18 Chapter XVII

Police Officer: What was Selena hiding?

Me: A shit ton of secrets.

***

Sunny had an unusually high attendance to the Kitty meetings, either because she was a rising star in the department of servantry or because she had an inborn desire to impress Selena with her attendance.

Today, Sunny arrived on the doorstep of Demanda's precious palace two minutes early. She intended to hold the door for the girls as an excuse for avoiding conversation with the mother. She stood, shivering in desultory politeness, shaking her toes on the welcome mat for a good ten minutes before the noise of trouble came rolling down Vinerdale street in two Ford trucks.

The girls hopped out whining in squeaky tones about what seemed to be some player guy and when they arrived beside the freezing girl, Sunny whipped on the door. Selena walked down the stairs, greeted the girls, not noticing Sunny's stick-like body flat out against the wall of the house. Sunny didn't move; she wanted to absorb the full glory, the courtesy of holding the door as an unconscious attempt to make up having received Selena's blessing of acceptance.

Then, after an extended time, Demanda tapped Sunny on the shoulder to which she jumped, sending a line of jitters across her body.

"You better come in," she said, her yellow hair folded atop her head like a crown braid. Sunny nodded, realizing that if Demanda had cut back on doughnuts, she'd be the living person of the barbie doll. Her gelatinous figure made her look like a huge blueberry.

Demanda made the girls chocolate chip cookies, brownies, and even popcorn to take down into the basement. She loved to spoil her visitors, just as she spoiled her babies. The two girls couldn't go into Selena's room because moans and sexual noises were seeping out from the door crack. Ron had brought home a girl.

Armed with Demanda's treats, a few candies, and some beers (which Selena insisted), the Kitties retreated downstairs. It was covered in carpet whiter and fancier than the ones in Devon's living room, had a massive projector spreading across the great beige walls, a pool table in the corner, and lots of hockey gear. It looked like a boy's change room, but not in a sweaty or stinky way. Everything was clean, sanitized, and taken care of. The towels in the bathroom were folded, the soap dispenser filled, the mirrors spotless. Demanda excelled at her job.

Sunny sympathized with this woman sometimes, for caring for these three kids proved to require much more patience than most other jobs. But despite her devotion to gossip, she never complained a word— she enjoyed maternal responsible like no other.

Selena, distracted by a text, lead the rest of the girls into a room. Sunny followed high hopes in her face. Tate made a show of holding the door, which was already open. Then slammed it in Sunny's nose. The door locked. Giggles. Instantly, Sunny's hopes of lightless and breeziness and a wonderful conversation with the most popular girls in the universe shatter. She returned to the couches realizing that the word "popular" came with the ceaseless threat of being broken.

The next hour, through the crack underneath the door, Sunny happened to hear Selena's grand summary of this week's hottest school gossip. The girls thrummed with pride as they went from one boy talk to another. Occasionally, a thin cloud of smoke would seep through the crack of the door. And even less occasionally, Callie's name popped up mid-conversation.

Selena shut down the conversation right away. It was a movie waiting to happen. Sunny reached over for the brownies. She might as well enjoy herself. Then, the door opened immediately. Three girls step out in unison.

"One bite, and that's a few hundred calories," said Selena.

"What?"

"I'm just saying. None of the Kitties are fat." Sunny shuddered and looked as if she were thinking about putting down the brownie. But then just stuffed the whole thing in her mouth. And then another, and another. She. Just. Couldn't. Stop. Selena started chuckling.

"These are so good," Sunny said, mid-chew. "Demanda is amazing."

"Sometimes I wish that I could just do that. You know, eat a brownie and not worry about anything."

"Me too," said Tyra.

"You can," Sunny replied, handing a muffin to her. "Here."

"No. Stop. You're only making it worse. UGH. My life is just so much harder than yours. Like I wake up and I have to worry about fluid retention."

"Yeah, well maybe you should worry more about brain retention at the speed of your dieting," added Tyra.

"Shut up slut."

"Why are you dieting anyways? It's not like your fat or anything," said Tyra. Selena, responding to the sudden attack, blushed. An involuntary flow of blood surfaced to her skin.

"It's not how it looks," said Selena. "Nothing ever is." Sunny sensed a vulnerability slither across her. She just realized that the girl was wearing a faint, brown, tie-dye T-shirt ten sizes too large. The baggy coverage, it seemed, was a way to hide her painful secrets. Sunny knew it was only a matter of time before she would spill. There was no way a young girl could hold such dark, isolating thoughts for such long periods.

***

When orange strands started to spread over the sky, the girls busied themselves with curling irons and makeup brushes. They never once missed golden hour. Selena, half-drunk, looked over at Sunny and realized that she hadn't brought any makeup.

"Oh gosh. You can't be in our groupie looking like that," Selena said, tilting her head sideways. "This is such an emergency." Immediately, dropped whatever was in their hands and rushed over. Selena whipped out a NARS Cosmetics Natural Radiant Longwear Foundation in the shade Jorunn. $80. Ashley an eyeshadow palette. $60. Tate some eyeliner. $30. Mascara. $18. Lipstick. $12. The Kitties frantically jumped up and down and move their hands around Sunny's face. An hour later, they transformed her into a very socially acceptable version of herself. They swung their booties outside only to find a dark sky. Everybody started complaining.

