I rolled my eyes. "You’re mean."
"Uh oh, looks like she’s spotted you. Incoming in 3. 2. 1."
"Allison Masters? Oh. My. God."
/>
I turned around, steeling myself. Maybe Tessa was right and I was being naive. "Hi, Audrey," I said, pulling my hair behind my ear.
"You look amazing!"
I almost choked on my beer. "Uhm, thank you."
"You’re in New York now, right?"
"Yeah." I gave Tessa a look out of the corner of my eye but she just shrugged.
"You look like a New Yorker! It looks like it was a good change for you. You really look fantastic."
"And so do you. You’re glowing!" I said, unable to stop her friendliness from infecting me.
She ran her hands over her big belly. I don’t think I had ever seen her smile so sincerely and kindly before. "Thank you. Say thank you, Little Eva," she said to her belly.
"What a pretty name," I said. I couldn't stop myself from asking. "How many weeks are you?"
"Thirty-two on Monday,"she answered before someone called her name and she looked away and waved. "I’m so glad things are going well for you. You look great! Bye, Tessa."
She walked away.
Tessa rolled her eyes. "What. The. Fuck. Was. That."
"Shut up and have your bouncer boyfriend fetch us more beer."
***
After midnight, and after several more pitchers of their nasty beer, things had become a bit more lively around the Statesman. The place had filled in with Bloomfield high alums from the last ten years, and among them I had spotted all three of my ex-boyfriends.
So far none of them had the audacity to stop and say hello, which suited me just fine. Every one of them were total jerks and none of our relationships ended well. If you could call them relationships.
But the beautiful Dennis Kamp had continued making eyes at me all night, and now that I was feeling a little drunk, the idea of a hot make out session was sounding very appealing.
"I wonder if he’s just loading up his spank bank with fresh images or he’s actually going to come say hello at some point," Tessa said. She was very drunk, and her boyfriend had already taken her keys and told the bar to cut her off. She was still up on two feet, though.
"You’ve got a way with words," I told her.
"Come on," she said, grabbing my hand and putting her fingers through mine. She started walking towards Dennis, who had spotted us bee-lining it towards him and turned himself to receive us. He smiled.
"Tessa. Allison, good to see you," he said. "You girls look great."
"You mean she looks great," Tessa said, holding up my hand. "I wanted to let you know that your telepathy isn’t working. You’ll need to use words."
I blushed, embarrassed.
"I need to use the bathroom. You watch her for me," Tessa said, and handed me off to Dennis.
I smiled shyly. "Sorry, she’s drunk."
But Dennis took it in stride, his eyes glancing down at my cleavage every few seconds. "It’s cool. So I hear James has hit the big time."