“God, shut up already.” Lola swats the air in front of Jenny’s face with her hand impatiently. “You’re depressing me.” She turns toward me, then to Ellie.
“Happily married women, please, tell us your tales. Remind us that there are penises—"
“I think it’s actually penii,” I cut her off with my musing.
She looks quizzically up to the strands of lights above us for guidance before turning back to us. “Remind us there are penii that are attached to worthwhile specimen out there. Please. Before I drown myself in the next pitcher of booze the waiter brings us.”
My face stays frozen, mouth pursed, eyes darting to my best friend.
“Don’t look at me,” she says. “I’m not married!”
Lola waves her hand at Ellie, too. “Oh, whatever. Happily together for five years is close e-fucking-nough.” Ellie silently holds up four fingers, correcting her on their timeline. Lola raises a brow in reproof. It’s the same shit, really. “Regale us!” It’s a demand, like a royal to the plebs in the Colosseum for entertainment at any expense.
“I mean…” She looks over at me, both of us like deer in some damn headlights. Or here in Florida, it could just as easily be alligator in the headlights.
“Oh, don’t tell me you’re having problems!” Jenny wails, throwing her head back, staring past the bright yellow umbrella over our table, the patio lights above it and into the watercolor dusk sky above and beyond.
Ellie shrugs. “Notproblems,” she says gingerly. “I just don’t think we have the kind of romance you want to hear about. We’re more…comfortable than…” a delicate pause, “ravaging. That’s always been these two.” She jerks a thumb over her shoulder at me.
Two more pairs of eyes follow.
I sigh, then acquiesce. “Well, we all know Chance can be a fucking fool, but let’s see. He does some cute shit sometimes.” I tap my finger on my chin in thought, and settle on what to share. “Last week, he decided to recreate our first date.”
An intake of breath around the table, and Ellie’s eyes widen almost comically.
“You guys had sex on the—" she lowers her voice to a loud whisper, “—beach?” I can’t decide if she sounds shocked and horrified, or impressed and jealous.
“No!” I holler back. “Not that I wouldn’t. But youknowthat wasn’t our first date!” I huff.
She laughs, pointing a finger at me. “Gotcha!”
“You’re an asshole,” I tell her, with exactly zero heat behind the words.
“Andyoucan’t call your second date your first one,” Jenny says dryly.
“We. Weren’t. Dating. Then.” Each word is expelled through my clenched teeth. I can’t believe after thirteen years we’re still debating this.
Lola looks between the three of us, waves down the server for another pitcher, and leans forward eagerly. “So what did he do?”
“Well, we were supposed to go to the park where we had our first date,” I glare at both Ellie and Jenny menacingly, daring them to argue. “But we had a fiasco with the goldfish—"
“No! Not Slater!” Jenny interjects.
I shoot her a look like she’s a fucking idiot. “Girl, when is the last time wetalked? Slater was, I think, our third fish and he died, like, forever ago. We’re on fish number twelve now.”
“Twelve?” Her mouth drops in horror. “What are you guys, selling them for parts on the black market? Get a better deal on a baker’s dozen?”
“Hardy-har-har.” I roll my eyes at her. “Anywaaaay,” I continue, as if I wasn’t getting made fun of by my only fucking friends. “So we had this whole thing with the fish, and the kids, and he had to move it around. So instead of going back to the park, he enlisted some help,” I shoot a grateful glance at Ellie, “and got us a child-free afternoon, and he threw me a picnic in the playroom.”
A chorus ofawws around the table, from these jaded women, takes me by surprise.
Lola leans in, elbows on the table, hands cradling her jaw, fucking hearts in her eyes. Even Jenny looks softened by it. Ellie’s already heard, but she looks respectfully swoony all over again for me.
“Yeah?” Lola prompts me.
“Yeah. So he turned on all the twinkle lights, put down blankets and pillows, made it all cute. And he got all these finger foods I love and made an ugly little charcuterie, bless him. Then he asked me a bunch of the same questions he did on our first date, and we dreamed up the future we want and stuff. It was…” My cheeks heat, recalling how sweet it really was. “Nice.” That’s a lame finish, but it’s notnottrue.
Lola lets out a very loud, very audible sigh.
