Chapter 2

Dirty Shots and Clean Secrets…

NOW

(Beth)

Holly had made the most painful face I'd ever seen when she invited me out to celebrate her upcoming wedding. She was the type to plan all her own parties to make sure they were perfect. And she held my hand as though she were telling me that someone close to me had died.

I laughed and told her I would be there.

Jeez, you get divorced once and suddenly you were judged over it.

Holly thought it would have been painful to attend her bridal shower. Which was being held at the bar she and Brian had met, three years ago. It was so cute to hear the story of how she was dead drunk and stumbled into him, spilling a drink all over him as he caught her from falling. She was a mess and he took her home and took care of her, not even trying to sleep with her. Which was apparently a big thing for Holly because first dates were often first nights for her.

I had to laugh again because we all worked at a bar on the other side of town. So our night off to hang out we were at a different bar.

Holly sat in a booth against the wall, working on replicating how drunk she was the night she met Brian. She was going to spend the night with Dani, who was drinking cherry soda.

I slipped my way around to the booth and sat down next to Holly.

She quickly put her head on my shoulder.

"I love you, girlfriend."

I reached with my left hand across my body and touched her face. "Love you too."

"I'm serious." She lifted her head. She stared at me. "I. Love. You."

"I know," I said. "You're really drunk."

"I love you enough to ask you something."

"Ask away," I said. "Since when do you need to be drunk to be invasive?"

Holly grabbed my left shoulder. "How do I know this is right?"

"What?"

"Marrying him? OhmyGod . What did I say yes to?"

I swallowed hard. "Oh."

"How did… I mean…. you were married. You loved him. Right?"

"Oh, Holly," I said. "You can't do that."

"I have to know everything."

If I was going to dive into the abyss of my marriage to Joel, I was going to need a lot more to drink. And I was going to need someone to be my wingman - winggirl - so I didn't end up doing something stupid. Like climbing up on a table and flashing the bar. Or getting something pierced. Or waking up next to someone whose name was as mysterious at the night itself.

"How do I know I love him?" Holly asked.

"You have some jitters," I said. "That's all. You're fine."

"You sure?"

"Holly… come on. You've been with him for a while. You want to marry him. You're planning a wedding. It's already happening. Why second guess it?"

Holly nodded. "Sure. Right. And… I mean… divorce isn't all that bad, right?"

Before I could answer, Holly leaned back and started to laugh.

"Then she saw the size of his dick and she pretended to puke to leave," Maria said as she burst into a fit of laughter that only made Holly laugh harder.

Holly slapped my leg as Nelle just shrugged her shoulders.

"I'm like a carnival ride," Nelle said. "There's a certain height needed to enjoy it."

I laughed.

Nelle was ditzy and drunk.

Comparing herself to a carnival ride wasn't all that smart or appealing, but then again, it was Nelle.

"You really faked sick?" Holly asked.

"Of course I did," Nelle said. "This lawyer talked such a big game. He probably bought the entire night on a credit card he couldn't pay off. And then gets me back to his place and pulls out that little hot dog."

I started to laugh too.

"I went into the bathroom and made the most gross sounds I could make. This guy was a pretty guy too so I knew if he thought I was sick or had some other bodily things going on, he would want me gone. So I left."

"I can't imagine," Holly said.

"You're all locked down now," Maria said. "Dating is crazy anymore."

"I don't date," Nelle said.

"You just fuck," Holly said and snorted. She turned her head and looked at me. "Maybe you should have stayed married, huh?"

Everyone looked at me.

The question maybe crushed me a little.

I slowly stood up, knowing I needed to say something.

"Maybe I should have faked sick the first time I saw his dick," I said. "Would have saved me time, headaches, and fake orgasms."

They all started to laugh.

Then they all woo ed and lifted their drinks.

I slowly backed away and grabbed Dani's hand, telling her I was going to use the bathroom really quick.

I just needed to get away from the table.

It was too loud and now Holly was talking about my divorce again.

It was weird to be at the age when divorce was sort of common. And yet it was the same age where women like Holly were just getting married for the first time. And then you had women like Nelle, who were proud of themselves, happy to be single, enjoying the not-really-dating life.

I had no idea what I enjoyed.

Life with Joel had been a whirlwind.

And the fact that it all started because of-

"Hey."

I stopped and turned my head.

My eyes went wide.

And I finished my thought.

"Leith."

I did this strange stutter step thing like I didn't know what to do with Leith.

Which was sort of true.

