Covered in Glitter

Barbie gets up on time each morning without the need for an alarm. She opens the curtains and welcomes the sunshine, and then she heads to her 50s decorated kitchen to have a glass of sparkling water and fresh fruit. Her morning routine is so precise that it takes her exactly an hour to get ready for her day, never a minute more or less. Not bad for a young woman whose mother named her after her favorite doll.

She drives her economy car to work with her favorite pop tunes playing on the radio and a smile on her pretty face. Her highlighted blonde hair falls past her shoulders and her eyes are blue like sapphires. At work, she parks in her usual spot and hops out, ready for her big day. The bumper sticker on her car says, “Choose Happiness.”

She has an important task ahead of her today. She needs to finish up the charts, graphs, and promo packages for tomorrow’s meeting with the owner of Fitness Time Gym. Sam Henderson is a kind of a big deal in the local area, and he’s looking for an advertising company that can help him take his business to the next level. He wants to franchise his gym and help others start their own business while continuing to grow his own.

Barbie is excited about the project; she knows she can help him with the publicity he needs to grow his business reputation. Plus, she’s seen his commercials and can’t deny that he's attractive because her heart flutters a bit when she thinks of him. So while it’s important that every presentation she does is as perfect as she can make it, this is one extra important.

With her meeting on her mind, she bops through the lobby door and greets the security guard with a bright smile and says, “Good morning!” He nods and says, “Mornin’” and then stares at her as she walks by as if she’s here visiting from another planet. He should be used to her constant cheeriness by now, but sometimes he still wonders what she’s so darn cheery about. He shrugs it off and goes back to watching the security monitors.

The offices of The Barry Goldman Agency are of minimalist design, the waiting area has not a single knick-knack, and the only time it’s decorated is during the holidays when there’s a small tree in the corner and a candle in the window. Barbie walks past the front desk with a warm smile for receptionist Jane, who never smiles back and rarely even acknowledges her. Down the narrow hallway, one side overlooks the city and the other side is a row of offices. Barbie stops at Stacey’s office to say hi, but she’s not in yet, so Barbie goes to her own office two doors down.

An hour later, Barbie is so absorbed in her work that she doesn’t see Stacey standing in the doorway. Stacey watches her work-friend with amusement because Barbie is typically smiling or laughing; but when she’s working like this, her serious face is almost cute. Stacey has never seen Barbie mad, and since Stacey is mad all the time, she likes to see others get mad too. Out of curiosity, she’d like to see Barbie lose control a little, but for the life of her, she can’t seem to find the right trigger that will set Barbie off.

Stacey says, “Boo!” in an attempt for a jump scare. However, Barbie is used to Stacey’s ways and has been aware of her presence even before the Boo. Barbie puts a bookmark in her work and gives Stacey her full attention. With a big smile Barbie says, “Good Morning! I’m just working on my presentation for tomorrow. What do you have going on?”

Stacey raises her chin and says, “I’m working on a project for Barry, he needs research done for the shareholders meeting, and he trusts me to do it for him.” Stacey waits for a hint of jealousy that she gets to work on a project for the boss.

Barbie’s expression is unwavering. She says, “Wow! You’re so lucky to work on that for him. Maybe you’ll even get to sit in for the meeting.”

Unsatisfied with her friend’s reaction, she changes the subject. “Would you like to go to lunch today? It’s a nice day, we can go to The Sandwich Shoppe and sit outside and make fun of the people walking by.”

Barbie laughs and says, “Let’s do it next week, I’m pretty tied up with the prep work for this presentation.”

“Sure thing.” Stacey gives a wink and points a finger gun at Barbie and makes a clicking sound. She walks to the end of the hallway and looks to the left, where there are more offices, and then walks into the breakroom where Walt and Bree are sitting at the table and sipping tea. Stacey sighs and says, “That girl just doesn’t know her head from a hole in the ground.”

