Bobbi pulled up next to Amanda’s BMW parked front row.
“Hey!” she yelled, rolling down the window.
Leaning up against her bumper, Amanda tipped her Starbucks cup back for one final swig and clomped over to stick her head through the opening. Her gray slacks and pinstripe oxford didn’t exactly scream ‘spur of the moment.’
“Bobbi, hon, thank God you’re here,” she said running her glossy French tips through her hair. “Oh, hey Leah.”
I nodded and offered her a weak smile.
“So who else is here?” asked Bobbi, deadening the engine and wiggling out the key. Apparently, this was really happening.
“Oh you know, Tarah, Lindsay, Megan, and Piper said she might come if she can get off work. But I just didn’t want to go in there without you.”
Amanda sighed and made one of those faces that was supposed to look both sad and mildly desperate at the same time.
The stench of her pumpkin spice mocha was filling up the cabin and setting me on edge.
“Okay good, almost all the girls. We can all go get drinks at Lucky Sam’s afterwards, do you think Trish would be up for that?”
“Hard to say.”
“Well, I say we invite her anyways. Might make her feel better.”
“Absolutely.”
Bobbi looped her arm through her black leather Kate Spade sitting in the console and popped open the door.
I hesitated to follow her as she stepped into the parking lot, suddenly feeling like I was seven again and scared shit to sit anywhere near a dentist’s chair.
“Leah, you coming?” she asked, already beginning to match strides with Amanda who, so far, hadn’t looked my way any longer than necessary.
I damned myself for not bringing a jacket and fell into step behind them, trying to pat down my hair from ‘sexy’ to ‘respectable’ in the mere seconds it took to cross the sidewalk.
“Trish!” squealed Bobbi as soon as the grave-faced fifty-something showed us to the right room.
There were old people galore and every pair of three-inch-thick, coke bottle eyeglasses was instantly trained on my ensemble the nanosecond of my entrance. It got me thinking that the whole ‘all eyes on me when I walk into a room’ phenomena wasn’t all it was cracked up to be.
My arms settled into a four across my torso and I tried to shove in between Amanda and the now embracing pair of Bobbi and Trish Hurley.
“Aw, I’m so glad you guys came,” said Trish, pulling away. She smiled at Amanda and I and that smile started to fade as she took in the hot pink.
I covered my mouth with my hand, looked away like it pained me to make eye contact, and mumbled something like, “I was unaware about the change of plans,” fully conscious of the fact that saying it probably made me look like a bitch.
Trish smiled nervously, “It’s fine,” she said, before we were annexed by the gaggle that was Tarah, Lindsay, and Megan.
I tried to explain the whole wardrobe thing while simultaneously trying to shove further into the sphere of flat ironed hair, perfume, and collarbones blessedly cut off from the prying eyes behind cataract glasses. I never really got through it though because Piper had blown us off again and how could she do that and who did she think she was? Same old Piper.
It was only when the gossip had dried, withered, and disintegrated when perpetually on the prowl Megan spotted eye candy across the room.
“Who’s that?” she asked, blue eyes sparkling as she pointed a slender finger at a 5’9 Timberlake wannabe.
Trish angled her face to see through the crowd, “Oh! That’s my cousin Grayson.” She smiled at Megan.
“Hello Grayson,” said Tarah, raising her eyebrows in innuendo.
“You want me to call him over here? I’m sure he’d be more than happy to.”
“Yes!”
Lindsay rolled her eyes, “You two are pathetic.”
“Hey now, just because your boyfriend is Mr. Perfection…”
“Please, have you heard him snore?”
“Doesn’t mean you can criticize those looking for their own.”
“Hey, he’s looking over here!”
“Trish, call him over!”
I took it as my cue to make a break for sanctuary.
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