“I want another margarita,” Andy said without hesitation.
“Can I get one of those too?”Delilah asked, her voice soft.
“I want a pina colada, can you do that for me?”Taylynn said when the man turned to her.He nodded.Then it was Tania’s turn.
“Margarita for me, but a regular one, not strawberry.”Tania smiled at him until he nodded, turned and left.“Remind me his name again?”she said to Taylynn who sat beside her.
Taylynn glanced toward the bar, where the man had gone after taking their orders, as if she had to double check she had the right face.
“That’s Thorn, why?”Taylynn looked back to her with a frown.
“Nothing important.I’m still trying to remember everyone’s names.I’m not sure I ever heard his.”
“No worries, there are a bunch of us.You’ll get it in time,” Taylynn said, patting her hand.
“I know how you feel.When I got here I was so overwhelmed by everyone.I managed by spending most of my time in the kitchen,” Delilah said.
“You still spend most of your time in the kitchen!”Andy said.
Delilah shrugged.“I’m comfortable in there.The kitchen is my happy place.Well, other than when I can curl up next to Hawkeye with a good book.”She gave them a shy smile.
“I’ll second that,” Taylynn added, “Though not the kitchen, and Raven might get difficult if I was curled up next to Hawkeye.”She glanced at Tania and winked.“So how do we want to do this?”Taylynn looked around the table.
“The way I see it, we have a few options, but let’s go over the ones that make the most sense, at least first.”Andy folded her arms in front of her and leaned on her elbows on the table as she spoke, belying her excitement.“I suggest we each make a list of say twenty books.”
“Twenty each?That’s eight books, it seems like a lot to start with,” Delilah said.
“It is and it isn’t, hear me out.”Andy glanced at Delilah then turned back to Taylynn and Tania.“Like I was saying, twenty books, but we’ll break it up into two groups.One list of ten books you want to read, the other is a list of ten of your favorite books.”She paused and looked around the table, when no one said anything, she continued.
“Then we take the lists and consolidate them.We can take any books on more than one list and move them to the top of the list, making those the ones we want to read first.After that, it’s a list we can vote on to choose what we read next.”
“We can do that,” Taylynn said.
“It doesn’t seem like so many when you put it that way.”
“Of course, the list is always organic.It grows and shrinks as we read things on it and add more, but it gives us somewhere to start.”
“But how often do we meet?Do we have to read the whole book between meetings?How will this work?”
Thorn appeared with their drinks.He passed them to each of the women, asked if they needed anything else, then left.,
“However we want it to.”Andy waited until after Thorn had gone to continue.“A lot of book clubs meet once a month, and we can do that, but the guys meet at least once a week.We can start with that and meet while they’re in church.We don’t have to have a new book every week but it gives us an excuse to get together and bull shit.Since right now we just have the four of us, does anyone have any friends they’d like to invite?If we have someone not living here as part of the group it will be more real and less like we’re lushes, looking for any excuse to drink.”
Tania shrugged.“I’m good with whatever.I don’t think I’ll be going anywhere any time soon.After today, I figure I’ll be lucky to do anything by myself for the next, I don’t know, fifteen years.Oh, and unless I can find a babysitter, I’ll be bringing Carter with me to meetings, if that’s okay.”
“That’s fine, at least until he’s old enough to understand what we’re talking about.Then we might have to set one of the prospects on babysitting duty,” Taylynn said with a wave of her hand, but we have a while before we have to worry about that.But thinking of, we should probably consider setting up something in here to be a kid-friendly space.Sooner rather than later would be best.”She smoothed one hand over her belly.
“You’re pregnant?”Delilah asked, wide eyed.
Taylynn nodded, barely holding back a grin.“I just hit the second trimester and we decided to tell everyone.”She turned pink.“I didn’t tell Raven I was going to tell you tonight.”
“But you’re drinking.”Delilah said with a frown.
“It’s virgin, here try it.”Taylynn pushed her glass across the table.Delilah took a sip.
“Oh.That’s good.What is it exactly?I mean I know you called it a piña colada, but what does that mean?”
“It’s coconut and pineapple.”
