by M. S. Parker
“I…” lied. But I couldn’t say that to her face.
I didn’t have to.
She could tell, just by looking at me. Sighing, she dumped the sandwich on the plate and moved away.
I’d eaten maybe half.
Now I was full. Ignoring it, I crossed my arms over my chest and stared at my friend as she started to pace. I reminded myself that her heart was in the right place. We’d been friends for more than twenty years.
“It’s not as easy as just getting out of the house and turning my brain off, Didi,” I said softly.
“Hell.” She huffed out a breath and shot me a look. “I know that. I know that. It’s not like I’ve never had to turn my brain off and sucked at doing that very thing.”
She moved to stand next to me, and I slung my arm around her neck. She leaned in closer to me, and I kissed her brow, feeling a little less miserable having her here.
We’d been friends for most of my life. It was easier to tell her things than it was to tell others. It had always been that way. Something about the two of us had always clicked, made it easy to bare everything and not worry about judgment.
“Did you do anything good for yourself today?”
“I made a sandwich.” I hugged her a little tighter, then let her go. I picked up the plate to remind her of my accomplishment. “No pickles. You want the rest?”
“No. I want you to eat it.” With a stern look on her face, she crossed her arms over her chest.
I’d been getting that look from her at least once a day since a week after we first met, which was the same day I tried to tell her that she was too small to follow me up the tree holding my tree house.
She’d not only joined me, but she’d threatened to put bugs in my lunch if I ever told her she couldn’t do something. I knew that threat still stood today, so those words had never crossed my lips.
But I was still stubborn.
“Not hungry.” I shook my head and put the plate down. I needed coffee. My head felt numb, like I’d been awake too long – and I had. But I couldn’t sleep yet. If I slept now, I’d see it all over again…and that wasn’t going to happen.
“Will you at least sleep?” Didi’s soft voice had me closing my eyes.
Without opening them, I reached up and grabbed a mug. “I can’t sleep yet. Later.”
“Don’t tell me it’s because you’re not tired. I can see it in your eyes. When did you sleep last?”
Because I knew better than to try and pour coffee with my eyes closed, I stopped trying to block the world out and reached for the pot, pouring the steaming brew into my mug before answering.
“I’m not sleeping until the day is over with, Didi. I did that last year and…” I stopped, shaking my head. “I’ll sleep better once this is behind me again.”
Without a word, she moved to stand next to me. As she slid an arm around my waist, I dropped a kiss on her head, grateful that I never had to wonder if things might get awkward between us. Grateful that we would always be like this, no matter what else happened.
“So…what are you doing? Going blind on paperwork again?”
“You guessed it.” Heaving out a sigh, I sipped my coffee. “I’m a regular party animal.”
“What else is left? Anything I can help with?”
Shrugging, I thought about it. “There’s so much red tape. I’ve got to get government approval, but I keep getting held up there.”
“Still?” She grinned at me like I’d given her an early Christmas present. “I might be able to help with that. I made a couple contacts recently that could cut through some of that red tape. Specifically, there’s this one senator who might be good to talk to.”
Easing her away from me, I studied her face. “Really?”
“Yeah.” She rolled her eyes and reached for my sandwich, peeling the bread away to take the tomato. Popping it into her mouth, she chewed it before continuing, “Of course, she’s back east right now, doing her thing on Capitol Hill.”
“Yeah.” Absently, I took a piece of turkey from the deconstructed sandwich and ate it. “You know a senator?”
“I know a lot of people, Dash.” She smiled and leaned against the counter. “I keep telling you I have connections.”
As she kept talking, I reached for another bite.
Five minutes later, my hand hit a bare plate, and I looked over to see that the sandwich was gone.
“Only time I can get you to eat is when I’m distracting you,” Didi said quietly.
“Please tell me you really do know a senator.”
Didi smiled and came closer. Cupping my face in her hands, she pressed a quick kiss on the corner of my mouth. “Of course I know a senator, you sexy beast.”