"It's all your fault," whined Tyra. "How is this going to look? People are going to unfollow."

"Yeah, who the fuck doesn't know how to do their makeup?"

"Ok, girls. Calm down," Selena said. "This fuck will learn to do it next time. For now, we can take photos with the ring light." Everybody stared at Sunny like she was a big bitch.

The girls took out their phone snapped a few pics; front, side, grin, no grin, duck-lips— some for Snapchat, others for Instagram stories. Sunny followed along. They stopped after a reminder popped up claiming that the storage was full. They captioned their photos: my favorite girlies, and another who I tolerate.

By the end of the night, Sunny, it had to be admitted, was exceptionally beautiful. She blossomed under her butterfly-like lashes and calm peachy white skin. Selena gave Sunny a taste of achieving praiseworthy red lips, and a shot at doing better in this society she had just set foot in.

Suddenly she felt abnormally confident with herself because she knew that it would change the way people treated her and how many likes she got on social media.

Selena taught Sunny all the tricks of social media. They told her about face-tune and advised her to make the bridge of her nose higher, enlarge her eyes, and make her skin whiter. They put over Sunny's features a billion filters and found some cheesy cation to go along with the photo. At last, they hit the rainbow icon on her phone that brought her onto the picture-filled Instagram page. Then, a huge big laugh. Her feed was not in "theme".

"What is this crap?" Selena said. Sunny admits that it was looking pretty scrappy now; there were nine photos (none of which contained herself). They are mainly composed of aesthetically posed shoes in front of the couches, or my attempts to mimic the Pinterest photographing nature—trees, lakes, sunsets.

"Ok. We are definitely going to change that."

"What?"

"You can't be a Kitty and have THAT Instagram." A mirror-picture, a smile, or the duck-lips selfie. Ashley thought the mirror picture was the hottest. Tatedisagreed. She thought the smile was most alluring, although it did make Sunny's eyes appear small. Selena liked the duck lips selfie. So it was the duck lips selfie.

She hit post and put the phone down. Sunny wasn't breathing properly. Lyssa warned her about posting pictures of her face online. It simply wasn't allowed.

"Any parents?" Tate said.

"Yeah, Lyssa and Hiram."

"No. On social media, idiot." Before Sunny could get anything out of her mouth, Tate snatched the phone from between her fingers.

"What are you doing?"

"Blocking Lyssa and Hiram." Tate spoke as if she took great pleasure in the idea of guiding Sunny's virgin steps on the hard road of growing up in Fort McMurray.

"They don't have Instagram," said Sunny, innocently. Tate paused then started up a chuckle. To witness Sunny say such peculiar things were gutting and instantly the whole room placed Sunny in a different category of person.

The girls began to once again make a buffoon of her. Sunny replied with smiles of joy; She had learned to leverage the power of social media and the nakedness of her happiness was surprising. I couldn't help feel afraid for the far worse and more expensive habits Sunny was on the path to acquiring.

***

Soon the sky was filled with stars and each person resorted to a corner of the room where they sat staring at screens. The girls started face-timing their own zitty boys. Soon the sky was filled with stars and each person resorted to a corner of the room where they sat like hungry robots staring at screens.

The girls started face-timing their own zitty boys. They'd say a few words, swipe on Instagram until there was nothing else to swipe, then every so often, the girls would bring their hands to their mouths and breathe into their vapes and then out. Sunny sat by the door having nothing to do.

Selena sat wrapped around a fluffy light rose sweeter texting. She gracefully tapped her fingers at the screen in a gesture that was alluring, satisfying to look at. Everybody, she texted, texted back. With messages double in length. Nobody left her on read. The atmosphere was odd; everybody was in their own fantasy world of liking, commenting, following.

Sunny looked left and right, and when everybody was heavily engaged with technology, she slipped out into the living room where Demanda and Atlas were amusing themselves with the last episode of the last season of Keeping Up with the Kardashian. Atlas was buff, the boss of an Oil Sand Company, and had the man-of-few-words demeanor. He was the kind of man who never complained of Demanda's prodigal spending and had a gift for eating whatever it was Demanda decided to cook.

Demanda sat entwined inside his hefty arms chuckling at the TV screen when suddenly Atlas reached over and pulled his wife into a deep French kiss. When they came up for air, he said some gross couple of things which made Sunny's presence very awkward. She looked away as if it would give them a sort of privacy. They didn't notice her.

Sunny couldn't help but think of her family, and how it was very different from all that she was seeing. It was such a rarity to even seen her parents hug let alone be at such an intimate degree in front of a wandering stranger.

Lyssa: I'm coming to pick you up.

Lyssa: We agreed. No sleeping over.

Lyssa: This is unacceptable.

Lyssa: Call me now or you're dead.