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    There’s Love in Labels




    Ah, to be young and in love. The sickening aroma of unfading selflessness. The intimacy of being overly intimate. The arrogance toward the single. Rude behavior against the relationship-impaired. Oh, ’scuse me, is it polite to hold the door for your significant other then allow it to slam in the face of a lonely stranger? Is it sweet to smother your lover in slobbery smooches, drowning the passersby in PDA and pointless peril? Sickening, indeed, to the envious. Arrogant, indeed, to those who want it, but will probably never have it.
    Love is in the heart of the beholder right? Do people say that?
    Okay, maybe I made that up, but it’s true either way. What’s that word I’m searching for?-Objectification? No, um, objectism- icism, I don’t know! It’s when a human is in love with an object. I suffer this in extremes. Just this very morning at the Valentine’s Day sale at Esteem I committed adultery. Disgraced my new engagement with a completely beaded, traditional Mayan garment for a pastel yellow charmuse sundress that had green, 1930’s style flowers embroidered in the short sleeves. Then, not even two hours ago, I dipped myself headfirst into a shoe sale at Marshalls, shaming myself in a three-way with a pair of green and beige, five inch Choos and a pair of red, suede Mossimo ankle high boots with tassels dangling around. And my loves have never lasted over two weeks ever since holiday season came on by. There have been nonstop sales in every bargain store, and even some couture shops, since black Friday. Now, the new year has too soon displayed its arrival and become just a year, and February is at its ides.
    And once again, instead of entering the sparkling double doors to a high-class restaurant with a human, I was entering the doors of a high-class shoe store trying to buy as many brand-spanking new spring items so I can feel more extraordinary and less boredinary. It was normally a jungle in Hot Foots, the big shoe superstore that was built just in September on a rich man’s spoiled daughter’s birthday. Today was a good day for Ginu, my shopaholic alter ego, but a bad day for my conscience. I was spending way too much in this one store, but I had no real competition in sight. All the lovely little ladies in trustful relationships must’ve stayed home today to give their men a chance to shop for them. What a bum decision. Men just didn’t get it, unless of course they weren’t straight, or even hetero acting homos. I hope all those women get last season’s outdated colors and have to return their heartfelt gift for something that made sense. For instance, I saw a tall, dark, and gruesomely handsome man biting his nails while staring at a pair of Baby Phat boots. The boots wee brown with gold and silver sprinkles on them. I prayed to Ginu, please stop him from buying those atrocious boots, please, please, please! Don’t let the man destroy his relationship with his girl just so you can hurry and grab those Mahnolo Blanics to his left! But Ginu did not stop him. Ginu let that gorgeous man unknowingly attempt to ruin his chances at love with some unlucky woman, who would have to explain his idiocy to her friends who’d see those hideous boots in her closet. I felt like a failure as a fashionista. I was born unto oath to never let a thing such as that happen. No one should have to pay over twenty bucks for the label Baby Phat and I just let a man pay sixty-five. Would I go to hair-hell for this?
    Anyway, I carried out the rest of my plan and grabbed up those wonderful Mahnolos. The Baby Phat fellow gave me a stare down. For a second I was sure he was going to tackle me. He was a pretty big guy, and made of muscle. But these shoes are worth fighting for.
    The Baby Phat fellow strutted over to me like a man with an itch. I felt my grip on the Mahnolos tighten as he slowly approached.
    “Excuse me miss? Got a minute?” The muscle spoke.
    I let an eye fall over his brawn and the other fell on my handful of designer shoe.
    “Yah.” I didn’t turn my body towards him, he wasn’t interesting yet.
    “Uh, I’ve been trying to find some decent shoes for my little sister. This seemed like a good store to look in, but I’m kind of lost. I don’t know what labels are the good labels.” At this moment he was trying to find an opening to begin hitting on me. Why else would he point out whom he was shopping for. No one needs an alibi to shop.
    “Oh, excuse me.” I shoved past him and two other handsome muscles to the shades stand, and picked out a pair of vintage looking Ray-Ban sunglasses.
    I could feel the muscles staring at my backside in awe. Like they’ve never seen a trained shopper before.
    “Should I get some of these to go with the shoes?” The BP fellow asked.
    “That depends on the kind of shoes you’re getting. I mean, if you’re not going to get matching brands then at least have the colors correspond. What is your spending limit today? What type of person is your, um, sister, was it? Is she giggly? Is she submissive? Is she bossy? Come on, I have things to do.”
    He was speechless. Good. Give the manikin time to think. I chuckled to myself. He smiled with no real knowledge of why.
    “What’s funny? Me?” He asked.
    “Yeah. You look like the token, black manikin in Am E.”
    “Am E? what, like American Express?”
    “No, that would be Am Ex, you dip. Besides that wouldn’t make sense. Am E is American Eagle. Not saying that I have ever been in there for over two seconds. Would never waste a penny in that Klu Klux group house. So back on point, tell me about your sister.”
    “You’re terrible at small talk. So I guess that means you’re probably single. Or a lesbian. Which?”
