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Fine. We’re both still alive, so that’s something.
I didn’t want to talk about what had happened today.
Here’s a Potato pic to make you feel better.
She sent me a picture of her goofy cat rolling on his back and showing his belly. Such a cutie.
That helps, thanks.
Because I didn’t want to be completely self-centered, I asked how Esme was, and she said that she was currently making her a drink. One of the benefits of dating a bartender. She sent me another picture of Esme pouring liquid into a glass, like some kind of sexy alchemist mixing elixirs.
There was that jealousy again.
A knock at the door and the arrival of the food was a welcome distraction.
I wondered how my brother and Gretchen were doing. It had been a relief to not be constantly seeing them all the time, but I did care about my brother and their baby. That kid was going to need me.
Natalie sighed loudly and frowned at her phone as another message came in. She’d been getting a lot and I’d been stopping myself from asking what was going on.
“What is it?” I finally asked, when I couldn’t take the suspense anymore.
“I’m trying to talk my sister out of using any kinds of explosions for a gender reveal.”
I made a disgusted sound.
“That is so Gretchen.”
“It really is,” she said. “I just don’t think we should possibly set anything on fire or blow anything up. If she wants to do that nonsense, there are a ton of non-dangerous ways. I’m trying to give her suggestions, but she wants something big and expensive and dramatic.”
So. Typical.
“You can buy stuff that will make people’s pee turn colors. Put that in the drinks at the party and whoever pees first gets to tell everyone else,” I said, doing a quick search on my phone.
“First, that’s disgusting, and second, that’s disgusting,” Natalie said, making a face.
“Yes, but people would be talking about it. Isn’t that what she wants?”
“Not like that.”
Talking about the gender reveal broke some of the tension between us. It was always a relief to be talking to Natalie again. Talking to her was so much better than not talking to her.
We exhausted the gender reveal topic and moved on to other things.
“It’s going to be weird going back to a place where I can’t just order a pizza and have it delivered,” she said.
“I mean, you could. Greg would deliver it.”
We both made disgusted faces at the mention of Greg Randall. He was the son of the guy who ran the pizza place, and he would hit on anyone or anything, no matter how much you discouraged him. I couldn’t count how many times I’d told him I was a lesbian, not attracted to men in the least, and that it was not going to happen. He still tried. I couldn’t tell if he was dense, or if he just liked irritating people.
Or both.
“Yeah, I think I’ll pass,” Natalie said.
“He’s single, you know. It’s slim pickings in Castleton these days.”
If you didn’t end up marrying your high school sweetheart, or finding someone somewhere else and bringing them back with you, or you just had no standards, dating was an impossible task, as I had found.
Paige and Esme were such an anomaly that people wouldn’t shut up about them.
