Chapter Six: A Whiter Shade of Pale

Edie sat on her bed with her quilt wrapped around her shoulders. She glanced down at her floor. It was littered with empty pill containers and records. Her posters of people she admired were falling and her clothes were pushed into a messy pile in the corner of her room. She stared at her reflection in her ornate mirror. Her blonde hair was messy and greasy. Her face was a sickly shade of white and she had black bags underneath her bloodshot eyes. A tear rolled down her cheek as she looked at this broken woman in the mirror. A soft knock came on the door. It slowly opened to reveal Rose, her eyes full of worry and sympathy.
"Are you okay, darling?" she asked.
"I'm fine" sniffled Edie.
She got up out of the room, her quilt trailing along behind her. She went into the kitchen where she found Frida. She had returned, early morning, from her date.
"Good morning" she said, wolfing down a bowl of something.
"Meh", grunted Edie in reply.
Edie leaned over to see what Frida was eating. It was fruit loops with wine instead of milk. Edie sat down beside her and poured herself a bowl of wine loops.
"Look, Edie, I have something I have to tell you. It's pretty important, I think, I don't know" slurred Frida.
"Uhuh, what is it?" replied Edie, slurping her cereal through a straw.
"Well... the thing is... I'm late."
"For what?"
"My period, stupid!"
Edie choked on her wine loops, spitting out rainbow blobs all over the table.
"Oh that is GROSS!" exclaimed Frida, trying to get out of her chair.
"What's going on?" said Rose, storming into the kitchen.
"Frida is late!" chocked Edie.
Rose's hand flew up to her mouth and gasped loudly as if Frida had killed the Queen.
"You could have a baby in you! And you're DRINKING!!!" she screamed.
"I doubt it," said Frida "Max said..."
Frida paused. The whole room was hanging on her words.
"Oh shit..." She fell back onto her chair and her mouth formed a perfect circle.
"Have you told the Stig?" Edie said, her eyes as wide as saucers.
"No... of course not. I'll, um, I'll tell him when we go out next."
"When's that?" asked Rose, wiping up Edie's chewed up pieces of cereal with a cloth.
"Um, today I think. For lunch. At this cafe" replied Frida, fixing up her hair.
"When?"
"In like twenty minutes" she said calmly before she realised what she said.
"TWENTY MINUTES!" She jumped out of her chair and ran out of the room. She rummaged through her piles of clothes scattered around her room until she pulled out a yellow sundress from beneath a sweater. She pulled it on and grabbed the first shoes she could lay her hands on. A pair of red sneakers. She brushed her hair and ran out of her room.

Dean was sitting in the lounge room, still trying to finish his video game. He furrowed his eyebrows in frustration and threw the controller across the couch.
"What do you want?" he sighed.
"Um, darling, could you maybe give me a lift?"
"To where?"
"This cafe, near the city"
"But that's-"
"Please" she asked, fluttering her eyelashes and opening her brown eyes as wide as they would go.
"Oh, alright. But only cause I'm sick of this game."

Dean's rusty ute coughed it's way to the cafe and Frida eventually got there. Thirty minutes late. She rushed into the cafe where the Stig was waiting at a table, looking impatient. She nervously stepped up to the table. The Stig looked her up and down and raised an eyebrow.
"Nice shoes" he said sarcasticly.
"What? I love these shoes!" Frida smiled.
She sat down and looked around the cafe. People were coming in and out the front doors and there were people, mostly couples, huddled around little tables. At the back of the cafe there was a makeshift stage where a guy with black hair was playing guitar.
"I'm so glad we could do this" said Frida, looking up at the Stig, trying to catch his eyes. the Stig was looking behind Frida, as if he was looking for someone. His eyes lit up and Frida turned around. Coming in through the door was a tall, tanned blonde girl wearing a cocktail dress. The Stig got up and and kissed her. He pulled up another chair and she sat down.
"Frida," he said turning to face Frida," This is my girlfriend."
As The Stig said that last sentnce, Frida's world shattered. Every thought in her mind was gone except for one.
He has a girlfriend.
Her scene melted around her and she filled with rage. She got up and threw her glass on the ground where it shattered. The whole cafe turned to stare at her. The guitarist at the back looked up from his chords and coughed. The Stig looked up from his girlfriend and saw Frida staring down at him, her nostrils flaring and her eyebrows furrowed so they pointed directly to the ground.
"Baby, calm down-""
"Don't tell me to calm down! And I'm not your baby!"
"Well, why don't you just sit-"
"No, I'm not going to sit the fuck down, you two-timing bastard! Yeah, well guess what! I'm late and if I am pregnant, you'd be a terrible father!"
The Stig fell silent. Frida paused her yelling. The cafe had since turned into her audience. Her chest was heaving up and down.
"I'm going..." she mumbled, her eyes filling up with tears. She ran out of the resturant and onto the road, dodging the oncoming traffic where she broke down on the sidewalk.

* * *

Frida sat on Edie's bed. Edie came and sat down beside her. She wrapped a thick quilt around Frida's shoulders. Edie picked up a pill container and shook it. To her dismay it was empty. She threw it onto the ground where it joined the others. Frida looked up at Edie's wall. Her posters of superstars were falling and the room was dark and stuffy. Edie pushed some clothes into the corner of her room and crawled into her bed. Frida stared at her reflection in Edie's ornate mirror. Her dark red hair was greasy and messy. Her face was no longer a pleasant shade of honey but a sickening shade of white and she had dark circles around her eyes. A tear trickled down her cheek and she closed her eyes.