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I stared at my sister and shook my head. "I hope this is not your way of trying to tell me that you're pregnant."
"What?" she said, sounding aghast. "What are you talking about?"
All of us started chuckling. "Bro, you know your sister. She loves to eat."
"True." I grinned and nodded. "I'd almost forgotten that. Alice, is there anything you'd like to get?" I stared at Alice as she sat next to me in the booth.
"I was thinking about the fried coconut shrimp down the deck."
"And we'll get some of the fried coconut shrimp."
"Good choice, Alice." Rosalie smiled. "We'll keep a menu in case we want to order anything else, but I think that's all for now."
"Certainly. I'll put that order in for you," the young server said and then walked away.
I could see Alice looking at me with demure eyes, and I tried not to stare at her for too long. She looked absolutely gorgeous, even more gorgeous than I'd remembered, and I wasn't sure exactly what that meant or how I should react. Yeah, Rosalie had told me to keep my hands off her, but I'd also told Oliver to keep his hands off Rosalie, and, well, look, they're together now, so it wasn't like they could tell me what to do.
"Anything fun happen in Europe?" Oliver asked me as he sipped on his water.
"Not really, but there's this exciting new venture that we're about to invest in. It actually involves AI and this robot that..."
"Foster. Foster," a loud voice screeched from across the restaurant, and I froze. I could feel my heart racing as I recognized the voice. "Foster, is that you? Are you back?"
The voice came closer, and I saw the familiar face of Amelia, though her hair was now a bright green. "Amelia?" I said, looking up at her in surprise.
"Foster, I thought that was you. You're back, darling."
"I'm back. How are you?"
"Oh, I'm just great. In fact..." She noticed we were all staring at her hair, and she touched it gingerly. "Oh, my hair. I was just expressing myself as we artists do."
"Good to see you, Amelia," all of us said with a small nod. "This is my fiancée, Rosalie, she is Foster’s sister and that's her best friend Alice. Alice is staying in the apartment now."
"Oh." Amelia's eyes darted around the table. "Interesting. Foster, darling, I've been calling you and texting you. We really do need to meet up." She patted her stomach. "There's something I have to tell you."
"Oh?" I stayed at her with a raised eyebrow. I could see from the corner of my eye that Alice's jaw was slightly slack.
"Oh, what is it?" Rosalie said.
"Rosalie, that's not really your business."
"Well, she's patting her stomach as if it's something really important." Rosalie looked at me with wide eyes.
"Mom and Dad are going to kill you if you knocked her up."
"Oh." Amelia started laughing. "I'm not pregnant." She paused, yet she winked at me and giggled. "Darling, Foster, shall I come over tonight? I can bring some bubbly, and we can..."
"No. I just got back from a business trip, and I'm exhausted, and—"
"Don't you need to speak to Amelia, though?" Rosalie interrupted again, and I glared at my sister.
Amelia was a woman in my building who I'd been casually seeing a couple of months ago. I wasn't really that interested in her, so I'd kind of broken things off but hadn't exactly told her. Instead, I just ignored her calls and emails. Rosalie and Oliver and Alice all thought that I should have a conversation with Amelia in person to let her know things were officially over, but it was just something I didn't really think needed to happen. How had she not gotten the clue? Yeah, we bumped uglies a couple of times, but it really hadn't been that fantastic. I didn't want to hurt her feelings by telling her that I was not interested in her in that way.
"So what do you think of my new hairdo, Foster?" she asked, preening.
"It looks very..." I licked my lips, trying to think of the word. "Um, it looks cool," I said finally.
"Really?" She grinned at me.