Walt says, “Must be talking about Barbie again.” Bree laughs and stirs sugar into her cup. They enjoy their daily gossip sessions, it seems like harmless fun.

***

Today is the day of Barbie’s presentation with Sam. She’s looking forward to meeting him, not just in hopes to win him over as a client, but because she admires his career goals and wants to know him better. She feels prepared, but wants to have one more practice of her presentation before she meets him. Their meeting is at ten a.m., so she arrives to work early.

She walks in the front door, past the empty reception desk and down the hallway, appreciating the silence before the workday begins. She walks into her office, flips on the light and hears a POP! She feels a slight gust of air and closes her eyes, when she opens them again, all she sees is glitter. She looks around to see what might go off next, but then she sees the single, small, open box on her desk and realizes that it must be a glitter bomb.

She rushes to the bathroom, sets her glitter covered purse on the counter and stares at her reflection. To hold back tears, she forces a smile. She doesn’t have time to go home and change, and rescheduling is not an option, so she dusts herself off as best as she can, then she dusts her purse and walks out of the bathroom.

By now coworkers have started showing up and have followed the path of glitter to the bathroom, where people are standing around to see her reaction. She smiles and walks past them. Stacey says, “Barbie, you’re sparkling!” and others join in to laugh. Barbie laughs too. Her intuition tells her that whoever did this wanted to see her blow her meeting with Sam, but Barbie is not going to let that happen. She is good at improvising and that’s what she will do. Instead of returning to her office, she walks straight to the conference room.

***

Jane leads Sam to the conference room and offers him water or coffee, but he declines. She lingers in the doorway until Barbie says, “Hi, Sam, it’s nice to meet you.” They shake hands, he gives her a quick look up and down and furrows his brows in confusion. She glances down and says, “Oh, sorry about the glitter, someone in accounting has a birthday today, and you know how everyone gets over excited about a break for cake!”

He nods and says, “Oh yeah, been there. Before I started my gym I worked in an office.” He runs his fingers through his thick, chestnut brown hair and smiles at her.

She offers him a seat at the table and asks him more about what he did before he built his business and why he chose a gym. He tells her about how he grew up with a single mom and not a lot of money, so for something to do he enjoyed physical fitness and when he was old enough, he started working out. He credits his dedication to health and fitness for his success, and he wants to help others succeed by franchising his gym and sharing his success plan.

“That sounds great,” she says. “I like your work philosophy and I have some ideas as to how we can give your business a boost to really attract potential franchisees.”

He looks at her as if they were longtime friends and says, “That’s exactly what I need. I’ve taken my company as far as I can and now I need to give back and help others. Together we can achieve more.”

She couldn’t help noticing that he doesn’t wear a wedding ring and never mentioned a girlfriend. She pushes personal thoughts out of her mind and finishes her presentation, and then she reviews the contract with him. He signs it and she senses a wave of positive energy rush through her. When he looks at her again, he almost looks like he’s going to kiss her. She leans back a little to avoid an awkward moment. She watches him; he is dazzling, and she is covered in glitter.

He says, “Thank you, Barbie. It’s very nice to meet you and I’m excited about your advertising campaign.” He stands up and pushes his chair in and she does the same.

***

In the afternoon, she gets an email from Sam inviting her to dinner at The Grill and asks her to meet him there at eight. It’s not from his usual email address but he says it’s his personal email. Despite the long day and glitter, she says yes. She has just enough time to drive home, take a quick shower, put on something non-sparkly, and hurry out the door to meet up with him.

She tells the hostess that she’s meeting someone, and the hostess takes her to a table for two. Barbie takes a seat, and checks her phone for notifications, nothing from Sam. The waiter arrives and Barbie orders ice water.

From the little office behind the kitchen, Stacey watches Barbie on a monitor. Stacey’s uncle owns The Grill and agreed to the set-up, because she wasn’t going to leave him alone unless he agreed, so he gave in.