I narrowed my eyes at her, feeling my face heat up. “Stop it, you brat.”
“Oh, hush. You need to hear it from time to time. You’re turning into a hermit. I swear, if you were my type, I’d totally jump you just to remind you that you still have a cock.”
The heat in my face only got worse, and I focused on my coffee. She nudged me with her elbow.
“Lighten up, Dash. I’ll call her tomorrow. She’s in DC right now.”
“You…” Pinching the bridge of my nose, I thought through what she said. “You know her home number.”
She winked. “Home number. Cell phone. I’m full of secrets, baby.”
It was another reminder of why I was glad she was on my side.
3
Astra
The sun shone down on us, a bright, warm day and I was currently enjoying it with my best friend. Piety was back from her honeymoon with Kaleb, and we’d met at one of our favorite restaurants.
The remains of a Philly cheesesteak lay on my plate.
Piety hadn’t even left that much behind. She’d gone through a full cheesesteak, two plates of fries, and a salad, and I was pretty sure she planned to order dessert. Her baby bump didn’t seem any more pronounced than it had a week ago, but I doubted she’d be able to get away without maternity clothes for much longer.
“So. What was it like?”
Piety looked at me with innocent eyes.
I wasn’t buying it. She had a glow to her skin, and it wasn’t just because they’d gone to Australia with a stopover in New Zealand and she’d tanned a bit too much.
She was glowing. Spinning on the side of a mountain, stupid with happy kind of glowing.
It was almost indecent to be that kind of happy.
“What was what like?”
“Oh, don’t give me that bit.” Leaning forward, I braced my chin on my fist and grinned. “The honeymoon. I guess the sex is still awesome. They talk about the honeymoon phase. That can’t be over with. Did he screw you six different ways to Sunday? Did you screw him six different ways? What did you see? What did you do?”
“How many more questions are you going to cram into one breath of air, Astra?” She cocked her eyebrow at me.
“I’m controlling myself,” I said, deadpan.
“I bet.”
“Now talk.”
“About my sex life? Please.” Her delicate snort had me grinning.
“It’s not like I’m asking positions or in depth detail about how he looks naked.” I waved a hand at her. “I saw him mostly naked, remember?”
Kaleb had worked as a stripper when we met him in Vegas. He’d been trying to raise money to get his sister out of a bad place. Camry was a recovering addict, and she seemed to be doing a lot better, but less than a year ago, she’d been attached to a drug-dealing pimp.
I was still wary around her, but Kaleb loved her, and because of that, I knew Piety was giving her new sister-in-law more of a chance. I was reserving my judgment.
“Let’s not think about that,” Piety advised, shaking her head. As she reached for a glass of water, I pulled up a somewhat hazy image from the show we’d seen, featuring that sexy piece of man flesh Piety was now married to.
He was the sort of beautiful man who drew attention no matter wher
e he went. And like many things of beauty, I was happy to admire from afar.
He wasn’t my type.
Still, it was fun to tease my best friend about it. That’s what friends did.
She threw a packet of sugar at me. “Are you thinking about my husband naked?”
“Mostly naked,” I reminded her. “I’ve never seen him fully naked. But I’ll bet I can figure out how big his c–”
“Shit.” She waved a hand in the air. “Fine. I’ll talk. If I don’t distract you, you’ll just stay on this tangent.”
She knew me so well.
“Yes. We screwed each other’s brains out. And…” She sighed and looked up, eyes closing in bliss. “We laid on the beach – or I did. He went surfing. It’s amazing, watching Kaleb on a board. We drove around. I got to see kangaroos. Koalas. We went to New Zealand…”
Her voice trailed off, and after a minute, I poked her in the arm. “And what?”
“It’s a dream,” she said simply. “Seriously. The mountains, the green. It’s all so unreal. I want that beam thing on Star Trek, but instead of beam me up, Scottie, I want some Kiwi to beam me over.”
