“If I need to, I will. I’m not that worried though. I’m pretty sure I can take her. She’s so lit all the time I probably could knock her over quick.”
She laughed, and I strained my ear to see if she was faking it. Oh, I guess I wanted to believe her. I wanted to carry on with what I was doing at that moment. Sitting close to Valka in bed and giggling like real girlfriends. Breaking free from the cold Nebraska winter. On my way to the new me. So I wished her well and made her promise to call me the minute anything happened. But secretly I hoped that phone did not ring. Because I still wanted to have some fun.
Back in bed, Valka gave me her best impression of a worried look, considering her forehead did not move a lick.
“You want to talk about it, Cathy?”
“Nope,” I said. “I do not want to talk about anything ever.”
Valka took in a deep breath. “All rightie, then,” she said.
“Sorry,” I said. I instantly regretted it. But I was not ready to spill my soul to the world. I loved Valka but it was so tight inside me. It still hurt to breathe.
Then she said, “Oh well, new day, new year.” She paused. “That’s right, it is a new year! Tonight, oh tonight. I am taking you to see the best show on earth, Hot Stars in the City. Two lady friends out on the town again. And then at midnight, champagne cocktails!”
“I don’t know if my head can handle it.”
“You’ll be fine. Just take some more aspirin. Or I’ve got some Valium.”
“Valium!” I said.
“I have lots of drugs. I’m a regular old medicine cabinet. I AM A CANCER SURVIVOR.” She said it so seriously I could not argue with her.
Valka got up and went to the bathroom and said, “This is magnificent.” Then she started puking.
“Are you okay in there?” I said.
“Fine,” she said. “Just getting it all out.”
“Do you want me to hold your hair?” I said. Isn’t that what girlfriends did for each other? That was how it was in high school anyway. Then I remembered she did not have any hair. She did not bother to reply.
I sat back and thought for a moment as Valka retched in the bathroom. She had been through so much. She lost her breasts. She lost her insides. She lost her man. There she was throwing everything up from last night. But still she had a positive attitude. She should have had a heart of stone but she was so much warmer than I would ever be. And I had not even bothered to tell her my secrets. She had not asked, but still, I could have offered something up in the name of friendship. I was the one who was wrong.
Valka turned on the shower and came back into the bedroom. She was naked. Her breasts really were in a perfect location on her chest. There were tiny pinkish scars on the undersides of them and around the nipples. She opened the closet door and pulled out a robe. “Ooh, these are nice,” she said. “They’re softer than the robes in my room.” She wrapped one around herself and came over to the bed. She sat down on it and faced me. “Do you want to see what I look like without the wig?” She put her hand on top of her head.
I did not want to see it, but I could not figure out how to say no.
“I don’t show just everyone,” she said.
Okay, it was a bonding thing. I wanted to bond.
“Show me,” I said.
She pulled off her wig. Underneath she was still pretty. Her hair was growing back in weird spurts, sure, like there was a strange map of the world on her head. But there were no scars on her head (I do not know why I thought there would be, it was not like she had had brain surgery) and the skin was still smooth. She had washed off her makeup the night before so all that was left was her, just her, just Valka. I put my hand out and touched her head.
“It’s fuzzy,” I said.
“Soft,” she said. “Yes. Sometimes I rub myself for good luck.”
We both laughed at that one.
“Not that I need it,” she said. “I’m the luckiest girl in the world.”
EIGHT HOURS LATER VALKA AND I were both done up in dresses and waiting in line at the show. I thought she looked prettier than I did. She had brought a special outfit for the occasion, a white dress with red and black rectangles on it, and black stockings with seams running down the back of her thighs. Her wig was puffed up on top, and she wore a wide band across the bangs. The ends of the wig curled up like the edge of a smile.
“Do you get it?” she said to me. “I’m a mod.”
I did not know what that was but I told her she looked just perfect, which she did. She looked like she was from another era. If that was what she wanted, to be somewhere else—anywhere else—but here, then I supported it.