“Everything’s fine. I’m going to visit a friend. Just make sure she has food twice a day, alright?”
“Of course.”
It’s probably for the best anyway. I’m exhausted and need a good night’s sleep. Unless something comes up and they need me, I’ve already let my staff know I won’t be back in until the day after tomorrow. Things have been running smoothly, other than the health inspector debacle tonight, so it should be fine.
It feels good to go to bed without setting an alarm and even better to sleep until nearly noon. Even once I wake, I lay in bed, scrolling on my phone for a few minutes with Goblin purring beside me. She’s had no issue settling in here. After checking my email to find no updates from my insurance company, I toss the phone aside.
There’s nothing that demands my attention today. Maybe I won’t even leave the house. It feels strange, though, being here alone. Most of my time has been spent at the diner or running around dealing with things since the fire. I’ve really only been here in the evenings when Lee’s home.
A low cramp in my stomach warns me my period is starting and gets me out of bed in search of a tampon. At leastmy IUD has knocked them down to only a day or two. I make myself some breakfast, then spend the afternoon cleaning the place up. I’m sitting on the porch, trying to decide if I want to take a walk around the lake when Lacey pulls into the driveway.
“Hey,” she calls out, taking a seat on the step beside me. “Is Lee working on one of the cabins?”
“No, he left last night to visit a friend. He said he might be gone for a couple of days.”
“What friend?”
“I didn’t ask. Did you try to call him?”
“No, it’s not important. I’m just looking for something to do so I won’t call Nick. We had an argument. What are you up to?”
“As little as possible. I’m off work tonight. I was thinking of getting a pizza for dinner if you want to stick around. What did Nick do?”
“Pissed me off. How about pizza and margaritas with a side of bitching about men?”
Lacey is sweet, if a little naïve. If he’s done something to screw her over, he’d better be able to run fast. “Are you kidding? Man bashing is one of my top hobbies. Let’s go to the liquor store.”
“Yes!” she exclaims, leaping to her feet.
Lacey is a hard person to be sad or worried around. She’s so upbeat and happy, it’s almost nauseating, even when she’s angry at her boyfriend. We grab a pizza with a side of breadsticks from a little local place and put them in the fridge for later. Lacey shows me where Lee keeps a blenderunder one of the cabinets, and I make a big pitcher of margarita.
“To a night with no men screwing things up,” I announce, sliding a glass across the kitchen bar to her.
She grins, raises the cup and taps it on mine before taking a long drink. With a rapid blink, she chuckles, “Woo, that’s good and strong.”
“Too much?”
“God no, let’s get wasted. I’ll just crash here.” She grabs her phone and connects to Lee’s speaker to turn some music on.
“Okay, spill it. What did Nick do? Did he cheat? Because I’ll bend his little hipster ass like a pretzel and stuff him in his guitar case.”
Lacey’s jaw drops and she bursts out laughing. “No, he didn’t cheat. We made a deal and he broke it, then laughed when I got mad.” She pauses for a second. “How did you know he plays guitar?”
“I know the type.”
Her eyebrows go up. “What type?”
“The soft guys. The ones who claim they’re feminists because they’re such deep thinkers. They couldn’t possibly be beasts like other men when they own two poetry books and cried at the end of a movie once.” Lacey covers her smile with her hand as I nod. “And they always think they can play the guitar but only know three chords.”
“That was…alarmingly accurate. No poetry books, but a notebook of song lyrics.”
“I’m not judging,” I assure her. “That was my type too.”
“Was? What changed your mind?”
“I came home to find the sweet guy who swore we were destined to be together fucking my best friend in my living room not long after I let him move in.”
She lets out a low whistle. “That’ll do it.”
