She's the ______ to my ______.

I decided not to like her the moment we met.

Her appearance completely clashed with my shallow friendship guidelines. I didn’t want to be seen with a pint sized brunette that wore studded belts with giant mouth shaped buckles and said insanely inappropriate things at inappropriate times. I didn’t want the other servers to dislike me either. I had a lot of bad habits at that time, but being a people pleaser was perhaps my worst. The girls that looked like “my kind” called her weird, though they had no problem laughing at her antics.

She didn’t seem to care that the female staff didn’t want much to do with her. She smiled, did the robot or the worm across the floor, flashed the kitchen boys, and went about her business. Occasionally I would have a section next to hers and watching and listening to her handle her tables was a learning experience. I’d been a waitress before, and I was a good one, but she could wipe the floor with me. By the time a group finished eating they weren’t just her customers, they were her friends, and they would come back and ask for her again and again.

Most of the serving staff was over 21 or damn near, but I’d only just turned 18. There was a bar right around the corner owned by a lecherous foreign guy that would let us in no questions asked. It became a ritual: Work till around 10-12, get off, sometimes change clothes, go to the bar with the others, get wasted, and go home around dawn. She never came with us, though I’m sure the guys probably invited her.

One Sunday morning, after a particularly rough all-nighter at the bar, I decided to call in to work. I was living alone at the time and hadn’t yet gotten a phone hooked up, so I drove the five minutes into town and called my manager from a payphone to beg off.

There were two managers, Brad and Ronnie. Brad was the GM and though he could be fun and had a mouth like a sailor, he didn’t tolerate any bullshit. Ronnie, on the other hand, was a lackadaisical pot head that liked to hide in the staff bathroom and smoke. If we ever needed anything while he was in charge, we had to hunt him down...follow the smell, as it were. They would both go out drinking with us occasionally.

I knew that I couldn’t use the “I’m sick” excuse because they were all well aware that I hadn’t left the bar until 6am. So when Brad answered, I said the first thing I could think of, “Dude, my car won’t start.”

“What the fuck!”

He bitched and moaned at increasing volume and I held the phone away from my ear.

“I had to walk to the payphone to call and tell you.”

After a few more seconds of swearing, he suddenly became quiet. I was terrified that he was going to fire me, but instead he shouted “RACHEL!”

“Rachel, can you go pick Alyson up? Her car won’t start!”

I heard a chirpy “Sure!” and then Brad said to me, “Here! Give Rachel directions to your house, she’s coming to pick you up!”

“But Brad”, I stuttered, “I live over half an hour away...”

“Can’t be that far”, he boomed, and handed the phone to her.

I reluctantly gave the girl I’d pretty much managed to avoid, until that moment, directions to my house. I warned her that it was a “long way”, but she said she was ok with that. I hung up, heaved a great sigh, and drove back home to get ready. In reality it was a 25 minute drive, but I was hoping she’d get lost. Most people did.

She made it in no time at all. I answered the door, said a sullen hello, and plopped down on the couch to put on my sneakers. She stood in the doorway and silently looked around. I was just finishing with the knot on my second shoe when she said, “There’s nothing wrong with your car, is there?”

I stared at her and she stared back, a small smile on her face. It was plainly obvious that I was miserably hungover so rather than deny it, even though I wasn’t yet sure of what she’d do with the information, I simply said, “No.”

Her grin got a little bigger, but all she said was “Ok”.

I grabbed my purse and apron and followed her out the door. She had a black Dodge Neon and I had a blue one, though hers was covered in band stickers and the like. We climbed in, she started the car, and heavy metal came blasting out of the speakers. I winced and she immediately turned it down, but even at low volume the squealing and wailing was enough to make my head pound.

I was trying to decide if I should suggest she turn it off or switch it to a pop friendly radio station, but I was worried that either option would be met with a disagreeable reaction. If we turned the radio off, the silence would be awkward; we’d have nothing to talk about. And the pop station route might make her laugh at me. Whether I liked someone or not, I still didn’t want them laughing at me and I had a feeling she would.

While I was having this internal battle she was pulling out of my driveway. My stomach growled. I hadn’t had time to eat before I left. Some people can’t eat when they’re hungover. I HAVE to. Even if it makes me feel worse.

I don’t know if she heard my stomach chewing on itself or not, but she turned toward me and said, “Hey, do you wanna go to Wendy’s?”

She was smiling at me in a mischievous way and I understood what she meant before she even explained. I grinned back at her. “Hell yes.”

