“That’ll take two seconds,” Lena said into her drink beforetaking a sip.
“I don’t think you’re right,” I told Lena as I sunk into myown armchair.
“Girl, he’s crazy for you,” Lena told me.
“I had occasion to be in his presence just a few days ago,and he ordered me out of his truck when I tried to talk to him.”
Lena and her false eyelashes blinked rapidly.
I needed to get an appointment for those semi-permanentfalsies.They looked great.Mine were always detaching mid-day so I either hadto rip them off or do a re-glue over the basin in the employee bathroom.
Not optimal.
“Where do you get your lashes done?”I asked my sister.
“There’s this place in Cherry Creek—”
“Hold up, hold up,” Toni interrupted.“Are we talking aboutlashes now?And not the Great and Twisted and Entirely Fucked Up Love Affair ofDarius Tucker and Malia Clark, who all of us thought had an unhappy ending,which turns out might not be the end?”
“I don’t know,” I said nervously, rubbing my hands on myslacks and then reaching for my own martini.
“I say you go for it,” Lena chimed in.
“Liam told me that he was trying to get Darius to come cleanand make a family out of us, but Darius refused to do it because, and this isLiam’s word, he thought he wasunworthyof me…or something.”
“Huh,” Toni said.
Lena’s attention cut to her.
“He’s not unworthy of anything,” she snapped.
One could say, now that I was over The Great Deception(another such Great Deception I had committed myself, but we wouldn’t get intothat), I was glad I didn’t have to clear the hurdle of talking Mom, Dad, Lena,not to mention Dorothea into not being mad at Darius and me for our, well,Great and Twisted and Entirely Fucked Up Love Affair.
“Calm down, sis.I didn’t say he was,” Toni replied to Lena.“I said ‘huh.’That’s got a lot of meanings.And in this particular instance,my meaning was, ‘oh yeah, that tracks as to why he had his head up his ass fora long, long,longfucking time.’”
Lena sat back, crossed her arm along her belly, rested herdrink elbow on it, and murmured, “Well, all right then.”
I put my drink down and clapped.“Can we focus ladies?”
Toni looked at Lena.“Did she just clap at me?”
Lena looked at Toni.“She did.And she clapped at me too.”
Oh my God!
Someone kill me!
I collapsed back in my chair.
“The drama, Malia,” Lena grouched.“Really, just tell theguy you want to work things out.I don’t know what happened in his truck, buthe’s head over heels for you.”
Still in a slouch, I tried to reach my martini.
I should have put it on the side table.
I had to curl up, grab it, but then I slouched right back.
“I’m not sure he’s over his father’s murder,” I noted.