    “None of your business, all of mine. Now about this sister.”
    “Valentine’s Day is tomorrow and you are buying shoes for yourself in a store full of men buying last minute gifts for their lovers.”
    “So, are you?”
    “Am I what?”
    “Are you shopping for a lover?”
    “No, I told you, my sister. Learn to trust.”
    “A man? Nah, got better things to do. And let’s just skip this, I don’t really flirt much. Just ask me out, I’ll say no, and you’ll move on. Come on.” I lead him to three round tables atop a big square table. A red and white sign above our heads read Fendi in Tahoma print.
    “If your sister is anything like you then you should def get her Fendi.”
    He touched the straw wedge on a red pair. His eyes were on me. His big bright eyes. They shined like strobe lights lining the runway in a Balenciaga show.
    “You’d better be glad I’m not an epileptic bright eyes. “
    “What?”
    “Oh, I apologize. I like to talk my thoughts. You should def get those wedges.”
    He held the wedges up in his palms between his eyes and mine. “Sure you don’t want them?”
    “I already have a pair of those. Won them in a sweepstake. Lucky me right?”
    He gave me this sly look from the corner of his eye as he waved a hired shoespert over to find him the Fendi wedges in a size five.
    “Your sister wears a size five in heels? Wow, she must spend a little and get a lot, lucky girl.”
    “Yeah, I guess. Look I get you hate to flirt, but that’s my guise. So can you just let me stay in my safe zone and tell you how beautiful you look in your mod dress.”
    “Oh, so you do know fashion?”
    “I remember a few silhouettes from high school Fashion Technology, but I can’t tell a label without seeing the tags.”
    I scoff as we both walk to the check out counter behind the line of well groomed men.
    “Fash. Tech.? You took Fash. Tech? You should be smarter than this then. Even high school children know Fendi from Baby Phat.”
    “I only took the class to chase after girls like you.”
    “Girls like me, huh? Sorry to tell you this, but girls like me don’t date.”
    “I can actually believe that. When I first saw you over there oggling those, um….” He pointed to the shoes I held in between my fingers.
    “Mahnolos.” I generously filled in the blank.
    “Yeah, well, right then I could see that you weren’t just an ordinary ‘girl.’ You could’ve picked up any pair of black shoes in here. You could’ve flirted with any guy in here. You could’ve even worn a dress that accentuated your shape. But you didn’t. You’re stylish for yourself. Well put together.”
    I should’ve been flattered to the next planet, but I wasn’t the type who took compliments with gratitude. If someone has to conjure up a little compliment for you, then that means you aren’t that good everyday.
    “Most guys call that high maintenance.”
    “Yeah, I can understand how some lowbrow men could mistake what you have for high maintenance. I’m a more sophisticated type.”
    “Oh, golly, a nice sophisticato has come into Hot Foots to sweep me off my pedicured feet. How fairytale-esque.”
    “Too stubborn for my efforts?”
    “Too stubborn to accept my denial?”
    “Touché.”
    It was my turn at the counter. A shoespert quickly ran up to me with three boxes of size tens with another employee holding a kid-sized shoebox for the man I had been in convo with for this entire time. I never asked his name.
    “So, how much Karo?” I asked the cashier while ripping my blue visa from my yellow coach wallet from my yellow coach bag. Colors upon colors…
    “Damn, Elliota, Ginu must’ve gotten out again. Anyway, it’s thirteen-forty. And you should really get to an H and M and buy some corals and baby blues quick, if you want to get ready for spring. And there’s a slumber party at the Gert Manor coming up. They’ll be handing out the invitations March seventeenth, so you better get your a** in gear. The initiation party is on Tuesday at the Piazza Hotel up in Fort Washington. It’s a white party, but all the grunts are wearing ball gowns.”

    “Aw, thanks Karo, you sweet, sweet person. I am going to hug you now, whether you like it or not.” I walked behind the counter and hugged him on the waist for a few minutes.
    “Alright already, I get it, you love me. But I have a job to do and there’s a line you crazy b***h. Now go make mama proud. You should wear your own dress.”
    “Maybe I will.” I returned to the side of the counter for patrons, took back my visa, and took my just acquired bags with high fash labels in gold and silver and white embedded in them. I waved to Karo and the BP fellow. Back to the world now. And I left the store after only spending just enough time inside.
    I began the trudge back to my car with the shrill excitement in my ears. That’s how I get off, shopping. Even just for accessories, even just online. Earrings and bracelets made me tingle, shoes made me moan, and garments, outfits, scarves, stockings, designer labels, well they just forced me to make a damn fool out of myself. A disease is what I suffered, I know, but a fabulous disease.
    An all too proverbial voice came a-ringing in my ears.
    “Wait a minute, I never told you my name!” The BP guy jogged after me with the Fendi bag in tow.
    “I never asked it!” I tried to hurry in the car, but the bags I held with pride a second ago became obstacles for me. He made it to me after I had gotten half my body in the vehicle. I had to roll my eyes ahead of time, before he could see my face.
    “I’m Quintus.”
    “Okay then. Goodbye Quintus.”
