Ride the Lightening
My best girlfriend, Shanna, owns a tile installation company and rides a Harley. She's not one of my Avon customers. She doesn't wear make-up, doesn't use lotions or perfume, doesn't scrub away the dirt and dust most days. Her fingernails are permanently filled with old grout and mold, but she doesn't seem to notice. We take our dogs to the lagoon beach twice a week and throw rotting tennis balls into the water and talk politics and pets. We're best-friends-forever, natch.
As long as I've known Shanna she wanted no man, wanted no person to share her bed. But something changed a few weeks ago. I don't know what, exactly, only knew my friend grew restless, distant. She joined one of those online match-making websites and pestered me for help in writing her a catchy profile.
"Make it sound smart, Birdie." Shanna dragged a kitchen chair to my computer and looked over my shoulder as I typed. "Make sure you say I'm cute."
"Geeze, man, since when do you care about being cute? I thought we were the anti-cute twins? Remember that? You keep this up, I'll have to get another sidekick." I sighed as loud as I could, pretended to be upset, looked critically at Shanna's grout-stained t-shirt and dog-hair crusted leggings. "Um. I'm going to have to give you an Avon makeover if you want to be classified as cute. Besides, we're both pushing 40. Really, we should be aiming for Luscious or Bewitching. Not Cute."
I did the best I could, stuck in adjectives like "independent" and "self-motivated" and "decisive." I described her love for animals and environment, added lots of noise about her puritanical work ethic and a sprinkle of physical buzzwords like "blonde" and "athletic" and "strong." What the hell, I thought. Plus, I'm cute!
"Oh, that's a great ending! I love it!" Shanna gave me the thumbs up and pealed out my driveway, hog smoke billowing a fog of hope.
Late last night Shanna called.
"I got a date! I got a date! The ad worked!" She squealed with the lost soul of a fifteen-year-old and I heard her dog start to howl in her yard.
"Alright, girlfriend!" I sat straight up in my Avon Soft Pink Bubble Bath tub, did a mini victory butt dance for my lonely friend. She fawned over his first name - Joel - how his profile mentioned horses and Harleys, how he played part-time drum in a Metallica tribute band. Wow, I thought. He sounds just like Shanna, only a guy. Perfect.
"But Birdie! I need a makeover! You have to help me get ready for this date! It's Thursday night!"
So I agreed to meet Shanna at her house, to bring as much Avon as my backpack will hold, to bring half my wardrobe, too, so she could choose something sexy, something not covered in powdered shards of tile.
"But, uh, Birdie. There's one thing I have to tell you. Please promise me you won't be mad, ok? Promise? We're best friends, right?" Shanna's voice cracked a bit, sounded more fragile than I ever remembered, and I wondered what could be wrong. Was her drummer-boy Joel married?
"Sure, Shanna, don't worry. We'll always be best friends. You know that, man. What? Just spill it! I promise I won't be upset."
But even with that cheerleading routine, even with Shanna as my best-friend-forever, I wasn't prepared for what came next.
"Thank God! I know you'd understand! Here's the deal. Joel has a friend and I told him the four of us could double date. His friend plays bass in his Metallica band."
11:16:01 AM 
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