December 28

RAMONA IN CHICAGO, UN-GIFTING WITH LATRICE...

E ACH YEAR, R AMONA ACCOMPANIED L ATRICE AS SHE INSISTED on doing her Christmas shopping after Christmas. According to Latrice, this shopping was actually her duty, as she felt obligated to return each one of the Christmas presents that she did not like or want, in favor of purchasing what she did want. This theme of exchanging what you do not want for what you do want was perfect on this particular year for the two friends, as this was exactly Ramona’s circumstance.

“Girl, you know you need to talk to Malik, right?” Latrice pulled the door open for Ramona at one of their favorite fast-fashion temples, a humongous storefront on Michigan Avenue with windows filled with headless mannequins wearing sleek designs. The interior of the store pumped some kind of nondescript techno beat, thumping, thumping as the soundtrack to the inextinguishable consumption that permeated the store.

“And tell him what, Latrice? That I secretly kept planning our wedding, ran off to California to hide it, slept with a surfing yoga instructor, and now don’t want him back?”

Latrice raised an eyebrow and then lifted a perfect forest-green sweater on a hanger. “Well, since you put it that way... Do you think this would look good on me?” Ramona shook her head no. Latrice turned the sweater to look at it again, returned it to the rack, and narrowed her eyes at Ramona. “I know you’re just being petty, but I’m looking for something else anyway.” Latrice turned to walk ten paces to another rack.

“Latrice.” Ramona sighed in frustration.

Latrice turned from her rack raking to look at her. “The real question is what are you going to do about what’s his name, Jay? You’ve been broken up with Malik for months. Any mourning you have left is about a wedding, not your relationship. And now you’ve already moved on! So, what you really need to decide is... not what are you going to tell Malik, but what are you gonna do about the rest of your life?”

“Maybe some things are meant to just be what they were.” Ramona sighed again, dramatically.

“Well, let me ask you this... if you never saw him again...”

“I don’t know. I think I’ve just learned not to hope.”

“And if he never saw you again?”

“What’s the difference between a one-night stand and the love of your life?”

“The rest of your life?”

“I wasn’t asking you, Latrice. It’s what I asked him.”

“And what did he say?”

“He said it was on the other side of decisions.”

“Yours or his?”

“Mine, I think. Although I didn’t ask him... I don’t know. He seemed pretty annoyed that I didn’t tell him about Malik earlier.”

“Girl, this is so tragic.” Latrice shook her head.

Frustrated, Ramona threw her arms in the air. “Let’s just face it! This is where everyone goes back to their original lives because nothing big enough happened to make a difference!”

Latrice froze in the midst of searching, of sliding hangers across the metal rod. Her hand rested on the last thing she touched. Her head whipped to face Ramona, eyes narrowed again with ferocity. “What do you mean, nothing happened? You happened, Ramona. You happened . When do you finally realize that you’re the big thing ?

“You, Ramona , who spends her whole life saving for something without even knowing why or what for. Who hides how she really feels, what she really needs from everyone else just to spare their feelings... like you don’t have any. You take what life hands to you, and you keep it because for some reason, you think it’s what you deserve. You, Ramona , who spent months, months , continuing to plan a wedding so that your mother could still have fun dress shopping. Meanwhile, the biggest events of your life so far happened in one week in California.”

“It wasn’t just a wedding , Latrice,” Ramona replied, defeated.

Latrice raised an eyebrow in response and released a huff.

Ramona wanted more than anything to be understood. No, it wasn’t really about a wedding. So, she tried again, beginning to speak haltingly, but finding more courage with each word to say the unsayable. “What if... what if there’s never someone who chooses me again?”

Latrice looked as surprised as if she’d been struck. Her mouth dropped open, with a shock she seemed to need to shake off. She lurched forward suddenly and wrapped her arms around her friend, so tightly it was almost uncomfortable.

“ Girl, what are you saying? Someone already chose you—we all have. Again, and again, and again. The people that happen to us, the experiences we share, they are not just coincidences. They’re all choices . And the most important choices now... are yours .”

“Not everyone gets a happy ending, Latrice.” Ramona pulled herself back to look her friend in her eyes. Between them now stood the essence of her fears and her doubts, all very inconveniently shared over the thump of music and under the harsh fluorescent lighting of the least intimate place they could be. But it didn’t matter, because the moment was urgent, as were the feelings.

“And maybe you’re not the person who gets a happy ending because you don’t ask for one.” With a sigh of frustration, Latrice seemed to turn her attention back to the clothing rack. But then, after just a slight hesitation, she turned back to Ramona as if she’d forgotten something important. “Prime example... what did you get for Christmas?”

“I don’t know, some clothes, a few gift cards. Some books. Why?”

“Anything you wanted?”

“Not particularly, but I didn’t really ask—”

“Exactly. And are you going to return anything?”

“It’s a gift!”

“If it’s a gift you don’t want, it’s a liability in the back of your closet. Deadweight taking up space. Something you held on to so that someone else would never truly know you, right? So they can continue to believe you’re someone you’re not. So you don’t hurt their feelings?” Latrice’s words made tiny pokes into Ramona’s gut, felt as acutely as if actually prodded by a finger. “You can’t keep saving everyone else from themselves.”

Ramona knew then that the words from Latrice would stick like gum to the bottom of her shoe. You can’t keep saving everyone else from themselves , her mind echoed. And then, she thought of all the times she’d done exactly that. She opened her mouth several times to protest, then to reply, but there wasn’t anything else she could find to say. Thankfully, Latrice saved her from having to. She was busy returning her unsatisfactory selections to the rack. When she finished, she ushered both of them toward the exit.

“Ramona, this should be your send it back era. If you don’t want it, don’t keep it. Let’s go. I’ve got two more stores and then five hundred bucks in gift cards from Tar-jheh... from the people who really know my heart.” Latrice smiled at Ramona. Ramona smiled back, because one of those gift cards had been from her.