Finally, an opening to turn this conversation around. “More likemisadventures. Have you ever had a guy make you cum with nothing but a car speaker? The other day, we—”
Flush…
Oh shit.
There was someone else in the bathroom.
And they’d just heard about me and Hudson.
My stomach washed away with that flush. Every neuron in my body vibrated until I was sure they would pull me apart.
Then the door to stall three opened. Addie stepped out, jaw fully dropped.
“You’re having sex with the new guy? Like, that wasn’t Jared just pulling stuff out of his ass back at the bar a few weeks ago? You’reactuallyhaving sex with him?”
He’d been working here for a while, sonew guyseemed like an ungenerous characterization of him. Still…
“We weren’t having sex then.”
“And now?”
“I’m not…nothaving sex with him” was my brilliant reply.
For a split second, I worried that Addie was going to take this news badly. As it turned out, I was right, but not for the reasons I suspected.
“You told the new girl before me?”
She was jealous. Addie wasjealous. It took me back to the drinks night at Josie’s; she’d been trying to befriend me then, and I’d shut her out.
“I wasn’t going to tell anyone,” I said by way of defense. “She guessed.”
“I’m extremely perceptive,” Leelah said. “Which is how I know that you’resuperstoked to be in on the secret now.”
Addie practically vibrated, her eyes lighting up. Apparently, being second to know wasn’t so bad when the possibility of friendship was on the table. “Are you kidding me? I’mdyingfor some girl talk. For all everyone talks about this being girlie central, there’s an awful lot of testosterone swimming around in the office pool. Is this it? Am I in the inner circle now? Can we please go full girl gang on this bitch?Sex and the Cityvibes?”
I’d forgotten how exuberant Addie could be. Once upon a time, I found that rattling. Now, endearing. She just wanted to belong.
“As much as there is an inner circle, sure,” I said with a smirk.
“Fuckin’ A. Now, how are we going to celebrate our female empowerment era? Do either of you like weed brownies? I made some today, but we can go to my place and make some more soon. You all could make treats, too. We could have abake-off.”
Neither of us had any experience with canna-baking, so we declined the bake-off invite, but as we returned to the office, we fell into an easy rapport.
By the time Hudson and I linked up after work for cocktails at a cute bar far from the office, I was practically glowing. I’d done something right. I’d beendoingthings right and people were noticing. Maybe I wasn’t such a failure. Maybe Icouldhandle letting go a bit.
Hudson, on the other hand, didn’t pass the vibe check. He did his best to chitchat at all the right places, even touching my knee below the bar and whispering about thefurther studyhewanted to do in my toy drawer tonight, but it all came out perfunctory, like his mind was elsewhere.
“What’s going on in that brain of yours?” I finally asked. “You’re like an electron caught in a direct-current circuit.”
“Hm?”
“You’re sluggish. Your energy’s zapped. Are you okay?”
For the last ten minutes, I’d been trying to figure out whatI’ddone to upset him. Usually when people got this way around me, I was the culprit of their emotional sabotage.
“I’m still thinking about our all-hands today,” he said, swirling the cherry-pink dregs of his piña colada. “Do you really think that marketing approach is the smartest thing?”
“It does seem like a solid strategy. People don’t believe companies. They believe other people. And in the end, I think Terrence was right. Most consumers don’t buy a product based on what it can do but how they think it will make them feel.”
