Seventeen. O Holy （Sht）, This Night Isn’t So Terrible #2
“Oh! This is a classic,” Dad agrees. He stands up from the table and extends a hand to Mom. They start dancing their way into the living room, gazing fondly into each other’s eyes. Brian takes the cue and does the same with Rachel.
“They’re all so cute,” Allie says. She sounds wistful. Do I ask her how she’s doing with her divorce? Her kids have eaten minimally but are hungrily diving into the activity, busily slapping paint onto their ornaments.
“Mommy, is it okay to make a Christmas unicorn?” Gia asks.
“Of course,” Allie says.
“And look at mine!” Dylan holds up what appears to be a Christmas boob—a circular ornament that he’s painted peach with a big red puffball glued to the center.
“It’s Santa!” The purity of his intentions means that when I look again, I see Santa.
An abstract Santa who looks like a particularly voluptuous breast, but Santa.
“I made a penguin,” Alice says, showing the younger Gia. “Can he be friends with your unicorn?”
“Mine is a sleigh, but I’m working on the dinosaur to pull it,” Henry says. “It’s a T-Rex.”
None of the kids’ ornaments are painted to resemble what they’re meant to, but there are no tears of frustration. And Allie is the perfect supportive co-crafter. “You’re all so imaginative,” she says, smiling at me.
I realize I should say something nice about the ornaments, too, so I offer, “The only thing any of those ornaments could use is more glitter.” Brian and Rachel are so Sweetville-pilled they won’t mind.
“Yay, glitter!” Alice shrieks, and the kids start sending sparkles everywhere.
Allie chuckles as festive but cute chaos ensues.
You’d think she’d be tense—no doubt her kids are going to need baths given all the glitter and paint stuck to them.
But Allie is serene. She’s painted five stars in holiday gold, silver, red, green, and white, and now she’s dusting them with glitter.
“When they dry, I’ll glue them into a wreath. ”
“Nice,” I say. “I’m hoping my snowman looks happy when I’m finished with him.”
“Do you remember that year my mom let us make gingerbread houses on our own?” Allie asks.
“Yes. She bought us each a kit, and we decided if we just built one house, we could eat all the parts of the other kit that day,” I say.
“Why are gumdrops only good if they’re construction materials?” Allie says.
“I disagree. I buy them every once in a while,” I counter. “They have that spiciness to them.” I think of Corey briefly when I say this, and his penchant for sweet-and-spicy cookies.
“That was a fun Christmas. But I still don’t know if it can top that year we made a star turn…” Allie looks at me and pauses, as if she’s hoping I’ll know what she’s talking about.
And I do.
“Freshman year! We tried out for the Powell…” I trail off, remembering I’m not in Powell Park anymore.
“For the holiday revue because we wanted to be dancing Santas.” We actually had wanted to be dancing slutty Santas—but the “slutty” was unofficial.
For many years after Mean Girls came out, everyone who auditioned for the dancing-Santa parts took it a step too far, wearing Santa hot pants or extra-tall black boots, and Allie and I were convinced boys would notice us if we did the same.
But we were both super-scrawny freshmen and no match for the curvy juniors and seniors who could dance us under the table.
(And then probably do table dances on top of said table.)
Allie yelped in delight. “And they made us elves instead. Those were the worst costumes.”
“So unappealing. And so itchy.”
“And hot. How many layers of felt did we have to wear?”
“I sweat so much in mine that I think I started to melt the hot glue holding it together.” This isn’t far from the truth. One of my costume’s arms fell off during the big “Elves on Broadway” finale.
Allie doubles over laughing. “I remember! It was falling apart on stage!”
“But you still attracted Will’s attention,” I say. Oops. Will is Allie’s ex-husband.
“Yeah.” Allie seems to focus extra hard on adding a second coat of paint to her silver star. “That I did.”
“Sor—” I start to say. But before I have a chance to get the word out, Allie has her hand over mine—both of us have paint-covered fingers—and says, “It’s okay.” Her dark eyes shine as they connect with mine. “It’s a good memory.”
It’s true that Allie first started talking to her ex-husband at that holiday show.
He was working the lights backstage, and when Allie’s elf hat fell off right before we went onstage, Will practically leapt out of his chair to get it back to her.
Will didn’t exactly have moves, but he clearly liked her, and they spent the next year talking on the phone a few nights a week, Allie extremely impatient for him to ask her out.
Which he did, right around the time that Corey asked out Christina and my heart was broken. Doubly broken because I felt like I was losing Allie, too. The weekend after her first date with Will, Allie came to my house glowing because they’d finally kissed.
We’d been working our way through Allie’s older sister’s Sex and the City DVDs, and as Allie swooned about how Will was already talking about prom months in advance and how excited that made her for their future, I said, “Wow, way to act like a Charlotte.” For the longest time, we’d agreed that Charlotte was the boring member of the show’s quartet.
“Maybe Charlotte has a point,” Allie said. “Like, what’s wrong with wanting love?”
“There’s more to life,” I squeaked, even though for months I’d hoped that Corey would ask me to prom.
“Yeah, but she’s a character in a show,” Allie said sagely. “You’re a little Charlotte, too. You’ll see when you fall in love.”
I was so angry when she said that, like she was growing up without me.
Allie became Allie and Will, and as she followed him to college (which, to be fair, was the same college she’d talked about going to before they were dating) and they made plans for their future, I wasn’t exactly a third wheel, but I didn’t feel nearly as essential to Allie’s life.
But our friendship still worked, and I was happy to stand up in Allie’s wedding—even though my date that night was a college boyfriend who’d always made more sense on paper than in reality.
Allie and Will bought a house and had Dylan and had taken adorable family photos. She’d loved Grant, and we even double-dated when they could get a sitter and Grant had the night off.
But I was sure Allie had gotten love right on her first try and that I would never be enough for someone as driven and talented as Grant.
By the time Grant and I had our final fight and Allie was pregnant with Gia, I was avoiding her altogether.
I hated myself for the ugly, jealous feelings I had toward my very best friend.
It also meant I missed the problems she and Will must have been having.
Now, remembering how I’d slipped out of the baby sprinkle for Gia early and was living in LA by the time she was born—and only liked Allie’s Instagram birth announcement; I didn’t even send a text—I feel so guilty.
I lean closer to Allie now. “I’m really sorry,” I say.
She blinks, her big brown eyes wide. “For what?”
“Vanishing. That I wasn’t really there for you when you split up with Will,” I say.
“You had your own stuff going on,” Allie says. “I mean, it would have been great to talk to you then, but it’s not like I was perfect, either.”
Would the Allie in Powell Park say the same thing? I’ve been so ashamed of fading out of her life that I’ve never reached out about her divorce beyond my quick text, the one that probably sounded schadenfreude-y. I see now that I should have called her or made a point to see her.
Mom swans over to the table, clearly riding the high of her dance with Dad. “It’s so nice to see you girls together again,” she says. “You should spend some more time catching up while Jill’s in town.”
Allie seems on the verge of saying something but then glances toward me, as if waiting for my reaction first.
I have no misgivings about spending more time together. “Yeah, I would love that, if you have time.”
Allie lights up. “I’ll bring the gumdrops.”