Jessica’s Day
“Tell me about Jessica,” Rachel said when we just woke up. Her smile seemed genuine, but I was dying inside. She had found out. I tried to hide her from Rachel, but now she was challenging me with a grin on her face. How could I talk about Jessica, my best friend, whom I had been intimate with? Would Rachel ever accept her? Would she accept me for hiding her?
Rachel touched my face and lifted my chin with her finger, and her eyes probed mine. I trembled with fear at what she would say next.
“What does Jessica look like?” she asked.
Look like? She looks like Jessica, a voice said in my head, but my mind was too busy worrying about how to explain that I had been thinking about Jessica while I was with Rachel. She knows I am panicking.
“What color hair does Jessica have?” Rachel continued to ask questions.
What color is her hair? A voice in my head tried to remember, but my panic was not letting me think clearly. That voice remembered and pushed the answer out of my mouth, “Blonde, she had blonde hair.”
“Cute?” Rachel asked.
All I could do was nod.
“On a lazy morning, what does she like for breakfast?”
Food, I thought to myself. Again, from somewhere deep in my mind, the answer came, “Pancakes.”
“How about I make us some pancakes, and you can tell me more about her?”
All I could manage was a nod. I was still waiting for the accusations, the confessions, and the tears, as I followed Rachel to the kitchen.
“All we have is pancake syrup. Is that what Jessica likes?”
“She used to make this blueberry syrup. That was her favorite.”
“Sounds yummy. We will have to try it next time.”
“Is Jessica pretty?”
“Of course, she is Jessica.” I was not sure where these answers were coming from. I was panicking inside, but Rachel was coaxing them out of me.
“Jessica reminded me of that cheerleader on Heroes,” I added
“Hayden Panettiere?”
“Yeah, I guess. And Jessica had a smiley personality and cheerful attitude.”
“She sounds cute and fun to be with.”
“Yeah, we always had fun.”
“If she is pretty, does she wear makeup?”
“Some. She worked as a receptionist in a real estate office, so she had to look nice. She just used light makeup. She was still pretty without it. Kind of like you.”
Rachel looked at me for a moment with an unreadable gaze. Either that, or I was too panicked to guess what she was thinking.
“You only wear eyeliner. But you look absolutely beautiful with it on.”
“You like my eyeliner? Should I try something else, too?” she asked, as she batted her eyes at me.
Panic struck me. Was I comparing Rachel to Jessica? Was she going to be jealous? I didn’t want Rachel to think that I thought Jessica was prettier than her.
Rachel set the pancakes on the table and walked around to stand behind me on the left. Had I said the wrong thing?
She put her arms around me, leaned in close to my ear, and said softly, “Jake, I love you. I am not jealous. I am not trying to replace her. Jessica is your best friend. I want to know about that part of your life.”
She kissed me on the cheek and moved back to her seat at the table. I began to relax. Maybe she is not upset. Perhaps I can talk to her about Jessica. I told myself.
“You can’t imagine me with makeup?” Rachel said, batting her eyelashes again.
“Well, you like purple, and it looks good on you. Maybe some purple eyeshadow would go good with your black eyeliner.”
She looked thoughtful. “Maybe… but I am not good with makeup. I am afraid to let Sarah help me. I don’t suppose you would help me.” And she batted her eyelashes again.
“No, Jessica said I was not allowed to help with makeup.”
“Why?”
“Once, she wanted to try some heavy makeup to see how she looked. To me, she looked like a clown, and I told her. She protested. Then after a bit, I offered to help fix up her makeup. I picked up the lipstick and used–”
“Oh no! Tell me you didn’t.”
“Yes, I did. I put a large red-lipstick dot on the end of her nose to complete the clown look.”
Rachel started laughing hysterically, and I started laughing, too. “She was so mad, and she kept punching and jabbing at me, and I started laughing. ‘Why?’ she asked. ‘Because it is funny watching a clown try to pick a fight.'”
Rachel and I laughed so hard. Finally, as the laughter died down, I said, “She said I am not allowed to help with nail polish, too.”
“Why? What did you do?”
“Jessica let me paint her toenails. After I finished, it looked like her toes were bleeding.”
The laughter started again. I looked at Rachel in the middle of our laughter, and I saw that kind, caring face I know and love looking at me. I thought maybe telling her would not have been a bad idea. Perhaps I didn’t need to hold anything back anymore. Whatever she asked, I decided that I would answer.
“What other beauty secrets did she teach you?” Rachel said with an amused smile.