And then we had an actual conversation. We talked about work, my hangover, how hungry we were, and the story we’d tell Brad when we returned. She would claim that she got lost on the way there and as added ammunition I would throw in that I had tried to tell him it was a long drive to begin with.

We went through the Wendy’s drive through and she surprised me again. “Let’s take this to the park.”

We sat on picnic benches, ate our food, and talked some more. She was funny and smart and completely different from what I imagined her to be. By the time we got to work I was ashamed of myself for the way I’d treated her before. I’d deliberately avoided her because of what she looked like and what other people said. I’d never thought of myself as a snob until that moment.

We were so late to work that I think we only had one table a piece before we left again. Poor Brad. We had a good laugh over his exasperation.

I continued to go out with the other people from work, but I started talking to Rachel a lot more. She even started coming to the bar. One of the girls that was supposedly “my kind”, Kelly, moved in with me because I was scared to be alone out in the middle of nowhere. Call it a hormone thing brought on by pregnancy (long story).

And wouldn’t you know it? “My kind” of girl turned out to be a cokehead that threw massive drug parties while I was spending the weekend at my mother’s. I kicked her out the minute I heard about it and found the evidence. (After I, at around 7 months gone, attempted to murder her at work.) Having a father that snorted your grocery and field trip money up his nose has a tendency to make you a little unforgiving in that department.

When I left the restaurant and moved back home, all those girls that I spent my nights partying and hanging out with disappeared. But Rachel didn’t. We talked on the phone and we went to lunch. When they finally induced labor, she was the only person that wasn’t family that I called.

Six years later she’s still the first person I call when anything of importance happens. She’s my daughter’s godmother, a huge part of my immediate family, and the best friend I always needed, yet never knew to ask for.

She is quirky, outspoken, honest, obnoxious, and unfailingly witty. She still wears studded belts with enormous buckles, band t-shirts, and no makeup. She’s shaved her head twice in the six years we’ve been friends – Once because she wanted to and again just recently for a very worthy cause (and she manages to pull it off, like a tiny rocker version of Demi Moore).

She’s an atheist and a self-proclaimed medical research analyst (which is a nice way of saying she’s a hypochondriac that loves Google). Her favorite author is Chuck Palahniuk and she listens to music that makes me cringe. (Yet oddly enough, also loves Britney Spears.) She collects dinosaurs and all of her dance moves are from decades past: the peewee herman, the worm, the sprinkler, etc. She’s pretty much what I used to say was the complete opposite of me.

My mother claims I’ve changed since Rachel and I became best friends, that I’m not myself anymore. She says I’m more combative and less spiritual. She’s only partially right. I have changed, but I’ve never felt more like myself. And she did that for me. She helped me be honest and original again. Being her friend allowed me to show my quirky, slightly shocking side without fear of ridicule or rejection.

Though I realized we have a good bit in common, we each have our own distinct role in the relationship. And, make no mistake, it is a relationship. (There’s nothing sexual about it, though we did make out once when we were shitfaced drunk.) She’s the dependable to my flaky, the rock to my rap, the understated elegance to my over-the-top glitz, and the reasonably grounded to my overactive imagining.

After thinking about it, just this moment in fact, it’s a wonder that I can commit myself to this person even platonically for the rest of my life yet in the past committing to a man would be giving in to the masses. We’ve had our arguments and our disputes, and I’m very much the woman in our relationship. I feel out of sorts when she’s angry at me and set out to fix it immediately. Well, unless she’s in the wrong. Which, because she’s clearly the man in our relationship, she never is. (That’s a joke. Sort of.) It’s strange, isn’t it? That women can form a bond that tight with each other and yet shy away from anything else?

My gawd. This post about my best friend has turned me into a raving lesbo.

We’re taking a trip to Alabama this weekend for her cousin’s wedding. Maybe the five hour drive will be a good time to discuss our gender roles. And that talk will be quite appropriate after I first mention that I wrote about our friendship and receive her response, which I’m 99.9% sure I already know.

She’ll flash me a coy grin and say:

“Lesbian! Wanna spoon?”

Christmas: It's why I need therapy.

Now that it’s over and I stand back to survey the damage, I realize it’s really not all that bad. I’m a bit overdrawn, hiding my car from the repo man, and the left side of my face is feeling a little slack from all the self medicating...but hey! The kid has a well stocked playroom and I’ve got enough ham in the refrigerator to feed an army of elves. Or just me. I like ham.

