Silence grows between us.
“Senna?”
“Hmm?”
“Do you ever...?”
“What?”
“You know...”
“Get to know them?”
“Yeah...”
“No. Not in that way,” I say, my mood instantly shifting.
She senses the change and stays quiet.
“Okay. Give me the rundown,” I say in a different voice.
She gets the cue fast and starts giving me the updates.
We go over the list of topics before I review her notes. I pick ten, move five to the ‘maybe’ pile, and slash the rest off the list.
“Sounds good,” I say. “Anything else?”
“Yes. There’s a hotel expense on the last statement, and I was wondering if it was business related.”
“What hotel stay?” I ask, distracted.
“A week ago... I wasn’t sure what it was since it was here in town... That’s why I wanted to double-check with you.”
“Oh, that...” I pause, the memory coming back to me, flaring through my senses.
“No, it’s not business related. Anything else?”
“You have a dinner scheduled for tonight. At the Black Rose. Eight o’clock. Adele, Mark, and... a question mark?”
“Shit. I forgot about that,” I say.
“The dinner or the question mark?”
“The fucking question mark.”
“What’s that?”
“A blind date.”
* * *
It’smoments like this when I hate my life, but I have to play the part once in a while. Adele is my only friend from back home.
Adamant as she is, she didn’t want to let go of me despite everything that happened, even though everybody else did.
My family included.
She is the only friend who had the guts to stick with me and not throw me under the bus, even though she was––and still is––one of Evelyne’s best friends.