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“Ho-ly shit,” Jade says in the back seat, enunciating each syllable.
“Well, we know Chris is a leg man,” Tessa says mildly.
“Stop it. It was nothing,” I chide.
“Sure, sure,” Jade says. “Nothing at all. Absolutely nothing about the way Chris was staring at you made me want to cream my panties.”
“Oh my god,” Emma says from the passenger seat. “Even I’m turned on now.”
They erupt into laughter, and the bright red blush stays permanently on my face the entire drive to dinner.
22
Sara
“This is really nice,”Jade says for about the hundredth time.
The four of us are at the baths. After initial awkwardness, completely on our part and not anyone else’s, we slipped into the water and slowly got comfortable.
Yes, there’s nudity everywhere, but everyone else is very chill about it. Jade’s looking on with mild curiosity, Tessa has her eyes closed and is relaxed back against the wall of the pool, and Emma is more flushed than any of us and desperately trying to keep her eyes from meeting anyone else’s.
I told her if she wanted, I could drive her back to Chris’s and then return later to pick up Tessa and Jade, but she wanted to do it with us.
“You know, this is actually impeccable timing,” Tessa says, her eyes still closed. “One of my frequent contributors sent me an article about a yoga retreat in Bali. It’s all very zen, and I wanted to go myself.” Tessa’s magazine is all about travel, and she spends a lot of time working with the contributors. “This is like my own little wellness retreat. But even better because I have you all with me.”
“We’ll even get to do yoga tomorrow,” I say.
“If you ask nicely, Tess, I’ll make some of those infused pitchers of water tomorrow, too,” Jade says.
“It is a lot better with friends,” Emma adds. “Even if I’m slightly uncomfortable having seen you three naked.”
“She went alone to the retreat, and I kinda picked up on the fact that she was getting tired of traveling without her partner.”
“That’s gotta be tough,” I say.
“It’s not quite long-distance,” Tessa says, “but I can see some parallels.” It’s been almost two months since Luc and Tessa met, and they’re making the long-distance thing work.
“I don’t know how you do it,” Jade adds. It’s tinged with a bit of bitterness. Her longest relationship dissolved when she accepted the job in China and they couldn’t handle the distance.
Tessa hums. “Luc’s worth it.”
When our skin resembles prunes and we are starting to fall asleep in the water—the wine and baths are a potent combination—we get out and leave, rinsing off before we go. I look at myself in the mirror of the bathroom. I’m returning to Chris’s house without my makeup, my hair pulled back in a sloppy bun. The only similarity to the Sara who walked down those stairs earlier is the dress and the heels, and I feel a twinge of regret that I won’t get to see Chris’s eyes light up when I walk in the door like they did earlier.
Now that my wine has worn off—Emma volunteered for sober driver duty tonight and drove us from the bistro to the baths—I drive us back to Chris’s house. We’re all quiet, sleepy, and relaxed, and I expect we will all slink into bed when we get home.
“I enjoyed the baths,” Jade says, and I catch her eye in the rear-view mirror.
“Doesn’t surprise me at all,” I say. I drive for another moment and then bring up something I’ve been thinking about all night. “Okay, y’all have seen my boobs now. Do you think I should get a lift?”
I see movement in the rear-view mirror when Emma sits up straighter. Tessa glances at me from the passenger seat.
“Do you want a boob lift?” Jade asks cautiously.
“I’ve been thinking about it,” I admit. “They’re . . . not what they used to be, you know? Gravity is taking its toll. I’m not perky anymore.”
“Does this have anything to do with the fact that Chris has probably seen a lot of young and surgically enhanced breasts in his lifetime?” Tessa asks.
“Or the fact that you want him to see you naked?” Jade chimes in.
