30. Feelings of Insecurity

“We were taught to channel anger, rage, feelings of insecurity—to channel what would be negative energy masochistically. We were taught not to do it directly—not to go out and hit someone, for example—but to do it so we’d hurt ourselves.” —Kathy Acker

The summer after sophomore year, Becky and Jenny spent almost every Saturday at the mall.

When they got off the bus, they would start at the store that sold lotions and strong-smelling candles. Then they would shop for clothes, first at the store with the cool clothes, then at the store with the ugly but cheap clothes where you could sometimes find a good deal.

After lunch—croissants and coffee at the bakery—they would go to the discount store that had cheap makeup.

The hulking, cranky security guard would eye them suspiciously as they entered the store, and Jenny could imagine how they looked to him: two teenagers, one with crazy purple hair and petticoats, the other seeming by contrast a typical Westchester County girl, tame and appropriate, a follower. Becky never seemed to notice, but Jenny always felt horrible under his disdainful gaze.

Jenny had wanted a new lipstick all summer, and one Saturday she found the right one on a display that had samples of lipstick and eye shadow in sparkly, pastel tones. The display’s cardboard backing was decorated with a photograph of a bride, her luminous skin painted in the subtlest imaginable shades of peach and baby blue under her graceful veil.

“Why are you looking at bride makeup?” Becky asked.

“I’m just looking for light colors,” said Jenny.

“I hate light colors,” said Becky. “They’re so non-committal.” She was holding a bright magenta lipstick up to her cheek, the color glowing assertively even through the layers of plastic packaging. “What do you think of this one?”

“It’s cool,” said Jenny, and she wasn’t lying, even though she would never wear such a startling color. It would look probably good on Becky; Becky could pull off crazy stuff like that.

Jenny rubbed her finger along her favorite lipstick in the bride display. It was lavender, with a metallic, iridescent sheen. She lifted her finger to smear the pigment across her lips.

“Do you want to get married?” Becky asked her.

Jenny rubbed her lips against each other to distribute the color. “I don’t know,” she said. “Do you?”

Becky blew out air from between her teeth to indicate that this was a stupid idea.

“Hey, that’s kinda pretty,” said Becky, pointing at Jenny’s face.

“You think so?” asked Jenny. Becky almost never approved of her relatively pedestrian choices in cosmetics or clothes.

Becky nodded, but her attention had already shifted to a bottle of acid green nail polish, which she held up, raising her eyebrows to show her pleasure at this unusual find.

“Well,” Becky said, “Maybe I would get married just to have the wedding.”

Jenny was surprised. “You want a wedding?” The thought of Becky in a white dress, her face painted in these gentle peachy colors that she so despised, made Jenny laugh out loud.

“Yeah, totally,” said Becky. “Not with my parents or anything,” she added, scoffing. “Just my friends.”

“What about the guy’s friends?” Jenny asked.

“What guy?” Becky asked. “Oh, right, you mean my fiancé? Sure, he can bring his friends, too, I guess.”

Jenny studied the lavender lipstick in the thin strip of mirror at the side of the display, pursing her lips and moving her head around to see her face from different angles.

“I’m going to decorate everything in black and purple,” Becky said. “At the wedding. The tables will be covered in black lace. And there will be giant purple candles everywhere.”

“Wow,” said Jenny, as she traced her finger over the rows of lipsticks under the display, like looking up a book in a card catalogue, until she found the lavender one.

“Wouldn’t that be pretty?” Becky asked.

“Sure,” said Jenny, pulling the lipstick out of its little cubby.

“You don’t sound like you really think so,” said Becky.

“No, it sounds pretty,” said Jenny, making an effort to sound interested and sincere. She felt guilty that she had only been half-listening to Becky, even though Becky did the same thing to her all the time. “It's just, maybe you won’t be into purple and black lace when you’re, you know, grown up,” said Jenny.

