “Uhh…sure, thanks!”

She had come over to give me a kiss as she
was asking the questions and she looked down at my feet.

“Sweetheart, you know you can’t wear socks
with those shoes, right?”

“Huh?” I said, looking down.

“You should be wearing nylons or nothing with
those pumps, but definitely not socks.”

What the heck are pumps? I thought these were
heels. “Oh, yeah. I guess I wasn’t thinking. I’ll be right
back.”

I walked up the stairs and into Nicole’s
room. I took the shoes and socks off and looked through Nicole’s
drawers for nylons. They were in the back of the sock drawer. I sat
down on the bed and started putting them on until I realized…I
didn’t know if the nylons went on over the underwear or if the
underwear went on over the nylons.

Okay, the nylons didn’t look finished at the
top, but underwear was all cute and finished looking. Yes, I was
aware how that sounded. So, it seemed logical that the underwear
would go on last, right?

I pulled the underwear off, put the nylons on
and put her underwear back on. After putting the shoes back on, I
walked back downstairs where Nicole’s mother had breakfast
ready.

“Much better,” she said, smiling.

“Thanks,” I said appreciatively. One less
thing for Nicole to find I did wrong.

She laid a ham, cheese and green pepper
omelet in front of me and I hesitantly started eating it. Omelets
aren’t common breakfast in our house, and I’ve never had one with
green peppers in it. It was delicious!

“This is really good,” I said.

“Glad you like it. Have a good day at
school.” With that, she kissed my forehead and walked out of the
room.

I hadn’t finished my omelet when I received a
text from Nicole telling me to meet her outside the locker room
before school started. She probably wanted to make sure I wore the
right clothes today. Who could blame her?

Once I finished my omelet, I took my dishes
to the sink, cleaned them and put them in the dishwasher. I grabbed
my things, got into Nicole’s car and headed to school. It was nice
not having to wait for Mike to pick me up for school each day. I
could definitely get used to having a car.

The trip to school seemed short because I was
lost in thought. Hopefully today would go more smoothly than the
last few days. We have to be getting close to some sort of comfort
level, right?

Nicole wasn’t waiting in front of the locker
room when I got there, so I decided to go inside and go to the
bathroom while I was waiting for her to arrive. Underwear and
nylons down…dress up and forward. Man, I’m glad I’m not usually a
girl. Just going to the bathroom is an event.

I finished up, washed up and walked back
outside, where Nicole was now waiting. She looked at me and though
she looked relieved at first, her eyes quickly opened wide with
panic. She walked up to me, pulled the back of my dress out of my
underwear, and looked around to see if anyone was watching. Nobody
was in the area.