“About what?” Delilah said innocently.
“Babe,” Claire said, a cute little whine to her voice.
“Hello?” Iris shouted from the bedroom. “Heartbroken best friend in here eagerly awaiting some succor!”
Claire threw one more annoyed look at her girlfriend before all but stomping off toward Iris’s room. Delilah waggled her eyebrows at Astrid.
“I see you took that dream to reality level,” she said.
Astrid finished cleaning off her mouth, which now had a definite rashy look to it. “I thought you weren’t going to say a word.”
“I changed my mind.”
Astrid shook her head, but felt it coming... the smile.
“Uh-huh, there it is,” Delilah said.
“Oh, shut up.” Astrid balled up the stained paper towel and threw it at her stepsister, which Delilah deftly dodged, even with her hands full.
“At least tell me it was good,” she said.
The smile spread into a grin. Jesus, her cheeks were starting to get sore. “So good.”
“Oh my god!” Iris yelled again.
“Coming, my queen!” Delilah yelled back, then ticked her head toward the hall.
Astrid nodded, following her stepsister into Iris’s room to find their redheaded best friend in bed and surrounded by a million balled-up tissues, her colorful mosaic-patterned quilt tucked around her, eyes red and puffy. What appeared to be an empty bottle of wine sat on her mint-green bedside table, no glass in sight, which wasn’t a good sign.
“I’m wallowing,” she announced as Delilah and Astrid entered the room. Claire was already settled on one side of Iris, so Astrid lay down on the other.
“I can see that,” Astrid said, resting her head against one of Iris’s many multicolored pillows and wrapping one arm around her friend’s waist.
Iris sighed, sniffled, fresh tears welling in her eyes. Delilah cleaned up Iris’s snot-rags, set the new box of tissues on Iris’s legs, and replaced the empty wine bottle with the glass of water.
“That better be vodka,” Iris said.
“You need to hydrate,” Delilah said.
“Ugh, fine,” Iris said, but took the glass of water and gulped down half.
Finally, Delilah settled on the bed at Iris’s feet, resting one hand on her shins. Claire wrapped her arm around Iris’s waist too, her fingertips brushing Astrid’s elbow. Astrid met her eyes over Iris’s body and winked. Claire smiled back.
They sat like that for a while, nothing but the sound of breathing and Iris’s occasional sniffles filling the room.
“What happened, honey?” Claire finally asked.
Iris sighed, brushed a red strand from her face. She opened her mouth, closed it, and repeated this little dance several times. The other three women glanced at each other—Iris Kelly rarely had a hard time knowing exactly what she wanted to say.
“Sweetie,” Claire said softly. “It’s us. Whatever it is...”
She trailed off and Iris nodded, then dropped her face into her hands. “I just feel so stupid.”
“You’re not stupid. Jillian is stupid,” Delilah said.
Iris released a watery laugh. “You don’t even know what she did.”
“Whatever it was, it’s caused you to go all angsty-teen-dealing-with-her-first-breakup, so she’s stupid.”
