ALL CHARACTERS IN SEXUAL SITUATIONS ARE OVER 18.
Characters are fictional.
Also, thanks to all the readers who have reached out and become friends. For all those who have sent compliments, this story is for you!
Enjoy!
MJ
*****
Chapter 6
Adrianna: Regarding Laura
Wednesday afternoon I got a text from Shayla.
'OMG! Laura invited us to ML to show n tell. What do I do?'
I stared at my phone. I tried to remember the days of home phones. Jeez. While I was thinking of what to respond to Shayla I got a text from Laura saying how excited she was, and that she wanted to see all of us tonight. Was seven pm okay? I texted Laura that seven was fine. I texted Shayla that she should chill out and show up at seven.
Shayla, Melanie, and Laura were already at the table when I got there. Laura looked positively radiant.
"Did you see the video of Peter's proposal? Isn't that the most romantic thing y'all have ever seen?" Laura said.
We were all quiet for a moment, which made me think that Shayla must have also told Melanie about 'the speech'. Laura didn't seem to notice however as she had gotten up and done a quick twirl of joy.
"It was the most magical thing in the world," Laura said. "It's totally different from the first time when I was knocked up and my father had to go after Jeff with his shotgun and bring him back."
"What?" That was from Melanie. I thought she was kidding, so I smiled.
"Well," Laura had seated herself again and she scooted closer in to the table. "It's bound to be different right? Being sixteen and pregnant with an older guy you barely know who basically has to say he'll marry you isn't going to seem very romantic. Even though that's the only thing I have to compare it in real life I still think this was the most romantic proposal I've ever heard of, don't you?"
We just stared at her.
I saw my arch nemesis walk in and my face sqwunched up like I was sucking on a sour lemon.
"What?" Laura said.
I had a horrible taste in my mouth and was trying not to stare at the chubby mouth-breathing pig. I took a moment to calm myself.
"That's Bud Bear," Melanie said. "He moved here from Charleston. He's a thief and a cheat and at the top of Adrianna's shit list."
Laura looked at me.
"He plays, ah-hem, 'music' and it's these pre-recorded musical tracks that he illegally downloads on his computer. Then he plays them while he is preforming and pretends it's him playing the guitar and singing. He jumps around stage to distract from the fact that an entire band sound is coming out of one person. He goes around to bars and venues and says that he can play for less than a band. Bud undercuts the band, puts four or five people out of work, and gets double or triple what each musician would make because there is only one of him. He does a terrible thing and it's a terrible show. But some bar owners go for it because it saves them money."
"What a sleaze ball!" Laura said.
"There are other rumors," Melanie said. "Cheating on women, sexual disease, drugs, fired from some of his day jobs for doctoring the books. But that was all in Charleston. Here as far as we know he's only screwed over musicians."
"The first person I've seen in New Orleans that I know to stay away from," Laura said, twisting in her seat to take a good look at his dark hair and beady eyes.
"Let's talk about something else," I said. "I'm sorry I interrupted you, Laura."
"I was going to say wasn't it the coolest thing to hear Peter propose to me? Wasn't that just the nicest speech you ever heard? I think it was a great idea that we recorded it and emailed it to all our friends and posted it on Facebook. Don't you?"
I'm quite a talker but I just wasn't sure what to say first.
"Well? Melanie?"
Thank God she did not pick me.
"Anyone who wants to spend the rest of their life with you is filled with smarts and romantic splendor," Melanie said.
Well done, Melanie.
"There. See?" Laura said.
"You got married when you were sixteen?" Shayla asked. I wasn't sure if she was just making conversation or she was thinking what I was thinking.
"Sure did. Dropped out of school, popped out my Scotty, became a full-time mom. My husband's a jerk but Scott is such a sweetheart I never could regret it."
The use of the present tense regarding the husband wasn't lost on the three of us. Melanie and Shayla looked at me. I looked back at them. How come I get the hard questions?
I got the last one, Melanie's expression said.
"Um, so." Are you still married? No, no. That's not the best way to phrase it. "How long were you married?"
"Twenty-four years."
"No..." Shayla, Melanie, and I all said at once.
"Yup, would you believe it? Twenty-four years. My son has four children. I'm a grandmother."
This last bit just flipped my lid beyond what I could take. I made a noise. "Byoingg-oing-oing-oing."
"I know," Laura said. "It baffles me too. But there it is." She took out her phone to show us pictures.
"Oh, but first, I have to show you this incredible engagement ring that Peter gave me," Laura said.
Laura put her hand out in Melanie's and we all took a look at woven copper and gold ring with three tiny diamonds all in a row. Shayla's sharp intake of breath had us all looking at her.
"I know, I know, it's gorgeous, right?" Laura said.
Laura and Melanie bent their heads down together to stare at Laura's hand as I mouthed to Shayla, "What?"
Soundlessly Shayla mouthed back, "That's Tracy's ring."
