Pretty Amy by Lisa Burstein

freaking suit.
    “How about Smart Separates? Or, no, Working Woman,” she said, snapping her fingers. My mother believed in the power of shopping and therefore she believed in the vocabulary of it. If there were an area of the store called Amazing Arraignment, we would definitely be looking there.
    “These are perfect,” she said, handing me a stack of suits, which she slung over my arm like a huge, unwieldy coat.
    “Yuck,” I said.
    “Stop complaining. Debra Lippitz and her daughter go shopping together all the time,” she said.
    “Debra Lippitz’s daughter has crabs,” I said. I wasn’t trying to be snarky—she really did.
    “Go try those, and I’ll find some more,” she said, ignoring me and darting off into the racks.
    I ran toward the solitude of the dressing room. Of course, the full-length mirror inside would have its own disappoint-ments, but I would take dealing with a fat ass over dealing with my mother any day. At least you can do something about a fat ass, in theory.
    I came out in the first suit, a navy-blue pinstripe, to find my mother sitting on one of the chairs provided for waiting mothers, her ankles crossed, rubbing at some dirt on her pants.
    “That is just darling,” she said, standing and fussing with the collar. And I could see in her eyes the hope that I would wear this to a job interview someday. I decided not to remind her that the only place I would be wearing this suit was to court. That afterward it would sit in my closet gathering dust, just like all the other lame clothes she bought me.
    An elderly saleswoman with white-blond hair like cotton candy poked her head in. “So, what’s the occasion?”
    “Possession with intent to sell,” I said under my breath.
    My mother glared at me. “No occasion,” she said. “It never hurts to have a good suit in your wardrobe.”
    “Absolutely,” the saleswoman said, nodding. “How can I help?”
    “Maybe something a little brighter. It is almost summer, after all,” my mother said.
    “Do you have anything that screams, ‘I’m innocent’?” I asked.
    “You know, to match her age,” my mother said, glaring at me again.
    “I think we have something in peach. I’ll just go get it,” the woman said, shuffling out onto the sales floor, her hair leading the way.
    “Peach? What am I, a cruise director?”
    “You’ll try on what she brings because it’s polite. Trying something on doesn’t hurt anyone,” she said, crunching on her index finger.
    I decided not to respond. There was really no rational way to discuss the color peach.
    “And stop talking about your problem,” she whispered.
    My problem, like it was an oozing growth or a sexually transmitted disease. Truthfully, either one would have been preferable to what was awaiting me.
    “What do you think of this?” she asked, pulling at the sleeves.
    “I hate it,” I said.
    “I suppose, dear, you’d rather wear something lying on your floor right now, maybe your jeans with the hole in the crotch? That will really make a good impression.” Dear was not a term of endearment for my mother. She used it the way a fairy-tale witch would.
    The saleswoman came back and handed me a pile of peach fabric and pearl buttons. “We also have one in sea-foam green, which I thought would be just beautiful with your eyes,” she said, handing me another pile that was the color of Comet.
    To think that after all those years of searching, the perfect thing to accentuate my beauty was right under our sink.
    I wanted to say something, but I couldn’t figure out what, so instead I went back into the dressing room and sat on the floor, my knees up to my chest, my arms crossed over them. It was as much energy as I could expend on a tantrum.
    “Get up,” my mother hissed through the curtain.
    “No,” I said, not because I didn’t want to get up, but because I didn’t want to do anything she told me to at that moment. I didn’t want to do anything anyone told me to at that moment.