“I’ll be like twenty-two,” Becky retorted, quickly. “That’s only seven years from now. Anyway I’m always going to be into purple and black. Are you going to change when you get old?"

“I don’t know,” Jenny said. “Maybe.”

“I hate that,” said Becky. “I’m not going to get all normal and respectable just because I’m old. I’m going to stay just like I am forever.”

Jenny nodded. “I think I’m going to buy it,” she said, holding up the tube of lipstick. “It’s pretty, right?” She smiled and turned her head to show off the dazzle of her iridescent lips.

Becky grabbed it from her hand and scrutinized the packaging. “It’s twelve dollars,” she said. “That’s way too much.”

“It’s okay, I have it,” said Jenny, grabbing it back. Her mother had given her a hundred dollars to spend this weekend. Becky’s parents didn’t have that kind of money, so Becky had only come with twenty dollars for the day.

“Yeah, but it’s the principle,” Becky said. “That stuff probably costs like twenty cents to make. I can’t believe they’re charging twelve dollars.”

“Isn’t twenty-two kind of young to get married?” Jenny asked.

“I’m not going to stay married,” Becky said. “It’s cooler to do it young, before everybody starts doing it. I want to be the first one.”

“So will you just get a divorce right after the wedding?” Jenny asked.

Becky thought about it for a moment.

“We’ll stay married for a little while so I can get to say ‘my husband.’ But then we’ll get divorced. I could never be satisfied with just one man.”

“How long will you stay married?” Jenny was still looking at the lipstick, turning it over, trying to decide whether the metallic sheen was pretty or cheesy.

“I don't know, a while,” Becky said. “Three months? I’ve never dated anybody longer than three months.”

She leaned over, pulled the lipstick out of Jenny’s hand, and dropped it into Jenny’s open purse.

“Hey!” said Jenny.

“Chill out,” said Becky, through her teeth, without moving her lips. She turned her back and started walking towards the cassette tapes. Jenny followed her, rummaging in her purse to find the lipstick amongst her tangle of other makeup and assorted junk.

Someone bumped against her, and she looked up to see one of the store employees, wearing a red vest and holding a clipboard. Jenny’s heart raced. It was her! she wanted to yell, pointing at Becky. I was trying to take it back out!

But she wouldn’t do that, and anyway, there was no need.

“Sorry,” mumbled the employee, hurrying past Jenny and looking down at his clipboard.

Jenny met Becky over at the tapes, still feeling shaken about the lipstick. I guess they don’t know about it, she told herself, deciding not to look for it in her bag anymore.

Becky was rifling through a bin of cassette tapes encased in large plastic security devices.

“You’re totally going to get married,” Becky said, nonchalantly continuing their earlier conversation. “Like in the normal way. You’re kind of normal.”

“No, I’m not!” Jenny said. But yes, she thought to herself. She did want to get married, and maybe even have a real wedding. Not a huge one or anything, but with a white dress and a cake and flowers. Maybe everything would be all light blue and gray and lavender; that would be so pretty.

She began to thumb through the cassettes, looking for something to buy so she wouldn’t feel so guilty. She found one she wanted, by a band whose lead singer she found extremely attractive, although his heavy use of makeup and falsetto made her pretty sure he was gay.

And she wanted to have a husband, she thought. And live with him in a nice house, and have children and a backyard and a dog. And it didn’t matter if that made her normal, because it would be sweet and cute and make her happy.

But she wasn’t going to tell Becky that.

“Get these, too,” Becky said, handing her a stack of blank cassette tapes. “I’ll copy some stuff for you.”

“Cool,” said Jenny.

The cashier, when they went to check out, was a middle-aged lady with helmet hair who beamed at Jenny and Becky as though they were her favorite nieces.

“Did you girls find everything okay?” she asked, smiling.

“Oh, yeah,” said Becky, as Jenny nodded.

