Of course, she’s just as athletic as her husband and snatches it out of the air and pops it on her finger. “Give me more, I wanna do E.T. fingers.”
“You’re so strange,” I say . . . but I still fill a cup with olives.
“Oh god.” Vonnie sits next to Charli. “You’re worse than my fucking kids,” she says.
“But you loooove me.” Charli wiggles her olive-covered fingertips in Vonnie’s face, doing what I think is her version of an alien voice.
“I do.” Vonnie stills Charli’s hand and eats one of the olives off her finger.
I stare wide-eyed as Charli feeds Vonnie another fingertip. “You guys are fucking disgusting,” I say.
When I was a kid and I pictured being an adult, this is not what came to mind. Hell, when I turned thirty this wasn’t what I pictured.
“Hmmm,” Vonnie says when she’s finished chewing. “You still haven’t seen Max, have you?”
“Ooooh! That’s why she’s such a grumpfish!” Charli sounds way too excited about my foul mood and turbulent relationship.
“Why don’t you just go over to his house? You have the code to get in, right?” Vonnie asks.
I open my mouth to answer, but Poppy magically appears and beats me to it.
“Max and you are still weird?” Poppy’s hair, which is always glorious, is somehow even more wonderful. She’s not wearing any makeup, but it looks like someone bronzed her skin, and her lips look like they’re swollen from being kissed all morning. Which might be the case, but since she hit the second trimester, they’ve been like this all the time. Her boobs are fucking huge and her bump is tiny and adorable. I already know that if I ever got pregnant, I’d be covered in acne and probably carry in my ass. Poppy looks like a fucking supermodel.
“No, we’re fine.” I shrug and start rearranging glasses that don’t need to be rearranged.
“Shit,” Poppy says. “You only organize when you’re really stressed. It must be bad.”
Ughhhh!
I close my eyes and start to count to ten, taking deep breaths through my nose. This is the downside to having a great group of friends. They notice things about you that you don’t notice about yourself, and it makes it impossible to hide anything from them.
“You know what? You’re right,” Vonnie says before I get to seven. “When we were getting her ready for her date, Aviana threatened to tape her hands together so she’d stop trying to organize the eye shadows.”
“When I was working here, some magazine was doing a feature on HERS, and she spent the night before it was published alphabetizing the files and writing a new manual that included the direction the toilet paper must face.”
“Oh my god! I’m standing right here!” I abandon my deep breathing on my third attempt to count to ten. “First of all, organizing is an extremely healthy way to deal with stress, especially when you have multiple bottles of tequila at your fingertips.”
Upon hearing “fingertips,” Charli starts to wiggle hers at me again.
“Also, nobody here can tell me that toilet paper shouldn’t go over instead of under. That was a perfectly reasonable addition to the manual.”
Poppy ignores me. “She also added that if one of us goes to Fresh for a break, we are required to ask everyone on shift if they need a caffeine pickup as well.”
Dammit. I don’t have an argument for that one. I wrote it and even I know that was batshit crazy. “Fair point.”
I don’t give in often, so Poppy’s face lights up—even more, the glowing bitch—knowing she beat me.
“Okay,” Vonnie says, her voice all business and a stark contrast to Charli, who is loading up her fingers with more olives. “So we watch this game, and when it’s over, we all meet at Brynn’s to come up with a plan on how this should be handled. But no more talking about this here, because there are too many ears and Avi and Jac are going to be here soon and they’re filming.”
“Sounds like a plan,” Charli says.
Poppy nods her head in agreement. “Agreed.”
“You guys want my input?” The snark is heavy in my voice.
“Nope,” Vonnie says. “We’re good.”
I throw a handful of cherries in Poppy’s Shirley Temple and put it in front of her with a little more force than necessary. “Ugh, Lady Mustangs.”
“Bitch, please,” Vonnie says. “Enough of that. You’re a Lady Mustang too.”
“Am not,” I say, but I don’t even convince myself.
“Oh, you so are,” Charli chimes in. “You attend more meetings than me.”
The world around me turns silver as everything explodes into a combustion of crystals and glitter.
“Fuck.” I rest my head on the bar, which is something else I added to the manual on things that were not allowed. “I am.”
“Oh my god! Look at this place! I’m going to have to call a babysitter more often.” Lucy shouts over the noise of HERS. I almost don’t recognize her without her massive diaper bag over her shoulder and a baby strapped to her chest. She reaches us, pulling out the empty seat next to Poppy. “So, what did I miss?”
“Oh, girl.” Vonnie pushes her martini over to Lucy. “If we’re gonna play catch-up, you’re gonna need one of these.”
“Yes!” Lucy punches the air and drains Vonnie’s glass. “The only gossip I ever get is which preschooler picked their nose. I came in an Uber and I’m so ready for this.”
Well, at least that makes one of us.
Thirty-one
Surprising nobody at all, the meeting of the minds at my apartment solved absolutely nothing.
I did, however, discover that Lucy is so much fucking fun, and if I could, I’d get her drunk every day. The pictures she sent me the next day of her with circles under her eyes and children literally climbing on top of her in bed with the caption “Send help” are being printed out so I can frame them in my office.
HERS doesn’t open for another couple of hours, but I got in early to catch up on all the work my sex-addled mind has forgotten about. Even though there are speakers built into the ceiling, I use the wireless speaker I ordered specifically to use while I’m doing paperwork. It’s covered in magenta Swarovski crystals. Was it a waste of money? I mean, who can really say? Can you really put a price on joy?
I blast my playlist—aptly named “Get Shit Done,” which is filled with gangsta rap and Spice Girls . . . it might sound like an odd combination, but it keeps my mind sharp—and get to work.