Jaded

Kari

"Are you excited at all? You look rough, like you might throw up any minute." Lisa reached over in the front seat of the car and poked Kari, whose hands were shaking slightly on the wheel.

Kari laughed sarcastically and glanced toward the fiery redhead beside her, a smile on her mouth as nervousness churned from her stomach to her chest. The big day was tomorrow and she was beyond blessed to be marrying someone like Frank, but that didn't ease her worry, her thoughts. To be tied down to someone for the rest of eternity and hope that they would remain loving, faithful, fun?

Impossible. Her own parents were a great match and yet they'd fallen apart her senior year, leaving her to celebrate most of her high school events with her brother, Marc and her mom's youngest sister, Katie. If two of the most compatible people in the universe hadn't made it, what chance did she and Frank have?

"Hey, that was a question."

"Oh, yeah, sorry. I was thinking about my folks again." Kari shrugged, glancing in the rearview mirror and pulling up to a long string of apartments. "Run in and get Sicily. I think I might hurl if I get out right now."

"Yeah, no prob." Lisa reached for the door handle before looking back across the open confines of the car. "You know you don't have to marry him, right?"

Kari shrugged and turned to face her friend. "I love Frank, Lisa. It's all good. I'm just feeling a little overwhelmed by the idea of forever."

"Yes, well, I don't love Frank at all. He's too mysterious and something’s jacked up about his hair."

Kari pushed at her best friend. "Go get Sicily and stop trying to break up my happy ending before it even happens."

Lisa huffed, her voice soft and low as she grumbled various things about Frank and his hair. As soon as she shut the door to the car, Kari let out a long breath, her head dropping back and her eyes closing. Was this the right decision? Why was she having second thoughts now? She and Frank had been dating since her freshman year of college and now they had both graduated. It was time for the next step.

The wedding had been planned over a six-month period, Lisa and Sicily helping her along every step of the decision-making process. It'd been a long six months, one filled with nothing more than minor petting and carefully guarded make-out sessions with her husband-to-be. It was something she wanted, not him. He was more than happy to hump the side of a pole if it had an opening, but he had been faithful to her for the last four years. At least she assumed as much.

She wanted their wedding night to be special, like opening a new package. The idea of re-virginizing oneself seemed trivial and silly to her friends, but it was something that mattered to her. So, she suffered through Frank's occasional rants about being a man and simply reminded him that she rarely asked for much and this was important to her. 

The ironic thing was that he wasn't exactly her type. He was fit and strong, sleek and mysterious, the last of which Lisa hated. Her friends berated her for not digging a little more into his past, which she knew very little about. Life was more about the future to come than the past that slipped into nothingness behind them. Right?

His mother had been from Mexico and a father was never mentioned, leaving Frank rather withdrawn whenever she brought it up, so she rarely did. They would have the rest of their lives to figure each other out. No need to know everything before becoming one. He was a good man and had a great job and doted on her most of the time. She'd yet to see a temper or angry streak in the past four years, and she loved him – plain and simple.

The front and back car doors opened and her friends slipped in, Sicily getting in the front where Lisa was previously. Her long chestnut hair hung around her slender shoulders and covered the top of a silky white shirt that dipped low into her breasts. Her friend was magnificently beautiful and yet she didn't seem to have the slightest clue, or she didn't care. They'd only been friends for two years, but Sicily and Lisa had grown up together on the west side of New York.

"You weren't lying." Sicily buckled up and looked over toward Lisa in the backseat, Lisa giving a sound of appreciation.

"Lying about what?" Kari asked before pulling back out into the street. They were headed out for the bachelorette party, the three of them joining a larger group of girls at a club in the heart of downtown Manhattan.

"Lying about how sickly you look." Lisa leaned up and tugged at a strand of Kari's hair, smiling up at her in the rearview mirror.

"You okay?" Sicily reached over and rubbed her forearm, a soft smile on the other girl's face.

Kari laughed again and shook her head. "I'm fine. Wait until you witches are getting married and then you'll understand. Forever is a long time. Like really, really long."

"Yeah, I'm not hunkering down with the same man for forever. No way." Lisa stomped her feet on the floor, the sound of her false tantrum filling the car. "Not gonna happen. I refuse."

"I want to settle down. I think it would be great to trust someone enough to really share all of yourself. You know, both your heart and your body." Sicily reached up and pulled down the small visor in front of her, popping it open and checking her teeth.

"You already share your body readily. What is the big deal with sharing your heart? You have us for that," Lisa responded from the backseat.

"Kari, help me out here. Our hooker friend doesn't understand love because she's a spoiled brat only child who gets whatever she wants."

Kari straightened up a little, pulling onto the freeway and trying to decide whose side to take. On the one hand, she totally understood Sicily. She wanted to love deeply and be loved, but to Lisa's point, sometimes love sucked royally and lust was simple and straightforward.

"I'm not a hooker. I just think that love and lust are messy, but lust allows you a quick shower and you’re back on your feet. Love usually provides weeks of crying, ice cream causing rear expansion, and a necessary purge to remove his crap from your house. That's a lot to ask of a girl."

"She's right about the rear expansion." Kari shrugged and tried to get into the conversation, her own thoughts filled with question. "Why am I so worried about this?"