Christmas Eve day I did what I said I wouldn’t. I went shopping. My mom had to work so she gave me her debit card, a list of groceries needed to make that night’s fare, and strict instructions to go to the devil’s playground where I could get the most bang for her buck: Wal-Mart.

I hate Wal-Mart, but it’s a necessary evil in these parts. Where else can you get a shopping cart full of chips, dip, rubber soled bedroom slippers, a new hairdryer, and a pack of condoms all in one go? It’s also the stomping ground for the badly dressed. Every time I set foot in there I make sure I look like I walked off a Kenneth Cole runway lest someone decide to put my picture on that terribly funny website: http://www.peopleofwalmart.com/.

It was packed so full you could barely move. I threw the kid in the cargo area and elbowed my way through the aisles, searching for this and that. I was scanning the baking aisle for red food coloring, growing more and more frustrated. For the love of gawd, who wants a red velvet cake anyway! Then I saw one lone box stuck amongst the sprinkles and squeezable tubes of icing. As I strode toward it, arm out, a blonde bimbo in a faux leather and fur coat snatched it up.

Loudly growling and stomping my foot wasn’t very mature behavior, but it felt pretty satisfying at the time. The blond turned around, her red lipstick smeared over her top lip in an effort to add fullness, looked at me and said, “Oh, did you want this?”

“I need that”, I replied.

“Well, let’s see if we can find some more.”

She grabbed my hand and started towing me up the aisle. I glanced over my shoulder at the cart to tell the kid I wasn’t going away because she gets weird about things like that, but she was obliviously having a jug of buttermilk make out with a loaf of bread. The bimbo did indeed find the actual shelf of food coloring at the end of the aisle. She triumphantly handed me one, practically bowed and said, “Merry Christmas”, like she was Santa fucking Claus and had just handed me world peace in a bottle. I hate when strange people are nice when I’m in a mood to be rude.

I grumbled a thank you and hurried back to the kid, who in my absence had managed to pile eight bags of brown sugar in the cart. “Don’t touch anything”, I said sternly as I transferred them back to the shelf. “I didn’t do it”, she replied all wide eyed and innocent.

“Santa doesn’t bring presents to liars.” She promptly burst into tears, making a racket that caused the whole of Wal-Mart to turn around and look. Thankfully my sister arrived to take her away so I could finish what I started. As she carried my snotty child away in her arms, she looked over my sister’s shoulder and stuck her tongue out at me. You win some, you lose some.

After a few more thankfully quiet errands, I headed home. As soon as I walked in the door I was greeted with screams and a blur of red and white. The kid was running hell bent for leather through the kitchen in her underwear and my sister was behind her, brandishing a hairbrush and a pair of tights. I threw my things on the table, went to my room, and locked the door.

Pulling off clothes as I went, I walked to the closet, dug through my secret drawer, and pulled out a small bottle of Jack Daniels and a pill box. My emergency stash, used only for family gatherings and kid induced headaches. I took a Xanax, followed it with two healthy swallows of JD, and then lay on the floor in my underwear to wait. After about half an hour and two more swallows, I was ready to take on my father’s family.

My papa’s Filipino girlfriend is a notoriously bad gift giver. Throughout the night you could go from one huddle of people to another and the conversation was of the same vein.

“She gave me a ceramic yard angel. What the fuck am I supposed to do with that?”

“Well she gave me a Hawaiian shirt in a 3X. Do I look like a 3X to you?!” (Actually, you do.)

“I got a framed photo of a pink flower.” (My cousin’s boyfriend)

Then they turned to me. “What did she get you?”

All smiles and sucking my liquor through a straw I replied, “Forty bucks and a sweatshirt. Ha!”

The envy was obvious. The motive was not. She dislikes me more than most of them so I was at a loss to understand why she’d given me a decent gift. Fear is about the only thing I could come up with. Maybe she was afraid I’d cut her. I can be pretty menacing when I’m around family...keeps them at a distance. I’m the cranky and rude, yet darkly funny relative. It could be worse. I could be the pushover or the medical moaner.

Anyway, there’s always one present that gets all the attention. Last year it was a $600 karaoke system that papa gave to his girlfriend. (Thankfully she won’t use it when I’m around anymore after a slightly awkward and drunken version of “I touch myself” in front of her church friends. I should really try karaoke in public...)

This year it was the interactive robot dinosaur papa gave to the kid. It walks, attacks, and makes over 100 noises. Even I was impressed with it. Everyone was crowding around, waiting on a turn with the remote. Somehow my cousin’s 3 year old brat got her sticky paws on it and we couldn’t get it back for about 20 minutes. Finally I intervened.

