Page 3 of A Party for Lola

The sales clerk at the last shoe store came back out with the perfect shoes. I loved them. I wanted them for myself. But they were for Lola. Every perfect silvery shiny six inch heel lace up bit of perfection that they were.

"I need them," I told her before she'd even brought them to me. I reached out my hands and made grabby motions. I couldn't help it. I was like a magpie. I needed those shinies and I needed them now.

She looked stunned. Maybe my earlier desperate tirade had scared her. Maybe not. I hoped not. I didn't want to be a horrible customer. I'd probably already fallen well away from that line though.

"Are you sure you don't want to try them on first?" she asked me. It was probably something she had to say. She definitely looked done with me. Exasperation was not a good look for her. I'd have to come back and apologize when I wasn't feeling quite so stretched thin.

"They're not for me. My girlfriend is five-five, if that. She can rock these." I was a little over six foot. I would have been a giraffe in these heels. I tended toward ones that weren't over two inches. Ever. I wished that I could have worn the heels though. Heels made her ass look amazing.

I could be jealous about my girlfriend's body later. I had to get going now.

I quickly paid for them, they were bagged up, and then I was off to my next stop. Shoes were nice, but this was my girlfriend's fortieth birthday. Two pairs of shoes were not going to cut it, as pretty as they were.

With forty minutes to spare before I needed to go get Lola's sister and kids from the Springfield airport, I hit the perfume store at the other end of the strip mall. It was also a makeup store. Nice makeup too. A bit expensive, but the good stuff generally was. Just like wine.

Thankfully perfume didn't only come in tiny sizes and hide in the back room if they were anything bigger so I didn't need immediate help as I browsed the different offerings. My girlfriend wouldn't smell like dead roses, but something lavender based was right up her alley. It didn't take me long to find something.

I could have left it at that, but this was my last chance to get Lola something for her birthday and the makeup was definitely calling me over. Two pairs of shoes, a bottle of sweet perfume, and some new lipstick would be a good combo.

I was browsing the deep reds that would have looked fantastic with Lola's gorgeous dark skin when my phone starting buzzing. Micah was at home cleaning the house in preparation for the party, but apparently my boyfriend was also worried all about me too.Are you at the airport yet? The flight might be early.

He really needed to relax.Micah, my love, I'll be there soon. I'm shopping right now. Relax.

I had hoped that would help him get over his need to micromanage everything around him, even when none of us were home, but apparently not.It's half an hour before the plane is set to land. You can't still be shopping. Buy it and go.

He was crazy. There was no ‘just buying' with me. He should have known that by now. Still, to get him to chill out, I grabbed the lipstick and went to the counter. It was moisturizing. It promised incredible color and all day wear. I wondered if it would survive being kissed by four people. We would see.

Moments later I had that little errand done and I was back in my car. It was probably the quickest of my makeup related shopping trips. Micah should have been proud of me about that.

*~*~*

The Springfield airport was tiny, but that made parking awesome. I stood there in the waiting area looking at Facebook and Twitter and wondering how everyone else was doing with their portions of the party when something small and warm wrapped around my waist.

I looked down, surprised to be caught so off guard, at the sight of my niece's smiling face. Kiley was five. She was perpetually smiling. "Hey kiddo."

I glanced around, expecting to find Emily, Lola's sister, and Todd, her son, as well. They weren't far behind.

"Auntie Tiffany?"

"Yeah?" I put my phone back in my purse and carefully picked her up. Carefully because I didn't want to risk my skirt riding up. My underwear tucked everything in nicely, but the people around us didn't get a peek.

"You're so pretty. Will you teach me how to do makeup? Mom says I'm too young."

I knew better than to step in that ever so welcoming pile waiting to happen. "When your mom says it's okay, I'll give you a full makeover. But not before then. Deal?"

She held up her pinky and I took it, wrapping mine around hers. We'd made a solemn pact in her mind. I had to be good about keeping them if she was still going to trust me with my promises when she got older.

"Hey," Emily said, coming up to us.

Lola's sister was subdued gorgeous. Small, perky, and managing to hold down the single mother and corporate life gig just fine without even messing up her perfectly natural hair.

I kissed her cheek. "Hi. I promised Kiley that I'd give her a makeover once you said it was okay for her to start wearing makeup. We pinky swore."

"So it's final," Kiley piped up.

Emily gave me a strained smile. "Thanks. You'd be the one to show her so I'm good with that. When she's older. Like fifty."

Laughing, I put Kiley down. She pouted, but I wanted to give Emily a proper hug. We hadn't seen her or the kids in almost eight months. That was far too long to go without seeing Lola's family. She was the only one of us that had any kind of connection to the family we were born into. The rest of us had kind of adopted Emily and the kids as our own. It helped that the three of them were fantastic about everything. Our pronouns, not asking horrible questions... everything. They made being around cis people easy.

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