I mean, there was a good part of me that wanted to hug him and ask him what he had been up to since the last time we talked. But there was another part of me that wanted to punch him. I even picked out a good spot right on his jaw to do it. He probably thought I was staring at his iron-cut jaw, but I wasn't. I had my time staring at him before. My fingertips had memorized that jawline so well they were tingling, knowing where that kind of touching would lead.

But I couldn't punch him.

And I couldn't hug him.

So I stuck my hand out.

Leith looked down at my hand.

As he offered his hand, I closed my hand into a fist.

A handshake seemed formal. But a fist bump…

OhGod, I'm like a college kid.

Leith put his hand over my fist and moved it up and down. "Nice to see you again."

I pulled my hand away. "Wow. This is crazy. Sorry. I'm caught off guard. What are you doing here?"

"Picking up chicks," he said.

"What?"

Leith laughed. "I'm kidding. Came for a couple drinks and some wings."

"Do you always come here?"

"Why? Do you?'

"No," I said. "My friend is getting married."

I turned and pointed to the table.

There was Nelle hunched over the table, her mouth aimed at a shot glass. Maria hurried to hold Nelle's hair back and she wrapped her lips around the glass and stood up, taking the shot.

"Wow," Leith said.

"She's crazy."

"She's getting married?"

"Nelle? No way. She can't commit to more than one night."

"I can see why," Leith said.

"What's that supposed to mean?"

I looked back at Leith.

"Well, a mouth like that…"

I swatted at his chest.

Rock. Hard.

Stop it, Bethany. Stop it.

"You're disgusting," I said. "All you men are the same."

"You think I'm the same as every guy here?" Leith asked.

I opened my mouth but quickly stopped.

This was too casual. This was too calm. Too cool. Too… much like the old us.

I clenched my teeth tight and stared at him.

His eyes were dark but not when he was in the light. Catch him in the sunlight and his eyes shined. An almost honey-red color, if that made any sense. But to see it you'd have to get really close to him. I had been really close to him before. I wondered how many other people had been really close to him too.

Which shouldn't have mattered.

No.

It didn't matter.

At all.

"It's good to see you, I guess," I said.

"You guess?"

"I don't know, Leith. I was going to the bathroom and you appear."

"So I'm holding up your pee?"

I smiled.

He was probably the only guy in the world that could talk like that to me.

I should have been grossed out or maybe blushing that he was talking about me peeing.

"No," I said. "I didn't have to go pee. I just wanted to walk away."

"Because of the dirty shots?"

"Dirty shots?"

"Your friends. Going down on glasses like that."

"You think I don't know how to do that?" I asked. "Am I not the one who basically taught you how to drink?"

Leith laughed harder. He leaned against a black pillar and had one foot up, a far cry from the sort-of-dorky-but-so-damn-cute boy that had once stolen my heart at an age my father said was way too young.

"I'll give you that," Leith said. "You may have corrupted me a little. But I was the one who always stayed behind to make sure you didn't get puke in your hair when you went too far."

"When have I ever gone too far?" I asked.

Borderline flirting. Yikes.

Leith took his phone out of his pocket. For a second.

"What was that?" I asked.

"Just seeing what time it is."

"You have a hot date?"

"No. Just wondering how much time we have until the bar closes to talk about all the times you've gone too far."

I swatted at his chest again.

Still. Rock. Hard.

"Asshole," I said.

There was a loud woooo from behind me.

I cringed and turned to see Holly trying to climb up on the table.

It started to tilt and Dani hurried to grab Holly while Maria and Nelle put their hands to the table to keep it from falling.

"You're going to get in trouble for that," Leith said.

He pointed and I saw a pretty bartender on her toes, craning her neck to see what was going on.

"You know her?" I asked.

"Jessie? Old friend."

My lip instinctively wanted to curl with jealousy.

At the same time, a wild urge kicked up in me. The urge to go order five shots and find the craziest ways to take those shots. The urge to grab some random guy and make him dance so close to me, things would get messy. The urge to take those five shots, then five more, and pretend I was a famous singer and everyone in the bar was there to see me sing.

"Can you just tell your friend to give us a minute to clear out?" I asked.

"You want me to do you a favor?" Leith asked. "I haven't seen you in how long?"

"What does that have to do with anything?"

"I just wanted to say hey. Not get stuck here."

"Oh, you're stuck here now?" I asked. My nostrils flared. "Not much has changed with you, huh?"

Leith pushed away from the pillar.

He was inches from me. "I'll go talk to Jessie. Go tell the bride-to-be to take it easy."

"Thank you," I said.

"Hey. Thought for a second you were the one getting married."

I laughed that sounded like a eh-eh-eh guilty, drunk girl laugh.

I turned and walked away.

Oh, Leith, if you only knew the truth…