He blew out some air and grinned. “Yeah, I suppose you’re right about that. You look good. Happy.”
“Thanks,” she replied with a small but warm smile.
“I . . . I hope we really can still be friends. Someday. Whatever that means,” Harry said nervously.
Instead of replying, Cierra held up her beer. “We had a good six years.”
“Yeah, we did.”
They clinked their brown bottles.
And then Melanie came over.
So that’s the new woman,Cierra thought.Of course.
Melanie had always been around. They had known each other for years but never clicked as friends. It didn’t surprise Cierra that she was involved with Harry, but it disturbed her to think that Melanie was preferable to her in Harry’s eyes. Now that they were in demonic three-way small talk, there was no choice but to play nice.
“What are we toasting to?” Melanie said in her raspy voice. Melanie gently but possessively placed a hand on Harry’s back, and all Cierra’s previous feelings of closure flew out the window; they were replaced by an irrational, white-hot rage.
“Amber’s birthday,” Harry said quickly.
“Hi, Melanie, how are you?” Cierra forced through a plastic smile.
Melanie swung her shiny jet-black hair to one side, showing her many perfectly curated necklaces, which all seamlessly went together and were definitely solid gold. “Good, thanks. Yourself?”
“Great.” A few seconds passed, each person grinning like a captive. “You’re a lawyer, right?”
“Yep, still at Waltz & Renner. God, can’t believe it’s almost been five years already.”
“She’s on track to make partner,” Harry interjected, like a reflex.
“That’s . . . incredible. Congrats,” Cierra said and took another swig of her beer. “What kind of law do you practice again?”
“She’ll be the youngest female partner the firm has ever had.” At this unnecessary outburst, both women swapped looks of confusion before Melanie steered the conversation back to Cierra’s question.
“I specialize in tax accounting, so, if you ever need anyone, let me know.” She did a little wink that made Cierra want to crawl out her skin. “And you have a new job, right?”
So, this was what Harry wanted? Cierra couldn’t stop comparing herself to this corporate Barbie. She definitely made more money than Cierra, and she was observably in better shape.
“By the way, your video popped up on my feed yesterday, and it wassocute. Consider me influenced.”
This was too much. Cierra tried looking for Mia to save her, but she was nowhere to be found.
“Oh, thanks. Yeah, just trying something new.” She placed her half-finished beer on the sticky bar. “Sorry, would you excuse me? Need to use the restroom.”
“Of course. Nice seeing you, Cierra,” Melanie said with a curt smile. Harry nodded. Before she was even ten feet away, Cierraoverheard a hushed, raspy voice say, “God, she really is all over the place. I mean, reels and TikToks? Are you serious?”
With tears welling in her eyes, Cierra booked it to the ladies’ room. On the way, she finally spotted Mia, who was arguing about shoe sizes with an unfortunate staff member. Cierra yanked on her friend’s elbow, dragging her away.
“Ow!” Mia yelped, pulling her arm back.
“Where the fuck were you?!” Cierra hissed.
“I was watching the whole thing, but it looked like you had it covered. Why was Melan—” She paused. “Ohhh . . .”
“Yeah.”
Once the duo reached the bathroom, Mia checked for feet under the stalls.
