“Uh-huh.”
I slurped my margarita. It was really running low.
“And there he sits,” Katie pointed out. “And you won’t even look over.”
Not true. I was definitely looking over there. On occasion.
Katie looked over there now.
“You know,” she mused, “he totally looks like a guy you’d go talk to under other circumstances.”
“So?”
“So, you like to date around, be social. Show up at parties with models. Schmooze. But we both know what you really like.”
My eyebrow spiked. “And what do I really like?”
“Devi. Come on. You indulge the pretty boys, when you feel like it. But what really gets you hot and bothered is a big, manly, athletic man. If he’s smart, successful and wearing a sharp suit, you get drunk on it. The only times I’ve seen you truly drunk on a man was when he checked off all those boxes for you.”
So. True.
But I said stubbornly, “I don’t see your point.”
Katie smiled at me sympathetically. “My point is, your new boss just happens to check off all those boxes. And from where I’m sitting, he’s also hella pretty. So what are we doing here tonight if you’re not here to see him?”
“It’s not like that. I just wanted to scope him out a bit, outside the office. See if he emanates the same frequency of evil in public.”
“And?”
“Yup.”
Katie glanced over at his table again, considering. “I don’t feel the evil you speak of.”
“That’s because you’re drunk.”
“Hey. You’ve drank the same amount as I have!”
“And yet I’m not talking crazy.”
She laughed. “He seems, I don’t know, sophisticated.”
“Why? Because he’s wearing a collared shirt that cost more than some people’s car? He’s sophisticated as a snake, Katie. It’s all appearances. He’ll try to charm you just as long as he needs to so he can slither around your neck and swallow you whole.”
“Wow. Um… so, as I was saying, I think you should maybe just go talk to him? Start over? Put aside the fact that you hate him and try to build some rapport. You’re amazing at building rapport with people. And I really think you have some power to negotiate here. Whatever went wrong at the agency, with Janelle, it wasn’t your fault. Right?”
“Right,” I said, distracted. I was kinda stuck on thatgo talk to himthing.
I really didn’t want to.
But I also did, so I could tell him where to go. God, I wanted to just tell him where to go. It would feel sogood.
Bad idea, though.
“So, make it clear to him that you love your job and you’re an amazing agent,” Katie said. “And he’d be insane to let you go.”
“You want me to go beg for my job?”
“It’s not begging. You’re just arguing your case, which you are incredibly good at, by the way. Remember when you convinced me to strip down to some lacy underwear and make out with a rock star in front of a camera crew? You know, the man I’m now married to? The father of my child? The love of my life? There is literally less than zero-percent chance I would ever have done that ifyoudidn’t convince me to do it.”
