She nods.“It was on his profile.”
“That doesn’t even make sense.What does he mean?”
“I guess I’ll find out tonight.”Avocado drips dangerously close to her eye.
“You’re really going out tonight?You said last night was a disaster.Maybe take a break in between, for your sanity,” I suggest.
She shrugs, then touches her face gingerly.“Almost dry.”
“You could just …eatan avocado.I’m sure the nutrients will get into your body that way.”
“I could but this way it goes straight into the skin and works it magic directly.”
“I see.”
“How was your day?”she asks, cheerily.
My stomach tenses.I’d rather not talk about it.I haven’t told her about my past, that I was a housekeeper’s daughter on a billionaire’s sprawling estate.I also haven’t mentioned anything about the Stella VIP event, so I don’t know how to casually bring the subject of Zach up.
“Why don’t you tell me about your date last night?”I deflect.Pretty soon I’m going to need to diarize Fleur’s dating events just so I can keep up with them.She’s currently seeing a few guys every month.First dates, all of them, and she always comes back disillusioned.
She groans.“I don’t even know where to start.”
“Start at the beginning.”
“Okay, but first, I don’t have long before I rinse this off.Can you help me pick between the black dress and the green one?”She wanders into her bedroom.I follow, then lean against the doorframe as she takes both dresses out.
She holds them both up.“Which one?”
I point to the green one.“It makes you look slightly wild and dangerous.”
“Cool.I want him slightly afraid.”
I chortle.She must be such a hoot on her dates.So cute and funny and unique.She’d be an amazing catch for the right guy.It’s heartbreaking what she’s having to sift through.
“Last night?”I prompt, as she slides the black dress back into her closet and lays the green one on the bed.
She rolls her eyes.“The guy wanted me to come home with him, otherwise he wasn’t going to pay the bill.”
My eyebrows raise.“You’re joking.”
“That’s what he said.”
“I’m shocked and disgusted.”
“See what I mean?No way was I going to go home with him.I can afford to settle my share of the bill, for goodness sake!”
“What do these men want?”I am horrified.And glad that I’m single and so focused on my career, although that isn’t really going anywhere at the moment.
“We know what they want,” she says matter-of-factly, rummaging through her makeup bag.“But I have principles, and besides, he wasn’t all that.He had jowls.”
I laugh.“Jowls are not a crime.”
“They are when they’re combined with entitlement.Stupid prick,” she snaps.“He said he was a brutally honest person.”
I laugh at the absurdity of it.Of him, and that he found it normal to talk to my friend the way he did.“A loser like that is not worth your time.”
“I know!So I left.Paid for my half of the bill and got the hell out of there.I walked home.Ate a whole bar of chocolate, cried for a bit—”