The woman took Jenny’s cassette tapes, the album and the blank ones, ran them across the scanner, and dropped them into a plastic bag. “Are you having fun at the mall?” she asked.

“Lots of fun,” said Becky, cheerfully.

“That will be fourteen dollars,” said the cashier. Jenny reached into her purse and saw the lipstick, in its plastic wrapping, poking out of the top of her jumbled clutter. She gasped and placed her hand on top of it, blocking the view as she rummaged around until she pulled her wallet from the bottom.

“I used to love going shopping with my friends,” the cashier said. “You don’t get to do that as much when you get old like me.”

“You’re not so old,” said Jenny, embarrassed to be telling such an unconvincing lie. She handed the woman a twenty dollar bill.

She wanted to rush out of the store as soon as she got her change, but she forced herself to wait calmly for Becky to buy her green nail polish.

“I’ve never seen a color like that,” said the cashier, holding it up to the light. “It would be fun on Halloween.” She brought it down to the counter and held it against her own hand. “Think I could pull it off?” she asked.

“She was so nice,” said Jenny, when it was finally time to walk towards the exit. She looked at Becky, who grimaced a little, as though acknowledging the thing Jenny was thinking.

“I know,” Becky said.

Just then, Jenny felt a hand on her shoulder and heard the voice from above her head.

“Miss,” it said.

She turned to face the security guard, who was towering over her, his hand extended as though he was expecting to have to grab her by the collar as she ran.

“Yes?” she asked, her voice shaking despite all her efforts to steady it.

“You put something in your bag,” he said, pointing at her purse.

She looked over at Becky, unsure of how to respond. Becky shook her head.

“No I didn’t,” said Jenny. “I don’t know what you’re talking about.”

“Someone saw it on the camera,” said the man, impatiently, as though he was expecting her to deny it. “You put a lipstick into your bag.” He grabbed Jenny’s arm and started to pull her towards the doorway.

Jenny began to get that spinning feeling that meant she was panicking. Where was he taking her? Was he going to arrest her? Call her parents?

He’d better call my mom, she thought, trying to strategize quickly. She probably won’t care. Jenny could never be sure about her mother’s reactions; she would be nonchalant about something scandalous like finding a little bag of Becky’s cocaine hidden in Jenny’s room. But then the most seemingly insignificant thing would send her into a fury, like when Jenny’s English teacher wanted her to stay after class to write poetry and her mother was sure he was hitting on her, which, even if he was, didn’t seem like the sort of thing that would upset her.

Maybe she thinks shoplifting is cool, Jenny thought hopefully. Maybe it’s like sticking it to the man.

“I’m taking you to mall security,” he said. “That’s where we handle shoplifters.”

“Wait,” said Becky. “Wait, I put it in her bag. You need to arrest me!”

Jenny felt the wave of relief—she would not have to go to security alone. She hadn’t expected Becky to speak up, and wouldn’t have been angry at her for staying silent. Unlike Jenny's own mother, Becky’s parents were predictable. They would scream at her for a week and ground her for a month; there was no doubt about it.

The guard turned to look at Becky as though he hadn’t noticed her until just then. Without saying anything, he surveyed her, his eyes lingering on her purple hair and painted combat boots.

“Yeah, you better come, too,” he said finally.

At the security office, an actual police officer searched Jenny’s purse, found the lipstick, and then asked for phone numbers to call the girls’ parents. He lectured them about how they could have gone to jail for their offense. They were banned from the mall, and if he ever saw them here again, he would arrest them for real.

He went into an adjacent office, separated by a large window, to call their parents. Jenny could see him cringe as though someone was shouting at him on the phone; that must be Becky’s father, she thought.

Neither of their parents arrived for half an hour. Jenny and Becky sat silently on stiff chairs as they waited, Jenny’s sweaty hand folded tightly in Becky’s.

Chapter 31:
http://kickoutofyou.blogspot.com/2009/12/31-agent-of-defeat.html