That Stupid Little L-Word:

Chapter Thirty Nine:

The door to my bedroom bursts open, and I groan sleepily. One eye pops open and I watch as my mother enters the room, her arms thrown up into the air. An excited grin is plastered onto her face. "Guess what day it is?!" Her voice pierces through my half-asleep state, and I scowl at her. 

The beast must not be disturbed before eight o'clock on Saturdays. She should know this. My gaze flickers toward the clock beside my bed, and I groan again when I see seven forty blinking in bright red on the front. I pull the covers up over my head in an attempt to ignore her.

"That's right!" Her voice is hardly muffled through the comforter. She grabs a fistful of the thick blanket and wrenches it away from my body. A small squeal rips past my lips as I shiver and curl up into a ball. I throw my hands over my face, trying to hide from her so I can go back to sleep. "It's Homecoming!" She announces. "Which means you get to take a break from all that studying and spend the day getting pampered." 

She rubs her hands together in excitement. "I've been waiting for this day all my life. You've always avoided school dances like the plague." 

I sigh and ease into a sitting position. I rub at my eyes. "We don't really have to do all this, you know," I point out. "I don't need a hair appointment. I can just curl my hair."

My mother hisses at me like a snake. "You will not ruin this for me." 

I roll my eyes. "Whatever." 

"Get showered and clean. Smell pretty. Shave. All that lovely stuff so you won't scare Seth away," my mother instructs with a wave of her hand. "You have until noon. I'm going to take you out for lunch, and then we'll go to your hair appointment."

While I climb out of bed, I grumble incoherently under my breath and begin to rummage through my drawers. I really don't see the point in dressing up and spending all this money on a stupid dance. I never have. But I know my mother is excited; she used to do pageants when she was younger, and she loved dressing me up like a Barbie doll. She's never exactly pushed me to go the school dances, but I knew she was always secretly disappointed when I refused to go. 

I pull out an old, baggy t-shirt and a pair of dark yoga-pants. I walk into the bathroom and twist the knob to the shower. After washing my hair really good, and combing a mountain of conditioner through my hair, I scrubbed the first layer of skin from my body with this yummy smelling body gel. My mother got it for me last year for Christmas, and it smells like roses. I remove the necessary hair from my body and then clamber out of the shower. 

After I get dressed, I make my way downstairs. My hair is combed, and it hangs down my back, soaking into my t-shirt. My mother sits at the table, an assortment of nail polishes strewn out in front of her. She pats the chair beside her. 

I sigh. "I'm hungry," I complain as I sink into the seat. 

"That's the price of beauty. We'll leave for lunch in a bit." She grabs my hand and presses my palm flat against a paper towel. Over her years of pageantry, my mother picked up the basics for painting your nails --primarily, french tips and striped designs. She can't do much more than that; she's not an expert. "I got some silver nail flowers," she says as she files my nails, gesturing toward a small plastic box next to the nail polish. "It will go great with your dress!" 

The dress in question is completely outrageous. The bodice is sleek, inky black, strapless, and it has a heart-shaped neckline. A stripe of silver flowers and sparkles trails across it, starting from the top of my right breast and ending in front of my left hip. Where the trail ends, the skirt explodes into a bunch of black, white, and silver ruffles. The front of the skirt seems to be missing --though, actually, it is incredibly short. It brushes the tops of my thighs. A thin layer of ruffles makes up for it, somewhat, and it across from my left hip to the middle of my right thigh.