“Kiwi?”
She laughed. “New Zealanders are Kiwis. And there are these little birds, too…also called kiwis. Adorable.”
“You sound…” Huffing out a breath, I finished, “Adorable. Ridiculously adorable and happy.”
“I am.” She shrugged and then leaned forward, pulling a binder toward her. “But…we aren’t here to talk about how cute and happy I am. Or for you to make faces at me.”
Had I been making faces?
I didn’t know.
Sticking my tongue out at her, I gestured to the fat, leather folio on the table. “Let’s get to it then.”
I reached for my wine as she unzipped the folio, flipping it open to the calendar. Our server paused by the table to clear the plates, and I flicked a few crumbs away from me as Piety flipped open one of the brochures I picked up while she was out of town.
“We don’t have a lot of time,” I told her.
“I know.” She sighed and rubbed her temple, gazing at the glossy photos and text printed on the thick paper. “This would be so much easier if we’d hired somebody when we started working on this a couple months ago. Event planners know all about this, don’t they? I mean my wedding planner…”
Her voice trailed off as she put the brochure down and reached for another.
“But I thought we thrived on chaos,” I said lightly.
I personally did.
Piety did too – or she used to, at least. I supposed being a mom would change that. She was going to be a great mom. Unlike our moms. Things were better between her and her parents, but they still wouldn’t win any parenting awards.
Clearing my throat, I turned back to my original thought.
“If we hire a planner, we can’t thrive.”
She laughed. “I thrive on sleep lately.”
I went to make a jab at her but stopped, because I realized that beneath all that glow, she looked tired. Reaching out, I put a hand on her arm. “Are you okay?”
“Just tired.” She lifted a shoulder and smiled. But it didn’t do anything to change the fact that she had shadows under her eyes.
“PS, do I need to strong arm you into going to see a doctor?” The nickname wasn’t one I used much anymore.
She rolled her eyes. “Stop it. I’m just tired, Astra. I’m pregnant, remember? And that flight was a bitch. Coming back to hear that the caterer for our event canceled and is leaving us hanging…ugh.”
“You’re the one who decided to fly to the other side of the globe while you were pregnant.” I made a face at her but relaxed. If she said she was okay, I believed her.
And it made sense.
Growing a person had to be exhausting.
Thinking of that, I wiggled uncomfortably in the chair and went back to something much more comfortable than thinking about growing a baby. Namely, business shit. “Well, good news is, I didn’t let her keep the deposit. She kept insisting she was entitled, and I pulled out the contract.”
“Did you now? You hadn’t lost it?” Piety smirked.
I scowled at her. “I only did that once.”
She raised an eyebrow.
“Okay, twice,” I admitted. “Now, can we figure out what we’re going to do?”
She looked back at the planner she’d brought with her and shook her head. “Normally, I’d be all over this, especially since I’ve finally got my parents convinced I’m not some flighty piece of work they need to guide in the right direction. Maybe they’ll actually see what I’m doing instead of what they think I should be doing.”
I grimaced. “Lucky you.”
“Hey.” She poked me in the arm. “It took getting kidnapped and held hostage to make them see me for who I was instead of some political piece.”
“I don’t think I’ll go that far.” Making another face at her, I pulled the folio over to me and flipped to the calendar. Trying to coax a smile, I nudged her. “I’ve already finished my costume.”
“And will you change your mind again like you did last year?”
Rolling my eyes, I said, “Weren’t you just complaining about your parents’ issues with flightiness?”
“So…I’m guessing you changed your mind at least three times.”
“Brat.” Huffing out a sigh, I said, “No. Two. But it didn’t matter. The same basic idea worked for both.”
And it was possible I’d change my mind again, but that was part of the fun.
“Your dad is really okay with all of this?” I asked, trying not to sound as wistful as I felt.
“Yeah.” Without looking up at me, she reached over and covered my hand with hers. “You know your parents love you.”