“She had long, beautiful hair. She wanted me to learn to braid it once, but I tangled it all up. Then she wanted me to brush her hair to undo what I messed up.”
“Do I want to know how that turned out?” Rachel asked, like she was waiting for the punchline.
“She wouldn’t let me touch her hair for a week.”
Rachel started to laugh and shake her head, “I can’t believe this.”
“What? It is true.”
“Oh, I believe that. I am just glad my hair is too short for a braid.” Rachel then mussed up her short mop of black hair.
I stood up and walked toward her. “I like your hair, though. I bet I could brush it.”
“I like it this way,” Rachel said, but I was already trying to tousle her hair as Wayne does.
“You are messing it up!” she shrieked. We both laughed at her reaction.
She went back to our room, and I followed. Rachel was in front of the mirror, acting like she was putting her hair back in place. I came from behind her and messed it up some more. She turned and playfully pushed me. She then pushed me onto the bed and jumped on top of me.
“Jessica would try to pin me down, too,” I said.
“Try?” Rachel said, daring me to try more.
With that, I tried to tickle her, but she rolled off and jabbed me on the side. I tried to roll over on her, but she shoved a pillow in my face. We rolled around and playfully wrestled until Rachel had me pinned down again, and I gave up. She laid on my chest and relaxed while I relaxed and enjoyed the moment.
“Would you like to listen to some music? Jessica and I had a playlist we would listen to.”
Rachel sat up and said, “I would love that!”
I pulled up the playlist on my laptop and played some of the songs. We would listen to a song and talk about music we liked.
“Jessica and I made this playlist long ago. We have been adding and removing songs over the years,” I explained.
I loved listening to Rachel sing. Her voice was so beautiful, and I could listen to her for hours. She started singing along with the music. Then we came to ‘I Think We’re Alone Now’ by Tiffany.
“Ugh. You put HER on the list!”
“You sing it then. I like your voice better.”
“Yes, but let’s do it with the original, Tom James and the Shondells.”
“Who are they?”
“The ones who first performed the song.”
We looked them up and found they did the originals for several other songs. We added them to the list, and Rachel sang with them as we listened to some songs. She did a much better job at singing than Tiffany did.
Occasionally, Rachel would balk at a song, “Why is this on the list? Who put that on the list?”
“I did,” acting offended.
“Jessica should have thrown that out. Why did she put up with that?”
“It is called compromise.”
“I never heard of ‘Compromise.’ Anyway. If I find something good, can I add it?”
We looked at her suggestions
“What is that?” I said, with some disgust.
” ‘The Three Little Pigs,’ by Green Jelly. What is wrong with it?”
“You can’t dance to it, and it sounds all weird.”
“How about ‘Praise You’ by Fatboy Slim?” She found the song. And we watched the music video.
The dancing was amateurish but had a certain appeal. We added that to the list.
“Jessica and I used to like to dance to the music. We would look up how to make some dance moves. Do you want to try?”
Excitedly Rachel said, “Let’s try the dance moves in ‘Praise You’!”
We watched the video again. We watched and tried some of their dance moves. In the video, regular people were dancing to the song. They were real amateurs, which gave it some charm. When Rachel and I tried their moves, we had fun dancing and being silly, laughing more than we were dancing.
We looked up some dance moves, like Jessica and I had done, and we learned them together. Soon, we were dancing around, doing all kinds of crazy dance moves. My favorite memory of the dancing was watching Rachel do the Floss while standing on our bed.
A slow song came on, and I offered her a dance.
We fell into rhythm for a slow relaxing dance. I remembered those moments with Jessica. Enjoying this moment with Rachel brought back good memories of Jessica.
Almost with thinking, I instinctually reached down and grabbed Rachel’s ass like would have done with Jessica. Somehow, this moment was more potent than moments with Jessica.
Rachel said with a sly grin, “Did you do that with Jessica?”
I was caught, I thought. “We liked to tease and flirt sometimes,” I said sheepishly.
With a slight amused edge to her voice, Rachel said, “I bet you did.”
“It wasn’t like that,” I began to protest, even though I had at times. “We just did it for fun. There was nothing really serious. She wasn’t even my type.”
Rachel looked at me with slight smile and a twinkle in her eye. She was not going to answer that when she knew I would feel like I had to explain more.
“When I thought Jessica was my type of woman, she flatly denied it. Instead, she tried to help me figure out what my type of girl. She wanted me to go to college and find some cute freshman girl. We would fall madly in love and live happily ever after.”
Rachel already could guess the answer but asked anyway like we were acting out some sappy love scene in a romantic movie, “So, what is your type of girl?”