Just One Night: Part 2 (2 page)

“You know I can’t resist that fluorescent-orange cheesey goodness. Don’t hate me. Hate the addiction.” She sits up and swipes her spiky blonde bangs out of her eyes. Her greenish-grey eyes bore into mine. “Seriously. Time to talk. Tell me what happened while you’re in the shower and we’ll come up with a plan of attack while we drive.”

“Now you’re trying to get me naked. Are you sure you’re not a lesbian?”

She pulls the covers completely off the bed. “Yeah, I’m a lesbo. You’ve figured me out. I totally wanna see your peacock right now.” She shifts to whining. “Come oooon, get uuuup. I seriously need you to help me ouuuut.”

“Fine,” I say, dragging my feet as I head to the shower. I can’t do the joking thing anymore. Pretending to be happy when I’m not takes too much energy. Shutting the door behind me, I drop my clothes to the floor with as little effort as possible. My arms and legs are almost asleep. “I’ll shower but I’m not going anywhere.” She can’t make me. I won’t do it.

As soon as the shower curtain slides into place, Mia comes into the bathroom and sits on the toilet. “I’m pulling the BFF card out on you. You can’t refuse. I’m desperate.”

I stick my head out of the already thankfully steamy shower to judge her expression. “You know that card can only be used in extreme emergencies, right?”

“Yes, I know, okay?” She picks at her cuticles, not looking at me. “I’m serious.”

I go back under the hot water when I’m sure she’s not kidding around. At least it gives us something better to talk about than my pitiful and annoying love life. “So what’s the deal? What’s so important you have to use the BFF card?”

She sighs, which causes me to pause my shampooing. Mia isn’t the type to fret over things. She’s decisive and bold, and, as you can see, never takes no for an answer. A sigh means a lot coming from her. I wait for her to explain herself. That Cyndi Lauper song starts buzzing through my brain.
Girls just wanna have fu-huuun.

“Don’t hum,” she says, annoyed. “Why are you humming?”

I smile. The day is getting brighter already. “Just waiting for you to spill your guts.”

“You know you aren’t getting out of your confession or anything,” she says, down to grouchy from fully annoyed.

“Whatever,” I say. “Tell me why you’re freaking out and where you’re going.”

“Where
we
are going, not just me. No way are you bailing on me.”

“I can’t bail on something I didn’t commit to.”

“You committed when you agreed to be a card-carrying member of the Mia BFF club!”

“Dammit!” Shampoo burns my eyes and rinsing them with water only makes it worse.

“It’s not that bad a gig, is it?”

“Shampoo! Burning!
Gah!”

“Oh. Okay.” She sighs. “That makes waaaay more sense. Anyway, I have to go to this
thing
, and I need you to go to this
thing
too. With me. As, like, my plus one.”

“Are we back to the lesbian thing?” I ask her.

“No. We’re on the you-need-to-rescue-my-ass thing. Keep me company, talk to some people with me, make sure I don’t do anything stupid…”

I pull the curtain over a little so I can look at her. “What stupid thing are you thinking about doing?”

She won’t look at me, so I flick some water at her.

“Stop,” she says, pushing the curtain closed. “You’ll mess up my makeup.”

“Tell me or I’ll drag you in here.” I don’t mean that. I’m too busy shaving my legs to wrestle. I imagine William’s hands there on my skin, sliding down my ribs, between my legs … and I drop my razor onto the top of my foot, nicking my skin. “Dammit!”

“Fine, I’ll tell you, geez, lighten up.”

I retrieve my razor and continue the job. “I’m listening.”

“Okay, so you know my boss, right?”

“Malcolm Charles Wainwright Stick-up-his-butt the third?” I roll my eyes. The guy’s a real jerk. I know why Mia still works for him, seeing as how his business is helping her meet all the right people for her future perfect job, but still … the job comes with
him
. Can you say sleazy?

“Yeah. Anyway, he’s put this dinner soirée thingy together and he wants me to be there.”

“So? He does that all the time. What’s the big?”

“The
big
is that he wants me to suck his gnarly cock and I’m not going to do it. I won’t. I refuse.”

I drop my razor again and have to dance out of the way to keep from letting any more blood. “What?!” I yank back the curtain once more. “But he’s married!”

“Exactly?!” Her eyes bug out at me and she drops her bottom jaw out to the side a little, waiting for my response.

