Mia woke me by lightly touching the red marks Simon left me from my leather thong beating. "Ow."
"Sorry," but she kept at the little lines on my hamstrings and back.
"What are you doing?" I mumbled into my pillow.
"He left you some pretty work." She took a pic with her phone and showed me my back. Simon had left a crisscross pattern on my pale white skin. It was pretty. I wondered how much darker they must have been a few hours ago.
"Oh. Huh."
"So, good night with Simon?" I thought of the night before, and before I could speak, she giggled, "My God, that was some face you made. It was a must have been a good night."
"Neal here?"
"No, Savannah."
"The city or some girl named Savannah?"
"The city. His dad is some big shot lawyer there, and Neal works for him," she pouted.
I was very confused, "Neal manages a bowling alley."
"Oh, I didn't tell you. He and his dad have an arrangement: Neal can do whatever he wants for work, but he had to go to law school first. So, he graduated high school early at 15, and went straight to college. After that, he graduated and bought a bowling alley. But, every once in a while, he goes to help his dad with a case, which earns him a huge stipend as a legal analyst. When his dad retires, Neal takes over at the firm." She looked proud of him.
"Huh. Well, good for him."
Her pretty face slumped again, "Bad for me."
"Miss him?"
"Yeah."
I hated seeing Mia so sad. She was gorgeous, Latina, and my best friend, as well as roommate. When she was sad, it was like seeing a dolphin try to walk on land: she was out of her element and didn't know what to do about it. Mia usually had two speeds, fucking or about to be fucking. "Sweetie, why don't we get some take out and Netflix all afternoon?"
"That sounds great. But we can't watch iZombie," she shook her head.
"How come?"
"When Neal found out I watched an episode without him, he was so mad, he didn't talk to me for our whole shower."
"Okay." Egg rolls and hours later, Mia and I snuggled on the couch as we watched a nature documentary about birds in the Amazon. It was a very comfortable arrangement until my phone buzzed and I jumped when I saw it was my boyfriend Gino. "Hello?"
"Hey, Hon. Wanna do something?"
"I'm keeping Mia company, Neal's out of town."