“Hey kid, give me that.”

“It’s mine”, she shrieked.

“Actually”, I said as I reached out my arm, “its Hannah’s, which means it’s mine by default. Hand it over.”

“Mine! Mine!” She started to back away, the look of a rabid dog on her face.

I picked up a stray pompom from the floor and waved it to the left. “Swish, swish, swish. Look!”

Momentarily distracted, she turned her attention to the pompom, allowing me to snatch the remote away with my right hand. She immediately began to wail while I danced gleefully away. Children love me.

By the time we got home with our booty it was around 9 and the kid was running on empty. I stuck her in the bed and she immediately passed out. My sister and I sat out the stuff from Santa Claus and soon followed suit. We had to be up early in order to open up presents before The Grandmother and the rest of my mom’s family arrived.

I was up and smiling at 6:30. I put on my new pink plaid bathrobe, started the coffee, and went to wake everyone but the kid. We were all situated in the living room with steaming cups when she came stumbling in, rubbing her eyes at 7. I took pictures of her awed expression as she looked over her new art desk and plethora of supplies that I’ll be sure to regret later.

We began to pass out presents. My mother, sister, Ray, and I all sat ours aside in a pile to be opened after the kid made her way through her enormous stack.

Everything was great until she opened the last present. She wanted more. “Dear gawd”, I thought, “I’ve raised a greedy little shit. No, no. It’s mom’s fault.” I allowed her to help open my presents to keep her happy. Sigh. The duty of a parent is never done.

I have to say, I got quite the haul this year. Even if my car does get repossessed and my cell phone gets turned off, rest assured, I will still be well dressed.

After a frenzy of cleaning, my sister and I decided that we were going to stay in our pajamas all day. And much to everyone’s disapproval, we did.

The Grandmother arrived with my Aunt D, Uncle B, and Aunt C in tow. My uncle stationed himself on the couch with his mandolin. That’s right, mandolin.

A harried Aunt D immediately approached me and said, “What have you got to drink around here?” I knew she didn’t mean soda, so I pulled a half empty bottle of rum out of the cabinet and mixed her a drink. Not an hour later I was walking through the kitchen and saw her emptying the last of my wine into a Solo cup.

“What are you doing?”

“I found this in the fridge.”

I sighed. I’d been saving that for later. No wine, no rum, and only one serving of Jack left in my hidden bottle.

After dinner I was sitting on the couch next to The Grandmother when she suggested my uncle play his mandolin. So he started a rousing rendition of “Dead skunk in the middle of the road” which sent Ray into a fit of laughter and my Aunt D to the bedroom to lie down. I got it all on video.

Later, when my drunken Aunt decided to emerge for a snack, the neighbor’s son happened to be stopping by to say hello to my mom. As he was walking out the door she said, “Is that your boyfriend?”

“No, that’s the neighbor’s son.”

“You didn’t invite a man to dinner?”

“No.”

“Well, why not? Don’t you have a boyfriend?” She was swaying at the entrance to the living room and I attempted to brush past her.

“No, I don’t.”

“She doesn’t date”, my sister said.

“I sure wish you’d meet a nice man and get married”, The Grandmother said.

That sent the majority of the room into peals of laughter. Irritated, I looked at TG and said, “Well what if I like women?”

“I’ve been thinking that’s the problem”, she replied calmly.

“Yes, I should have brought my girlfriend to dinner”, I said sarcastically.

“Where is Rachel today?”

“WHAT?”

Evidently The Grandmother has been under the impression that my best friend and I have a closer relationship than we let on. Seriously. I’ve joked about it before, but on Christmas day she decided that she would tell me how deeply disappointed she was that I’ve been secretly seeing a woman...and an atheist woman at that. I was relieved when they finally left.

The rest of the weekend was devoted to spending my gift cards on outfits they’d never allow me to wear to work and taking down the Christmas stuff. Usually we wait another week or so, but I wanted it all out immediately. For some reason it makes me feel better to have it out of sight.

Right now I’m deeply enjoying my quiet office. The boss is occupied with catching up on her phone calls and everyone else has been put on notice to leave me alone. This week is all about recovery.

After all, I’ve only got four days and then it’s New Year’s dinner at The Grandmother’s. Maybe I can find someone suitable to bring while I’m out getting shitfaced the night before. That ought to put things to rights with this lesbian nonsense. I'm thinking someone with a few tattoos and a leather fetish.