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“It looks like something Joe’s grandmother would wear too,” Didi says under her breath.
I realize she’s actually accusing me of raiding my own grandmother’s storage for vintage treasures. I didn’t do that, but now that I think about it, it’s a good idea. I’m going to have to start.
“You always look so amazing,” Desi pouts. “The shoes, too. I sort of hate you.”
“Oh, stop,” I sigh, finally getting out of the oilskin, which I have to admit is actually kind of heavy and inflexible. “I didn’t know it was going to rain like this. I probably should’ve worn galoshes.”
“Well, let’s get a pitcher of margaritas or something!” Hannah chirps. “That’ll warm you right up!”
“Come on, it’s Didi’s party, let her pick,” Desi sniffs.
“Margaritas sounds good to me too,” Didi grins evilly. “It will get us all loosened up in a hurry. Perfect!”
She raises her hand toward the bartender and stage whispers our order for him. The bar isn’t too busy so it looks like the communication is actually successful on the first try.
Okay, I’m just going to have one drink, I tell myself sternly. If Didi plans on loosening everybody up, nothing good will come of it. I’m gonna have to be the sensible one. The one with no embarrassing stories tomorrow.
I’ve never been very good at holding my liquor, and Didi is just the opposite. I can’t even remember how many times I’ve been wobbly and slurring after just a beer or two while she is still pounding shots of Jack like a linebacker. While she thinks it’s funny, I don’t really like the spinning and the dumb things that tend to come out of my mouth.
I like to keep a cool head, as my mom used to say. And Didi is a hothead, as my mom also used to say. I figure since we’ve known each other our whole lives, we have enough compromising information on each other to cancel each other out.
Hannah and Desi are roommates, but also strangers. Hannah moved to Manhattan from Colorado Springs. She frequently has this startled expression on her face as though she just awoke from a dream and found herself here by mistake.
Tall and willowy, Hannah may not be the sharpest tool in the shed, but she may be one of the most beautiful tools anybody ever saw. I have personally witnessed her gliding obliviously down the sidewalk while everyone stops, slack-jawed, turning to watch her as she passes with her corn silk-colored hair flowing out behind her.
Desi, on the other hand, is raven-haired and compact, as sharp as a switchblade. She grew up in Atlantic City and gives New York in general, but Manhattan especially, a great deal of side-eye.
She seems to expect to be disappointed in everything and everyone, and she’s often right. She’s also an extremely shrewd saleswoman, able to read a client before they’ve come all the way through the door. It must be in her blood or something.
Didi and I came here together, with about as much street smarts as two years of community college could have possibly given us. But we’ve had each other all this time and somehow managed to make it through, forging reasonably sophisticated identities out of our small-town backgrounds.
When we got off the bus together four years ago, we actually made a pact to act like we owned the place and to cover for each other when that act was, shall we say, less than convincing. We just stuck our chins in the air and figured everything else would fall into place.
Mostly, it has. We eventually landed jobs at Martha Adler’s flagship contemporary gallery, which is where we met Hannah and Desi. For the past three years, we’ve been the four musketeers, grinding away at gallery life until things just seemed to kind of fall into place.
“Shit, Holly says she’s not coming,” Desi announces, scowling at her phone.
Holly would be musketeer number five, if she showed up a little bit more.
“I knew it,” Didi smirks. “She said she broke up with Trevor but I’m one thousand percent certain that she didn’t.”
“Mm-hmm,” Desi agrees, twisting her glossed lips in a sneer. “You called it, sister.”
Didi nods smugly. “Hell yes I did.”
“I still can’t believe you’re leaving us,” Hannah pouts as the waiter places a giant flagon of pale green margaritas in the middle of the glass ingot.
“It’s temporary, it’s not forever. Just to set up the new gallery. And besides, I’m not leaving you, silly,” Didi smirks as she eyes her glass. The bartender fills it almost to the top and she takes a healthy slurp, leaving her upper lip dusted with salt flakes.
“No, you’re leaving the whole frigging country,” Desi snips.
“Oh, come on… It’s Florida! It’s not Paraguay!”
“Paraguay isn’t even a real country,” Hannah giggles into her glass.
She doesn’t see Desi raise her eyebrows at her. To her credit, Desi doesn’t even correct her. She used to and it used to kind of hurt Hannah’s feelings, but eventually it just seemed kind of pointless.
I hold up my hand to indicate I only want a half a drink, but the waiter smirks and fills my glass all the way to the brim. Tiny little shards of salt swan dive into the surface and dissolve immediately like miniature suicides.
