Buying the Clothes off Your Back

For secret Santa, one of my (now ex) coworkers Marina knitted me a neck warmer. We had a delightful little interchange where she knitted it right in front of me without my knowledge and then fretted when I said I didn't want just another scarf for secret Santa. It's beautiful, the perfect shade of green to bring out my eyes, with little brass buttons for show, it's one of my favorite articles of clothing. It was also incidentally the first piece Marina ever gave away, which makes it even more special. I receive a lot of compliments when I wear it, because sometimes you find something that just conveys essence of you, like your personality distilled into clothing or accessories and people can't help but notice.

So wearing it at STORE one day, a lady compliments me on it. I smile and thank her and gesture back towards Marina. "She actually made it for me." The lady exclaims and comes forward to examine it. I feel like she's sizing up my neck in order to study how best to rip it out, but I stand still and let her, She says, "may I?" and without waiting for permission touches my neck warmer to feel the fabric. I'm itchy with the need to flee this situation, since this lady is right in my face. Not only that, but I'm very possessive of my things, I don't like the idea of her hand oils over my lovely new neck warmer, but I can't growl at her to step back while on the sales floor. She nods absently to herself, and another coworker pipes in that Marina sells them. I had been about to announce it was the first piece she gave away, and unique, and shut my mouth quickly. Marina nods frantically and the lady says, "Well, I wouldn't want green, but charcoal gray would be nice. I'll take her number or a card if she has them. Of course I'd really want to try yours on first." I ignore that comment and go to write down Marina's number while she haggles with the woman over price.

I hand her the number and she says, "Okay, now I'll try yours on." I can't vocalize the reasons why I hate that idea, because none of them sound very logical. Foremost is this woman's unshakeable faith that she can just buy the very clothes off my back. Second to that is my possessiveness and the intimate nature of the neck warmer. It sits right around an area that is very private, and vulnerable,  and it keeps it safe, and warm. Taking it off and letting this strange bossy woman try it on makes my nerves grate. But I can see that Marina is excited by the idea of making a sale of her own, and I can't explain why this feels so horrible, so I go with the lady over to a little mirror we keep and pull the neck warmer over my head and hand it to her. She stretches it over her own head and it obviously a little disappointed that it doesn't look as good on her as it did on me. I'd like to explain that the reason it looked good was that it's an extension of me, that it connects to me on a level it will never connect with her. But I don't, because then I'd be a crazy, so instead I just hold up the little mirror until she says that one in gray would look better on her and hands mine back to me. I can almost feel it readjusting to me as I put it back on, wondering why I let a stranger handle it, and I croon reassurances at it.

Shh, baby, I'm here now