Chapter 7
Adrianna: Regarding Angela
I admired that Shayla was portraying enough of an outer cool that she wasn't hurting Laura by raining on her parade. But I could tell that Shayla was stressing and I was stressing too.
When I'm stressed I eat, I oversleep, or I call Angela. There was no food on the table. I wasn't getting out of ML so easily to crawl back into bed. But option number three roared in to my head like a great big ball of need.
"Where's Angela?" I asked.
"I don't know," Laura said. "She was supposed to be here an hour ago." She put her hand in mine so I could oooh and aah over her ring.
I felt bad, like the jambalaya I'd eaten was doing the tango in my stomach. I simply stared at the ring and was quiet. What the hell did I know? I didn't know what Tracy's ring looked like. Maybe he just liked the style.
Laura took her hand out of mine and gave it to Shayla who looked like someone sent a poleax through her forehead.
"I know," Laura said. "Unbelievable right? That someone would give something so beautiful to me? But here it is. Concrete proof that I am loooo-aaaah-ved."
Oh, crap. This just does not bode well, does it?
Just then Angela walked in. She was tightly tucked and curled under the arm of a man who looked like a combination of just got out of boot camp and a character in a Where's Waldo drawing.
I half expected to see a book under one arm and a hunting rifle in the other. I immediately checked to see if he was wearing a plastic pocket protector. She looked up at him with an utter adoration that was raw Toll-house cookie gooey.
Ut-oh.
"Everybody, this is Burt."
"Hello, Ladies." His voice was surprisingly rich and deep. Burt was about 5'6", with military short light-brown hair, and tortoise-shell rim glasses. He smiled at each one of us in turn. He held out a chair for Angela.
"Sorry we're late," Angela said. "We were busy."
Burt blushed red from his neck to the roots of his hair.
Melanie decided to be the one to give this guy the third degree. I was glad because I was already prejudiced against him. First, he'd gotten so neatly around Angela's new no sex on the first date rule. Then, he'd asked Melanie, who he hadn't even met yet, for money. Not the kind of facts that make me impartial. I was trying to appear neutral. I wasn't sure I could do it so I certainly didn't want to be the one asking twenty questions.
Melanie started nice and easy, by asking him his full name.
"Tallalamus Burt Caldwell."
We all stared at him.
"My first name is a combination of syllables of my parent's best friends' names, Tally, Al, and Remus," Burt said. "Burt was my grandfather's name. Caldwell was my mother's maiden name. My father changed his name to Caldwell when they got married. He figured after hundreds of years of women changing their names to match the man's name someone should do it the other way for a change. I don't love my middle name but considering my alternative is Tallalamus, it's not like I have much choice."
"Do you have a job?" Melanie asked.
"I work for an accounting firm."
"Siblings?"
"I have a twin, who has the bad grace to be two inches taller and have better hair. If that wasn't bad enough, he plays the sax better than I do and his name is, argh, Robert.
"I've never been married. I don't have any children. I grew up in Hawaii as a kid. We moved to Los Angeles when I was in ninth grade. No I don't know Brad Pitt.
"I'm crazy about Angela. There's no one else like her."
That's for sure.
"Every time I see her I light up all over."
I can see that.
"What firm do you work for?" Shayla asked.
"Anderson and Wentworth," Burt said.
Melanie whistled.
"Longest relationship?" That was Laura.
"Four years," Burt said.
"What happened," Laura asked.
"She became a born again Christian and I didn't."
The interrogation went on. His voice was melodious and his stories entertaining. He was handsome in that weird combination of strong and muscular yet geeky and intellectual at the same time. I could see why Angela liked him.
Angela waved her hand around and I caught sight of her ring. I was amazed I hadn't noticed it before now.
"Cripses!" Holy shit is more like it. "Wow."
"Wow is right," Melanie said.
"Double that," Laura said.
"It's a dinner ring," Angela said in a fake haughty English accent.
"What's a dinner ring?" Laura asked.
"It was what, in the Victorian era, gentlemen sometimes gave to their betrothed if they were paired up but wouldn't be engaged for a long time," Angela said.
"Sort of a pre-engagement engagement ring," Laura said.
"Exactly," Angela said.
"It's my great-aunt's. Was my great aunt's," Burt said.
"She gave it to us as a pre-wedding present," Angela said. "Isn't it sublime?"
I had to admit that it was. It was obviously turn of the century. It had ten thin gold bands that looked like waves wrapping around fourteen small diamonds.
"It's like a sparkling ocean," Laura said.
That's exactly what I was thinking.
"It's beautiful. It really is," I said. "Congratulations." I looked at Burt. "I think a family heirloom is a wonderful, classy, thing to give a lady. This piece obviously has a lot of meaning to you and your family. I can't think of a more worth-while person to give it to."
Angela sniffed.
I slapped her gently on the shoulder. "Now stop that. It's true. You're certainly worth diamonds, and gold, and accolades, and love."
"And rubies, and money, and fame," Melanie said.