    “Wait. Can I at least give you my number?”
    “ Nah, don’t think I’ll be needing that. Maybe we’ll see each other again. This is a small town after all.”
    “Yeah, but we’re just two small people in this small town”
    “Happy Valentine’s Day Quintus.” I started the engine to my pink Charger and drove off.







    heart





    I went to Borders around six in the evening. It was the day I’d been dreading all month and a bookstore was the least romantic place on the face of the earth. Well, any other bookstore. But Borders is like the Neiman Marcus of bookstores. Just so fabulous. There were nicely dressed couples reading magazines to one another. There were some sneaky tweenies reading manga in between the aisles, rated M manga, I believe, there was way too much giggling. Even the business type, clad in three piece pantsuits, read the Times and the Post to each other, turning off and keeping off their cells and other little gadgets for V-Day. It was paining me enough to want to leave. But I had already wasted the gas, so….
    Luckily there were only about six couples in the spacious building and I could hide out easily all the way in the back. Which was perfect because all the writing and art and fashion books were located there. My fave chair sat before me as if it were ready to feel the curvatures of my butt, to keep me comfy and warm. I let out a little breath of air at the sight of the thing. Then I went to find some couture reads. All the best books, of course, were on the shelf at the very top. I had to grab a step ladder. I was in fear that someone would see up my dress, then I remembered: I was alone. Or so I thought.
    I was scanning through a book on shoes from the 18th century to now when I heard a “Hey!” It frightened the hell out of me and I almost fell.
    “Whoo! Easy now, Minolo girl.” I felt two hands holding me up from the near fall. I just leaned on them in shock, clutching a miniature book on shoes and an oversized biography on the model Edie. I could’ve fallen. Ew, that would’ve been so not haute.
    He called me Minolo girl, how so-so. I remember referring to him as BP fellow quite inaudibly to myself, before he so nobly informed me on what his actual name was. Dubbing one by one’s purchases is a commonly used tactic of fashionistas and fashionistos to remember faces without having to remember names.
    “Are you stalking me, sir?” I said with a nod of my head.
    He chuckled. “Maybe, I could be. You have the butt of a perfect stalkee.”
    “Yeah, and your hands are all over it right now. So is it possible for you to let me down?”
    He did what I asked, but a little more as well. He lifted me up like a handicap and carried me to my favorite chair. In this new close up view of his chiseled face I could see that he was an obvious metro. His eyebrows were waxed to perfection, his skin was smooth and even, makeup, he had on hints of mousse foundation. Oh, he knew fashion, no matter how much he didn’t want me to know it.
    “You lied to me, sir.”
    “Excuse me?”
    “Are you metro?”
    “Would that calm your rudeness?”
    “I don’t know. Are you?”
    “Some would call it that. I just like to think of myself as a beautiful people.”
    “Ooh, is this an official organization? Oh, couldn’t be, I’m not in it.”
    “You could join now.”
    He smiled with so much pearly teeth and dimples that my temples hurt.
    “How do I join?” Was I flirting?
    I gave him the look he gave me and there was a leveled moment where we both got it but didn’t say it. I was totally flirting.
    “You’d have to give a kiss to the founding member. Whom is me, of course.”
    “Ssss, I don’t know, sounds like a hardy price to pay. And the only lingering question remains: What are the benefits of being in this group?”
    “Me.”
    We shared a laugh. He was close to my face.
    “You should go, sir, I have reading to do.”
    “Are you a good person?”
    “I don’t know.”
    He turned away from me and began to walk from me.
    “We’ll see.” And he was gone, way gone out of the doors, off the curb, out of the driveway.
    Well, that was an adventure. Tedious. Okay it wasn’t tedious, it was rather enlightening. Now, that I was in the dissed category I can no longer stay in this love-house of books. I went to the counter to purchase my books. It came up to forty-seven dollars and eighty cents. I decided to use my Am Ex.
    The cashier was a nice looking woman with a tightly pulled back ponytail of red hair. She wore professional amounts of make up on her face. And before I could get my wallet out she optioned me to use my Borders Reward card. So I did and only paid thirty-seven.
    “I saw that beautiful man you were with just now. Is that what girls are into these days?” said Ponytail.
    “Not me. He’s not really my type.”
    “And what is?”
    “Um, I like them a little less human a little more designer, if you get me.”
    “I do. So are you leaving? It’s a nice day. No need to waste it watching the disgusting love fest.” She nodded at the café full of couples.
    “Ugh, how could they be so ostentatious. I mean I do have a gag reflex.” I stared at two people tonguing one another down with no mercy.
    “That girl must not have one.” Said the Ponytail. I laughed with her.
    We shared relative glances. I went into my purse for my wallet and found in there a small black cell, on the screen it read: Q.
    I gave Ponytail my Am Ex, got my books, and walked off.
    “See you around, miss.” She pleadingly called behind me. Yeesh. Desperation mucho?
    I ran out into the lot hoping maybe I just might see BP. But he was nowhere in sight. Damn.
    Now I would have to find him.