The swimsuits at Costco are displayed on transparent plastic woman-shaped half-mannequins. That way you can see what the swimsuit looks like on a physical form -- better than a hanger that way. (More awkward to manage in the store when you're trying to find your size whilst sorting through a huge pile of womanly-shaped mannequins on a big Costco-sized table, but that's a different story.)
When you buy the swimsuit, they don't care about getting the half-mannequin thingy back.
But it's also not something you necessarily want to lug around either. So when I got home, the half-mannequin thingy was promptly left in the back seat of my car. Where I forgot about it.
Until the next morning.
I was giving my friend Lisa's seven year-old son a ride to school. He usually does things on his own timetable anyway, but he seemed to be taking a long time, even for him, to climb into the back-seat.
"Come on, (Boy)," I urged, wondering what the delay was. Then I turned around to look at him. He had one leg half in the car and was staring perplexedly at ... something. I twisted around to see what was distracting him, and saw... HER. My swimsuit mannequin. Complete with womanly curves. And...well, invisible, really. I can only imagine what it looked like from his point of view. And what he was thinking. "Why does Auntie Laura have an invisible woman complete with boobies in her car?" is the unedited internal dialog I imagine him having with himself.
I laughed awkwardly, trying to cover up my embarrassment. "Oh, ha ha. I bought a swimsuit and this is what it came on. Isn't that silly? ha ha." Then grabbed the invisible woman and stuffed it onto the floor in the front seat next to me.
After I dropped him off, I went back to Lisa's house to show her the mannequin and tell her about her son's reaction to seeing it. Then said, "You're welcome," 'cause let's face it. Who doesn't want their best friend teaching their son about nekkid invisible woman?
