Monday, June 18, 2007

Girls Who Wear Fake Toes Aren’t Liars Day!

Back in high school you got heartbroken pretty bad and you vowed to never trust another woman again. You pulled it off for a couple of decades, until last week when you met Lucy at a waterfront bar near your work. She knew a colleague of yours and joined your table. You and she got to talking and before you knew it, you were making plans to have dinner the following Wednesday.

You and Lucy had about four dates before you found out about her fake toes. She’d invited you back to her place, and things looked promising. You were enjoying drinks on her couch, kissing a bit, when you looked down and saw she’d taken her sandals off. The sandals were sitting on the floor five feet away, poking out from under the glass coffee table. Her pretty toes were still in them.

You stopped kissing and grabbed one of the sandals. The hollow toes with the perfect bright red polish were made of a kind of thick rubber. Off the foot, you were shocked that you ever thought they were real.

You then saw her naked feet, and the toes on them. Oddly shaped, fat in all the wrong places, chipped and neglected nail polish barely coating her nails. Just a bunch of ordinary, everyday, ugly-ass toes.

“Toe cleavage,” she said. “It’s a big trend right now.”

You got up from the couch, went to the kitchen to grab the doggy bag you brought from the restaurant, and you got the hell out of there.

She left voicemails and sent you emails for several weeks and you stayed silent. Then she stopped trying to reach you. That’s when you realized how much you missed her. That’s when you panicked and told her you’d like to meet and explain. You’re having coffee tonight at six, and you’re going to tell her you were lied to around 23 years ago and therefore trust is a very big issue for you.

“Girls who wear fake toes aren’t liars,” she’ll say. “I just wanted to look pretty for you.”

You tell her about the prom. How you were surprised when the cheerleader asked you to go with her because you weren’t exactly quarterback material. Then when it was announced you had been elected prom king, it was like a dream. Then it turned into a nightmare when they dropped a pig on you.

“It was alive, but with its legs hog-tied. It pinned me there on the stage. They laughed, all of them, students and teachers, and they left me there stuck underneath that enormous pig while it squealed and shat all over me, and they went about their dance for another couple of hours, occasionally coming on stage to take a picture with me or to fart on my eyes. It wasn’t until they’d all gone that the custodial staff came onstage and rolled the pig off of me.”

Lucy’s crying when you finish your story. “That was the only reason that girl asked me to the prom. So her and her friends could trap me underneath a live pig while everyone pointed and laughed. I made a promise to never trust another woman again, until you came along. I didn’t want to hold anything back from you. Then I saw those toes.”

“Those toes were no more an effort to deceive than the lipstick on these lips,” she says. “Nothing more than an effort to make you want me just as much as I want you.”

You lean in to kiss those lips. She pulls back.

“You have to trust me,” she says. “This won’t work if you’re going to doubt my heart.”

You nod.

“You have to trust me,” she says. “I’m not a liar, and I want you in my life.”

You swallow. You say, “I trust you.” She reaches across the table and pulls you into her kiss.

Happy Girls Who Wear Fake Toes Aren’t Liars Day!