“How’d you like it?” Corinne asks as we exit the theater two torturous hours later. I shield my eyes from the bright sun.
“It was all right, I guess.”
“I thought it was awesome…imagine falling in love with the man of your dreams only to find out he’s a demon and he wants you to bear his evil spawn? That would totally suck, huh?”
“Totally.”
We walk toward my car. “So what do you want to do now?” I ask, unlocking the doors.
Corrine slides in the passenger side and snaps on her seatbelt. “Um, I dunno…do you want to hang out more?” She sounds almost shy, but hopeful.
“Sure, I have a few more hours if you want.”
“Wanna cruise around the mall?”
“Sounds good. I wouldn’t mind looking for some new tops,” I say, surprising myself. I’ve never been one for shopping; that’s Lucky’s department. She’s the fashionista. I prefer not to stand out or be noticed, hence the ‘all black all the time’.
“Oh, I just wanna walk around and look at stuff,” Corinne mumbles. “I don’t have any money to actually buy anything. But, of course, you can if you want…”
“It’s your birthday. We’ll find you something cute…my treat.”
“Liora, no. You don’t have to…I didn’t mean for you…”
“I insist. No arguing.” I pull out of the movie theater parking lot and head toward the Riverdale Shopping Center fifteen miles away. I don’t know where my sudden urge to bond with Corrine is coming from, but making her happy is making me happy. So I’m going with it.
“Liora, can I ask you something…something kinda personal? You don’t have to answer if you don’t want to,” Corinne asks as I merge onto the highway.
The tone in her voice puts me instantly on guard, and I grip the wheel tight. Please don’t push it, Corrine… “Sure, what’s up?”
“Umm, I was just wondering…have you ever, you know…done it with a boy?”
I exhale and press my lips together to keep from laughing. That’s just about the last thing I expected her to say right then. “No, I haven’t…Have you?”
She looks down at her lap and fidgets with her seatbelt. “No, but I want to. I want to be in love. I want love like those people in the movie had…crazy love.”
Good grief. “Well, not to sound like your mother or anything, but you know that sex and love aren’t the same thing. And insane love isn’t necessarily good love, either…”
“I don’t know whose mom you think you’re channeling, but it’s definitely not mine,” she says with a grimace. Well, at least she has a sense of humor about her wanton mother.
“I just mean,” she continues, “just imagine being so super crazy in love with someone that nothing can tear you apart, no matter what…no matter how awful or scary or horrible or anything. I want someone to love me like that…and then that’s where the sex would happen. Obviously.”
Obviously. “Yeah, I mean, it would be cool to be in love and all, and have someone be super in love with me…but not like those people…in the movie I mean. That was just creepy and all kinds of wrong.” My eyes stay focused on the road ahead. I rarely drive on the highway, so I’m more concerned with the cars flying past than I am with Corrine’s deluded sex life.
“I guess…”
I glance over my shoulder as I change lanes, and catch the disappointed look on her face. “Her feelings for the demon weren’t real… she thought she loved him, but did she really? He possessed her to feel that way about him. And he killed her family and friends when they discovered the truth about him. I don’t think that’s someone I would want to love…”
“Yeah, I know…I wasn’t talking about that part necessarily, just…when they were together…how much he loved her…so much so that it made him do all these crazy things…”
“Have you ever had a boyfriend?” I ask, trying to steer her away from the crazy movie she apparently now thinks represents some sort of romantic ideal.
She blushes and pushes up her glasses. “No, not really.”
“Well, you will one day. And when you do, I hope you want someone who treats you better than that dumb guy in the movie.”
“Sorry,” she mumbles, looking out the passenger window.
I’m confused. “Sorry for what?”
“Sorry I made you watch that stupid movie.”
Oh, great. Now I’m coming off like a righteous bitch…taking that movie waay too seriously. It’s not her fault it offended me personally on so many levels. She thinks we’re just having a girly-bonding chat over a make-believe fantasy story, and I go and get all sanctimonious on her. No wonder I don’t have any friends.