“That’s … that’s … that’s just rude.” I go back to the shower and the shave. “He should know you better than that. You’re not the man-stealing type.”

“That’s what I said. Only of course I used more descriptive language, and I didn’t say it to his face. I just smiled along and said I’d be there but that I’d be bringing someone.”

“So he knows you’re not going to do that with him, right?”

“He said, ‘I hope it’s not a date,’ or some crap like that.”

“He can’t tell you that you can’t bring a date to a company function, Mia. That’s sexual harassment, I’m pretty sure.”

“Well, he
can
fire me, and I seriously need this job, so I came up with a plan.”

“This ought to be good.” I roll my eyes again. Her plans are almost as bad as my plans.

“Shut up. Okay, so here’s the deal. You and I go to this dinner thing. You get all sexied up, I’ll get all sexied up, and as soon as it’s over, we’ll say we have to leave because we have other plans. And you’ll stick to me like glue so that he doesn’t have a chance to do anything inappropriate.”

“I seriously am not interested in pretending to be your lover, okay?” I shake my head. “Something is seriously wrong with you if this is the best you could come up with. I’m pretty sure pretending to be homosexual only when it’s convenient is rude.”

She hits the shower curtain, and I jump sideways to avoid the slimy plastic.

“I’m not saying that, dope! Listen to me when I’m explaining the master plan, would you?”

“I thought I was.” I rinse the conditioner out of my hair as I wait for her explanation to make more sense.

“We’re going to say we have dates waiting for us. Men. Like
other guys
who are going to sex us up and stuff after the dinner.”

“And he won’t expect you to stay after dinner for dessert or something?”

“Whatever. We just won’t hang out for the after dinner sex and BJ part.”

“Is this a swingers party or something?”

“I’m seriously going to suffocate you inside that shower curtain if you don’t stop.”

I laugh, for the first time in a week feeling happy again. “Okay, fine. I’ll behave. I guess I could use a decent dinner. I’ve been eating frozen stuff and take out all week.”

“I know. Your ankles are totally retaining water from all that sodium.” Mia leaves the bathroom before I can come after her for that one. Well done, Mia, well done.

Once she’s gone, I take a long look at my ankles, wondering how much truth there is in her statement. “Nah,” I say to myself. “My ankles are still showing boney protuberances. That’s good, right?”

“I’m waaaaiiiting!” she calls from the kitchen.

Thirty minutes later, I’m dressed in sweats and my hair is dry and piled around my head.

Mia looks up at me from her gossip magazine. “The eighties called. They want their hot rollers back.”

“I’m going for the wavy look, okay? Some people like it.” Flashes of William’s admiring gazes move across my mind. Maybe if I go out tonight I’ll meet another awesome Englishman who’s partial to boobies. And maybe monkeys will fly out of dark places, too. I’m instantly sad again.

“Don’t get all whiney-baby on me,” Mia says, turning a page in her magazine and sliding her finger down the column as she reads. “It’s going to look gorgeous as always.” She looks up all of a sudden, frowning. “But you can’t go in that.” She gestures at my sweats. “This dinner is at Club Sixx. Think understated sexy.”

“You’re not wearing understated sexy,” I say, staring pointedly at her Converse sneakers.

She waves her magazine over at the front door. There’s a dress and high-heeled sandals hooked on one of my coat hangers. “When you’re ready, I’ll be ready.”

I step over her legs and sit down next to her with my bag of makeup and a mirror. “So who else is going to be at this little affair?” I ask, putting a very light sheen of foundation on. My skin is too blotchy from feeling sorry for myself to go without it tonight.

“Malcolm Charles Wainwright the third, some of his sycophants, some girls I work with who will no doubt be lapping at their heels, and two cool people.”

“That would be us, right?”

“As if you have to ask.”

“How is it that you’re still single?” I ask, only partly kidding. Mia is not only super cute, she’s sharp as a ginsu knife. She could easily be running the vintage and collector wine business for Malcolm Charles Wainwright III if he could just take his eyes off her ass for five seconds and pay attention.

“First of all, I’m only thirty-three, so I have plenty of time for that. And second, as you know, I did that marriage thing once and it didn’t work out, so I’m not currently interested. I’ll take monogamous and dating indefinitely instead, thank you very much. Until Mr. Mia arrives, that is.” She flicks her hair that is too short to be flicked. “I’m just waiting for my Prince Charming to show up and then I’ll be ready again.”