From the monitor, Stacey could see how uncomfortable Barbie is while waiting for her date with Sam. She wonders how long Barbie will sit there before she calls or texts him to find out where he is. Or maybe she will just get up and leave. With any luck, Barbie will make a scene and cry…now that would be fun! Stacey wishes she had some popcorn.

Thoughts of snacks popped out of her head when she saw him walk in and take a seat at the table with Barbie. It wasn’t Sam; it was someone that Stacey didn’t know. It looks like Barbie knows him, and they appear to be arguing. Stacey scoots up as close to the monitor as she can, but the picture isn’t clear enough. She decides to peek into the dining room and see if she recognizes the mystery man at the table.

From behind the door to the kitchen, Stacey peers out and sees that the fight has escalated. She doesn’t think she’s ever seen Barbie look so mad; her face and neck are turning bright red. Stacey laughs, and then decides she’s seen enough and she’s ready to go out there and find out who this guy is. Before she can make it out the door, a waitress walks by with a large tray of food and Stacey has to move out of the way. By the time she’s able to walk into the dining room, Barbie and the guy aren’t at the table anymore, they’re walking out the door.

Stacey rushes after them. Once she gets out to the street, she almost loses sight of them. They’re walking fast, and he’s pulling her along by the arm. Stacey runs to catch up with them and says, “Hey! Where are you taking my friend?”

Mystery guy and Barbie turns to look at Stacey. She sees tears streaming down Barbie’s cheeks, and it’s not as much fun as Stacey thought it would be. Instead, she feels protective of Barbie and turns her attention to the mystery guy. He’s tall with dirty blonde hair, hazy eyes gray, and a dingy t-shirt. He says, “Mind your own beeswax, lady.”

Stacey steps between him and Barbie and says, “She is my business! Why don’t you find someone else to bother.” He smirks at her and reaches for Barbie. Stacey pushes his hand away from her and his expression turns to a scowl.

A far-off voice calls to them, “Everything OK over there?” Stacey looks to see a police officer fast-pace walking toward them. She turns back to see Barbie wiping her tears and regaining her composure.

Mystery guy takes a step back and holds his hands up for a second, and then drops them in an attempt to act casual. “Yeah, everything’s fine. I was just leaving.”

The officer says, “See to it then,” and watches the troublemaker turn and walk away. Then the officer looks at Stacey and Barbie and says, “You two doing alright?”

They nod in unison and Barbie says, “We’re fine, sir. We just had a disagreement, it’s over. Thank you,” she smiles at him.

He’s close enough to get a good look at them and see that they’re OK, and the guy who was arguing with them is out of sight. The officer decides there’s no problem here, and says, “Have a nice evening, ladies,” and then walks away.

Stacey turns to Barbie and asks the question she’s been dying to know the answer to, “Who was that guy?”

Barbie, who has miraculously bounced back to her pretty, perfect-self, waves it off and says, “He’s just an ex-boyfriend who comes around when he needs money.”

“Ah,” Stacey says, like that brief explanation was enough to solve everything, but really it just left her with more questions. She’s always thought of Barbie as a shallow person, but maybe there’s more to her than what she shows most people. With the thought that she’s seen this side of Barbie that most people never get to see, Stacey grins and vows to keep everything that happened tonight a secret between friends.

At work, they don’t talk about it, but Barbie can feel a bond with Stacey that was unexpected. By the end of last night, Barbie figured out that Stacey sent the email pretending to be Sam, and that’s why she just happened to be at the restaurant. Just knowing that was enough, Barbie decides not to confront Stacey, and intends to pretend it never happened.

The next day at work, Barbie takes a break and checks her notifications and sees that Sam sent her an email. She opens it and notices right away that it’s from an email address that she recognizes, so with relief and excitement, she reads his words. He asks her to meet him for dinner to discuss a few promo ideas. She replies that she’s happy to meet with him. Now she can’t stop thinking about him and what their life could be like together. She doesn’t want to get her hopes up, but then again, she is Barbie.