As magic hour suffused the sky with a purple glow, our found family began to arrive. Oat Willimena and Emmylou appeared through Emmylou’s sliding glass back door carrying giant bowls of homemade popcorn. Miranda came next, looking happy and peaceful, Tater Tot swaddled against her chest, Chauncey in tow. She was asking me for advice on signing up for classes at Pole Kisses again when Tina, the principal’s assistant, blew in with her eight-year-old granddaughter and a Tupperware full of baked goodies. Miranda, Tina, and I were chomping rainbow brownies and talking baby sleep hacks (lightly stroke the baby’s eyebrows, play the originalWhite Lotustheme music on a loop, et cetera) when Miley O’Riley showed up with her daughter, Bam-Bam.
“Have you made your list?” Miley asked as Bam-Bam scampered off to join the other children. Miley had invited me to headline a fall festival she was putting on, and wanted me to create a lineup of up-and-coming comedians to open for me.
“I’ve been working on it!” I said. “Let’s have a playground date tomorrow so I can show you some reels and see what you think.” Then I had to run off to say hi to Principal Cruz and Maricela, who’d made a big entrance with inflatable beach balls for the twins—which I predicted Little Sister would pop within the hour.
Johnica, her mom, and both of her mom’s sister wives appeared right before Layna sailed through the gate holding hands with a muscular hottie. With his tight fade and dimples he looked very, very good for his age, which I figured to be old-but-not-grandpa-old. I recognized him instantly.
“Retired astronaut Kendrick B. Johnson!” I said. “Not a catfish!”
He smiled a little warily.
“Tilly thought you were catfishing me,” Layna explained. “She said you for sure were not DMing me from outer space.”
“Well, she was right,” he said. “I absolutely was not DMing you from outer space. I haven’t been since 1998.”
“That’s exactly what your Wikipedia page said!” I cried.
“If I’d met you, I would’ve known you were teasing,” Layna protested. “But how was I supposed to understand your sense of humor?” She gave Kendrick a playful swat and they beamed. It looked like Layna’s time to heal was going to turn out to be a sexual healing after all.
Kendrick volunteered to help Nate set up the projector. All the Pole Kisses gang had arrived—except for Zhang Xiu—and we clustered together to share good news. Gucci had a fantastic new grad school advisor now that Professor Bidelspach had been forced to resign. Shade had been tapped to emcee Drag Night at the Balcony Club. Cheyenne held hands with Salma Hayek as she told us Cheyenne’s Sentient Strippers wereon back order all over the country. “That would never have happened if those clips of your comedy set hadn’t gone viral,” she said.
“I wouldn’t’ve had material for my set if badass women like you hadn’t developed pole into a high art for some and a very funny hobby for others,” I said.
I was chatting with Layna about her first week at beauty school when Zhang Xiu came through the back gate with a slender woman in a flowered sundress. The young woman shared Zhang Xiu’s straight black hair, flawless skin, and bowed upper lip.
“You must be Zhang Xiu’s daughter!” I said. “Wait, is it weird when I call your mom that?”
“My mom has always needed an alter ego. She’s never really seemed like an Ingrid,” she said. “I’m Peony. Nice to meet you.”
“Zhang Xiu! Your name is Ingrid?”
Zhang Xiu shrugged. “Spiritually? Not really. But legally? Sure is.”
I hadn’t forgotten what Zhang Xiu had told me that night at Barbarian Brewing, about how some degen had assaulted her daughter in the parking lot of a bar three years ago. And here was Peony, looking at ease in her strong, willowy body. It made my chest ache to think of what she must’ve had to overcome, of how much strength it takes sometimes just to survive.
“Zhang Xiu told us you work for...” I wracked my brain, trying to remember.
“Allergan Aesthetics,” Peony said. Off my blank look she added, “It’s a drug company.”
My head clanged between cartoon cymbals. Every Los Angeleno worth her salt knows of Allergan’s most famous product.
“B-Botox,” I stammered. “Allergan makes Botox.”
Gucci stared at me, eyes as big as manholes.
“God bless Allergan,” Layna said, gesturing at her forehead. I’d eventually told her Connor had been stuffed to the gills with Botox. Still, she wasn’t catching on.
“Botox is what we’re known for,” Peony said. “But we also manufacture Juvederm, Kybella, CoolSculpting. Everything a modern gal needs to be flawless.” She said it with an ironic twinkle in her eyes.
“Isn’t CoolSculpting where you use paddles to freeze someone’s saddlebags off?” Layna said. “You can have mine. Just please don’t freeze my juicy butt off!”
“Zhang Xiu, can you help me in the kitchen real quick?” I said. “Sorry, Peony, I’ll bring her back.”
Before Zhang Xiu could protest, I dragged her inside, Gucci on our heels. The kitchen was blessedly empty; still, I pulled Zhang Xiu all the way into my bedroom. Gucci shut the door behind us. But before I could speak, Layna burst in. She wasn’t clueless at all. Just a better actor than I’d given her credit for.
I turned to Zhang Xiu. “It was you, wasn’t it!” I asked.
Zhang looked panicked. “Tilly, what are you talking about?”