I snort. “Prince Charming does not exist, trust me on this.”

“That reminds me,” she says, sounding all sly, “what happened with that ad you placed?”

I pause in the middle of lifting up my mascara wand. “I thought we were going to drop that.”

“In all the years that you’ve known me, since the moment you threw your champagne into my cleavage at that party, have you
ever
seen me drop a story as juicy as this one?”

I smile remembering that night we met over ten years ago. “No. Never.” The charity ball with William was not the first time I’ve had a weird reaction to a certain drink.

“So dish up the goodies. I’ll dress while you confess.” Mia stands up and takes her black Chanel off the hanger, wasting no time stripping down to her lacy underthings. Her former husband was uber rich and she still has some of her old wardrobe left over for special occasions. I’m pretty sure she has other things left over from that relationship, like a broken and slightly twisted heart, but we don’t talk about that. Mia doesn’t permit discussion of
The Incident
, otherwise known as her marriage.

I try to act totally casual as I complete my makeup, hoping that if I play it off as no big deal, both Mia and my heart will start believing it. “I placed an ad on that website I told you about.”

“What did the ad say?”

I shrug. “Nothing much. Just attractive businesswoman seeking one night stand or something like that.”

“Wow. That’s sexy.”

“It was supposed to be businesslike.”

“Mission accomplished.”

“Thank you,” I say, proud for a moment. “I think.” Her cross-eyed smile makes me doubt myself. “Anyway, I got lots of calls, but none of them passed the psycho test.”

“And what did this test consist of?”

I shrug. “Questions. I just said no to anyone who made me nervous.”

“Did anyone pass the test?”

“Yes. One.” One very special guy.
Argh
. No, no, no, no,
no!
He was not special! He was just a guy. Just a regular old, run of the mill guy like any other guy.

“Tell me, tell me.” She’s grimacing as she bends in three different directions trying to reach her zipper.

“His name is William. He’s English.”

She pauses. “English-with-an-accent, English?”

“Yes.”

She grins evilly. “Holy hootchie on fire.”

“I know. It was like that. Completely.” I can’t stop the poo-eating grin from spreading across my face. So much for convincing myself that he was run-of-the-mill.

Her sly expression falls away and the only thing left there is pity. “You didn’t.”

I sit up straighter and act cool. “I didn’t what?” My makeup bag needs serious organizing right now. I start fiddling with all the brushes and compacts and junk, shifting it this way and that, acting like it really matters.

“Fall for him. You didn’t, didn’t you?”

I frown. “Don’t be ridiculous. Of course I didn’t.” Blush brush on the right, foundation brush on the left. Mascara in the middle. “It was a one night only thing. We set it up that way.”

She gestures out at the room and then the kitchen dinette table. “Take-out all week? Working from home? Death by Vitamin C?” I look up in time to see her shaking her head. “How many times do I have to tell you…”

I hold up both hands to stop her. “I know, okay?! I know!”

She comes over and sits down across from me, pulling my hands into her lap. “He was a good one, wasn’t he?”

I nod as the tears well up and fall down my cheeks. Did I mention that no one can make me cry at the drop of a hat like Mia when she’s concerned? Yeah. She has mad power over my emotions sometimes. She’s like a mom. “He was completely awesome.” My chin trembles. There. I said it out loud. Maybe this will help exorcise the memories, to acknowledge reality instead of fighting it.

“Did you do it? Yanky his wanky and all that?”

I nod. I can’t bring myself to tell her how amazing it was. I’ve been trying to forget all week.

“And he hasn’t called?”

I shake my head. “We agreed. One night only. That was the deal.”

She puts her hand on my cheek. “But you can break the rules. Call him. Maybe he feels the same way.”

I shake my head and look down at my lap. Mia is such a good friend. But she doesn’t understand. I’m not bold like her. This ad thing was the limit of my courage and look where it got me. No way can I take a chance like that again. “It’s over.” Saying it out loud like that is physically painful. My heart feels like it’s shrinking down into a raisin-sized lump of coal. “It was over before it even started. That was what we both agreed to.”

She drops my hands and stands. “Well, that’s just stupid. But if you want to wallow for a little while, I’ll let you wallow. I know you need to get it out of your system. Besides, tonight, we’re going to have fun. I’ve decided.”