"Jazmine, how do you like your Secret Wishes Star Trek Classic Deluxe Red Minidress?" Dear Amazon, Thank you for asking. I like it fine. Except for the fact that it doesn’t fit quite as snugly as you’d think a dress from a company called Secret Wishes would fit, and consequently I find myself standing in front of a dry-cleaners mirror in a Star Trek mini-dress on the second-to-last day of the year, having alterations made. As always, the drycleaner is discreet and doesn’t bat an eye, and I find myself marveling a little about the matter-of-fact-ness of this process, or maybe it was just something that’s supposed to be so sexy happening in such very fluorescent lighting at 3:07 PM. I manage to navigate that out-of-body-experience, and decide to take it a step further and also purchase vintage lingerie to further flesh out this fantasy of the first nice man I’ve dated in my life. Garters and waist cinchers and corsets and silk stockings at a boutique that specializes in just this sort of thing, amounting to a total that makes my unemployed blood run cold, but I convinces myself these things will be reused. And yes, I note that it does feel a little strange to be putting dollars and cents toward this fetish, but he was so demure and sheepish in revealing this hidden wish to me in a sideways way before the loveliest Christmas Eve spent together that I was almost flattered, empowered to oblige it. But I have also been aware that I might lose some power if I granted this wish too readily. And I can sense that things have grown oddly quiet after Christmas, though he assures me everything is fine. So I wonder if, when I see him, it will be the right moment to enact for what I have all parts assembled. Yet…there’s an urgency I can’t quite pinpoint to this. Maybe it’s simply eagerness, but I want to see this thing come together, sooner rather than later. So I decide on a compromise—I will wear the lingerie under another dress and carry the crayon-red minidress in my purse. I’ll feel it out in the moment, and be ready in a flash if need be. But I never wear the dress. Instead I find myself being broken up with in my favorite diner under yet another brand of fluorescents, wearing $207.85 of vintage lingerie under one dress, with the uniform of the Starship Enterprise crumpled, unused in my purse, while he tells me that he’s pursuing another final frontier entirely—he’s going to have a baby with his last girlfriend. I was able to return the lingerie the next day to a very empathetic salesclerk who noted my likely tearstained face and encouraged me that I’d be back again for a happier occasion. I decided to take this as prophecy. So in answer to your question, Amazon—I like it fine. I have no idea when I will wear this absurd garment in public, but it will no longer be for anyone’s secret wish, but for myself. I will boldly go where no man has gone before—forward. Sincerely, Jazmine