“Sure. Like they’d love a puppy. It just wasn’t as easy to get rid of me once I grew out of the puppy stage…like they did with Max.” One Christmas, my parents had given me a Schnauzer. It had been the best present, and we’d all had fun playing with him. But Mom and Dad didn’t think about things like neutering a dog, and when he’d gotten older and started acting like unneutered boy dogs do, they’d gotten rid of him, giving the sweet boy to a friend who lived outside of the city.
And that friend wasn’t careful. Max ended up getting hit by a car and dying before he was even a year old.
I cried for two days and never asked for a pet again.
Heaving out a breath, I looked at the list of things to be done in the next few weeks. We knew from experience that if we didn’t start on it now, it would only get more difficult as time passed.
“What about a theme?” I asked Piety abruptly, determined to get my mind off my parents.
“You’ve already picked out your costume,” she reminded me.
I grinned. “So, we make the theme work with my costume.” Waving a hand, I grabbed my laptop and flipped it open. As the computer booted up, I dug around in my purse for my glasses.
“I’m surprised you still haven’t done the eye thing yet,” Piety said.
“And let some maniac with a laser near my eyeballs?” I shuddered. “No. Capitol N. Capitol O. No.”
She laughed as I slid the black cat-eye framed glasses into place.
“Besides, I look good in glasses.” I winked at her. “Sexy librarian good.”
“You look good in anything.” She rolled her eyes and leaned forward, bracing her elbow a little closer so she could see the monitor. “Guys would still fall all over you if you walked around wearing burlap.”
“No…they’d be falling all over me because I’d be naked. Burlap would be itchy.” Wagging my eyebrows, I typed in a search for fun Halloween themes. One of the first had me bursting out laughing. “What do you think? Would my parents go for it? You could dress up as Ana. I’d have to start from scratch, but…”
She gave me a light shove. “Please don’t. And if anything, my mom would be Ana.”
“What?” Whipping my head around, I gaped
at her. “Amara Van Allen actually read... Fif… Fif…” I faked gagged. “I can’t even say it.”
“I should have kept my mouth shut.” Pushing her dark hair back from her face, Piety eyed me narrowly. “Camry gave a copy to my mom. They’ve…well, it’s weird, but Mom and Camry have really hit it off. I think Mom’s trying to make up for everything between us, and she’s being super sweet to Camry. And it was like…I dunno. She’s practically adopted the girl. Then Camry goes and gives the book to my mom. I’ve walked in on her reading it, Astra. Freaked the shit out of me.”
I grinned. “Maybe I should get her one with those BDSM for beginners kits.”
Piety pointed a threatening finger at me. “Be quiet, or I’m going to hurt you. Friendship will only get you so far.”
“Okay, okay.” I skimmed down a little further. “Did we ever decide if we were going with a masquerade ball or just costumes?”
“I don’t know.” With a shrug, she moved closer once more. “I think it sounds fun, but keep in mind, we’re trying to snare some of our dads’ friends, and a lot of them are a little…stand-offish. If we toss in something like masks are welcome and encouraged, it will probably discourage some of them from coming.”
“Because they are sticks in the mud.” I sighed. Leave it to them to take all the fun out of things. “Fine…we can do masks are welcome, but not required.” A picture caught my eye, and I tapped it. “You know, you’d look awesome in a dress like that. And picture Kaleb dressed up as the beast. Not in the torn-up cape thing, but at the end. Beauty and the Beast.”
“I love that fairy tale.” She smiled a little.
“We could do a fairy tale theme. It would be fun.” I didn’t care if it didn’t match the costume I’d originally planned to wear. I could do that anytime. I liked the idea of fairy tales.
“If we did, what would you be?”
“A mermaid,” I said, not even having to think about it. I’d always loved The Little Mermaid, although I hated the Disney-fied version. The one from Hans Christian Anderson was much more poignant. Even if she did turn to seafoam or whatever at the end.