Dear Girls Above Me: Inspired by a True Story by Charles Mcdowell Read Free Book Online Page B

friends as “sisters.” I don’t go around telling people that the guy who makes my coffee every morning at Starbucks is my brother. And I guarantee that Alejandro and I have a much tighter bond than these girls could ever have.
    Over the course of the next few minutes I was catching glimpses of the girls I’d been overhearing every night. For example, hints of their vocal fry (a way of talking in the lowest vocal register, making the words sound like a creaky vibration; think Kardashian-speak). As well as the unintended “ah” after a word. Such as “Thank you-ah.” Or “Nooo-ah.” This way of talking would sneak its way into the flow of the conversation like Anthony Hopkins’s British accent whenever he plays an American. Also, at one point, Claire wondered if some businesses were closed on 4/20. There were the girls I knew. They popped out from time to time.
    I became so enamored that I forgot to even mention what I was doing there in the first place. It was evident that they just assumed I was a new neighbor introducing myself to the tenants. My God, do people actually do that? Sounds exhausting. Anyway, I was debating bringing up the noise complaint when one of their “sisters” looked over at Claire and said, “You think Charlie would wanna play?” I was just hoping it wasn’t another round of FMK, or in their case, FFF.
    “Oh my God, do you want to play the texting game with us?” Claire blurted out.
    “Umm, I’m not familiar with that game,” I regrettably said out loud.
    They began explaining it to me, as if I were five years old. The idea was one of them would come up with a random text message for me to send out. It could really be anything, but their example to me was, “Ugh, I want a baby!” I would then start scrolling through my cell phone contacts, until someone yelled “stop.” I would then have to send that text message to whomever I landed on. The girls admitted to me they had been routinely playing this game since college and that “It’s literally the best game since Alex Trebek invented Wheel of Fortune! ” I could think of at least fifty games off the top of my head that were better than this one. Like Jeopardy! , for example. But if there’s anything I learned from growing up with three sisters, it’s that you never argue with a pack of girls. With one girl, you might win an argument every so often, but you shouldn’t expect favorable results. With two girls, chances are very slim. Only a few men have ever pulled that off. With three girls, forget about it. Zero chance. I don’t care how slick or good-looking you are, no man has pulled off a dispute against three or more women. No matter what, the women are right.
    Cathy and Claire begged me to play. Perhaps I said yes because I was severely outnumbered, but before I knew it, my cell phone was out. I also realized another problem that might occur: The more I bonded with these two, the harder it would become to discuss the noise issue.
    “Okay, here’s your text message. Are you ready?” Claire asked.
    I thought about quickly deleting a few numbers from my contacts list, but I didn’t want to get penalized before I even started. So I anxiously nodded.
    “You have to text … ‘I’m stuck on the toilet; can you bring me some toilet paper?’ ” All the girls erupted in giddy laughter. If theythought I was going to send that text message to any of the people in my contact list, they were bat-shit crazy.
    “I can’t send that out. I have many colleagues’ numbers in my phone,” I informed them.
    “Colleagues? What are you, friends with my dad or something?” I did not believe I was friends with their dad. Also, it’s hard to have colleagues when you’re unemployed, but I was grasping at straws.
    “You have to send the text! That’s the game!” The game? That’s not a game. Pictionary, Taboo, Scrabble, Words with Friends—these are games. But I knew I wasn’t going anywhere until I sent out that text