Page 1 of Late Bloomer
Chapter 1OPAL
I feel, to put it delicately, like a dickhead.
And said dickhead feeling is becoming far too familiar. Comfortable, even. Like rewearing the same pair of sweatpants for six days straight without washing them because if I don’t leave my couch during that time, do they actually get dirty? (Yes, I know they do. Yes, I am mentally ill, thanks for asking.)
But life seems dead set on plopping me into situations that bring out my dickheadedness. I regularly and melodramatically flick through my memories in search of one specific moment I can point to as the start of the chaos.
Maybe it was the time I was trampled by a herd of alpacas at a farm when I was four, my sisters watching in silent horror as those giant furry caterpillars with legs created a lifetime fear of long necks.
Or perhaps it was at age ten when I sawThe Mummy(1999) for the first time at a sleepover and had felt… felt alotfor bothBrendan Fraser and Rachel Weisz. I’d felt so much, in fact, that that same night I’d tried to kiss my best friend at the time. She had screamed and locked herself in the bathroom, then told everyone at school on Monday that I was a giant lesbo. Surprisingly, we didn’t hang much after that.
A more obvious moment would be the time I drunkenly—albeit hopelessly romantically—got my first boyfriend’s name, Sam, tattooed on my hip. Sam then dumped me two days later (on my birthday), and I sobbed while returning to the tattoo parlor—sisters Olivia and Ophelia holding my hands—and had the inky, cursiveSamchanged toSandwich♥.
But, as I stand on the street corner outside my place of employment, Sprinkle, dressed in an inflatable ice-cream cone suit waving a sign that saysTRY MY FRESH WAFFLE, I’m wondering if chaos is less a consequence of actions that sends a life careening off any discernible path and more a curse afforded to the unlucky at birth. And I am very,veryunlucky.
Or just a dickhead.
As yet another pickup truck speeds by while blaring the horn, the driver leaning out his window to pick the exceptionally low-hanging fruit of a waffle joke (Urban Dictionary edition), my phone buzzes in my pocket. Poisonous butterflies erupt in my stomach, lodging into a dangerous clump of hope in my throat.
The last thing I should want is a text from my shitty ex, Miles. But knowing I shouldn’t want that and stopping my stupid little heart from earnestly cracking with how badly I want to hear from him are two entirely separate things.
I sigh, awkwardly stooping to lean the sign against the base of my cone body. Pulling my arms into the suit, I wipe the sweat from the back of my neck and push strands of orange-creamsicle-colored hair off my forehead before fishing my cell out of my pocket.
My heart sinks as I realize it’s the group chat with my sisters, confirming our weekly dinner plans.
Olivia
Pizza or curry tonight?
Ophelia
The answer is ALWAYS curry
I blow out a raspberry through my lips, then force my mouth into a smile, texting back my order. Pocketing my phone, I waddle to the entrance of Sprinkle, the scent of ice cream and waffle cones smacking me even through the suit.
It’s not that I don’t enjoy Thursday night dinners with my two favorite people, but the tradition had sprung up from being miserably dumped by Miles and the excessive wallowing I’d done afterward. While eating curry and binge-watchingThe Real Housewivescertainly does some heavy lifting to fill the gaping hole in my life since he broke up with me, the recurring dinners are still a reminder of how much time has passed since we split up.
And how the chances of getting back together are slimmer and slimmer.
It doesn’t help that I’m stuck in a nasty cycle of feeling depressed and alone, getting a text from Miles to “hang out”on a random weeknight, going over to his crappy apartment with his mattress on the floor and two drool-stained pillows (without a pillowcase in sight), giving him a blow job or some other form of lackluster sex, then leaving immediately after (read: getting kicked out because he has anearly morning—I’ve never known the man to wake up before eleven), only for painful radio silence from him for the next week. The routine leaves me feeling even more miserable than before.Shocking.
Anytime I get mopey and weak—more often than I’d care to admit—and blubber to my sisters how badly I want to get back with him, they ask the super-fun question of what I even liked about the man to begin with.
It’s embarrassing how quickly it shuts me up. But, honestly, I don’t have an answer. How do I explain that he was physicallythere(except for all the times he wasn’t) and his smile wascute(but he stopped smiling at me sometime around the second week of us dating) and I’d sort of ratherdiethan be alone (even if I felt lonelier than I’d ever been while in a relationship with him).
I squeeze behind the shop’s counter, then through the kitchen, trying not to run into any appliances as I navigate my way to the break room. The suit makes ashwlooopingsound as the swirl at the top gets cut off by the doorframe, then pops back up as I force myself through. My friend Laney turns from where she’s hunched near the tiny window in the corner.
“Hey,” Laney says, taking a final drag on her joint and blowing the smoke through the open window.
“Hi,” I say as cheerily as possible despite my less-than-sparkling mood. People don’t like me if I’m not peppy andhappy. “Power me down?” I ask, turning and waving toward my butt.
Laney’s footsteps clomp across the small space, and she flicks off the battery pack near the base of my cone, then unties the drawstrings.
I sigh in relief as I shimmy out of the nylon monstrosity. Despite it only being the start of April, the humidity in Charlotte, North Carolina, is smothering the city with a vengeance.
“Got something for you.” Laney tosses a folded envelope to me, and I fumble, then drop it.
“What’s this for?” I ask, stooping to pick it up.
