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“For a year? And when’s the last time you’ve had sex?” she shouts, trying to be heard above the lively Mexican music.
Our waiter refills my water, grinning broadly. Sweltering heat rises up my face as I melt into the seat and die of embarrassment. Brooke roars with laughter, planting herself facedown along the bench.
“This coming from a woman whose face is kissing an area where someone’s ass has been. After they’ve eaten their weight in Mexican food.”
I ball up my napkin and toss it at my drunk friend’s head, which does little good. If anything, it eggs her on, as she moves on from laughter to a perfect whale-song combination of howling, raucous heaving, and silent squeals.
She rubs the flood of hysterical tears from her face before pointing a finger straight up, conveying how she needs a moment to catch her breath.
Hushed, I lean over. “I’ve had sex,” I say, arguing with the giddy drunk girl. “For your information, I have it regularly.”
“Like as regularly as when the salmon swim upstream?”
The waiter brings our food—two shrimp quesadillas for me and a taco salad the size of my Honda Civic for Brooke. I glare at her over the rim of my water glass as she orders a margarita.
“Virgin?” she shouts, having lost all control over the volume of her voice.
I scowl at her until I realize she was talking about a drink. Which actually sounds good.
Turning to the waiter, I ask, “Can you do a pineapple margarita with no alcohol?”
He nods and heads off.
“And more nachos,” Brooke hollers after him.
In an instant, her elated happy face drops. Despite the fact that she’s a champion lush who can usually out-shot or out-chug any man, I’m almost afraid she’s about to be sick.
“You okay?” I ask, ready to rush her to the ladies’ room.
She merely points past me, and I turn to see whatever zapped every last drop of happy-go-lucky from her face.
Lo and behold, it’s Derrick.
I’m elated that he made it to my birthday celebration after all, until I see he’s not in the professional button-down shirt he was wearing earlier at work. And he’s not alone.
This version of Derrick looks freshly showered, his hair still damp and curled in a pretty-boy style that actually makes him look younger. Wearing his faded jeans that are my favorite, he’s seated at the bar, relaxed as his spread-eagle legs give easy access to let a sloppy blonde slide in between them. She’s made herself perfectly comfortable, smoothing her fingers against his chest and shoulders and pretty much all over his lucky fucking polo.
I square my shoulders, and before I know it, I’ve crossed the length of room, vaguely aware of Brooke huffing, “Shit,” as her footsteps stumble behind me. I’m seconds from yanking the blonde by the hair—southern style—when I come to my senses and realize it’s not her I’m pissed at.
“Oh, fuck,” Derrick says like a dumbass because that’s what he is. A worthless, dickless dumbass. He fumbles his way from behind the body of a woman whose perfume smells way too familiar because, like the man she’s draped all over, that’s also mine.
“Is ‘oh, fuck’ all you have to say? I guess she’s your destiny, too.” I frantically search the bar for the biggest drink within reach to toss in his face.
“What’s going on?”
When his companion turns to face me, I realize it’s none other than his accountant. Which explains all those closed-door and after-work meetings.
“Hey. Iris, right?” she says with the charm of a pole dancer, and now I’m searching the bar for two of the biggest drinks I can find—preferably crammed full of ice.
“Don’t make a scene, Ivy,” Derrick says calmly like a total idiot. “We’re hardly exclusive.”
“Excuse me? You’re the one who was talking marriage and kids. You’re the one who’s always asking what cut of diamond I prefer and where our honeymoon should be.”
His lips tighten, and his words come out cool. “You can’t pin this on me. I need passion. Spontaneity. A woman who will throw caution to the wind. The most I got out of you was your toothbrush.”
He means a girl who will throw condoms to the wind. “And that’s my fault? You’re the one who wanted to keep our relationship on the down-low, and now I know why.”
“Grow up. You don’t want exclusive. You want to roam fast and free and with whatever guy rolls up. Like Limo-man this afternoon. What was in that envelope he gave you? Cash? A hotel room key?”
