I frowned. So lucky? Well, that was a matter of perspective. Though I didn’t envy her dealing with man flu, whatever that was.
I could practically hear Sage’s bubbly voice in my head.
That’s when a man is near death from the slightest sniffle. And if Seth has the man flu, then Oliver will get it too, and if he gets me sick after getting me pregnant, he’s going down.
She might change some of the phrasing around, but I had the gist. Sage could make me smile even when she wasn’t in the room.
That was what I wanted to be like too. Fun and spontaneous and wild, and not just when it came to big talk. Up for anything. Ready to grab the bull by the horns and ride that steer all the way home.
I would start with taking charge of Sage’s shower. At least until Ally could take over again.
Planning was something I was good at. Even better now that I’d started working on planner layouts with Sage. We’d hit the craft store and now my boring school schedules were prettied up with paper tape and cute stickers and fun borders. Even my Type A nature appreciated a little embellishment of my lists.
I tugged my leather planner and one of my colorful pens out of my bag and flipped open to a fresh sheet, writing the details I knew so far at the top. Time. Date. Important info.
Right now, I had none, other than the shower was for Sage Evans-Hamilton and she was having a girl. A very spoiled little girl already, and she hadn’t even been born yet. I expected Sage to tell me Oliver had purchased the baby a pony any day now.
I wasn’t jealous.
Not even a little.
The fact that I’d chosen a green pen was just coincidence.
I grabbed my phone and sent Ally a quick reply.
Sure thing. I’d love to help! Just send me what you have so far, incl the guest list & where Sage is registered. I’ll get right on it. Thanks for thinking of me. Hope you & the fam feel better soon!
Ally’s texts saying thanks were profuse and plentiful. She promised to send over her list within the hour, which gave me plenty of time to order that pizza and get started on unpacking.
The day was looking up already.
My whole life was. A girl couldn’t be down for long when pepperoni was in her future.
And I had a project.
I freaking loved projects. And getting to buy more school supplies for said project. Hey, I’d become a teacher for a reason, and it wasn’t just because I loved little kids. I also had a pen and notebook fetish. Not all the fetishes I had, though I couldn’t safely explore most of them.
And Tommy thought sex with me was just “nice”? Ha. Here I’d been holding back.
Whatever. He didn’t deserve me.
So said Gloria Gaynor as I put on one of my favorite feminist anthems—I had a whole playlist of them, in fact—and doubled down to do some serious unpacking.
Along with a little booty dancing in between.
Sure enough, as I was digging through my box of my grandmother’s china, an email came in from Ally with an attachment. I grinned as I opened it up. Almost pizza time too. The guy on the phone had told me an hour, and it was almost sunset. Busy time on a Saturday night. But I didn’t want to run down and get another lo
ad of my stuff until I finished with what I had in here and refueled.
The refueling would happen quicker than finishing unpacking. I was currently in a state of hardcore flux. Boxes were open everywhere, stuff spilling out in every direction. The few sparse pieces of furniture I had were covered with crap. Luckily, the place had been semi-furnished because my old sofa was a mess and I couldn’t have afforded movers in any case.
See, I needed more friends. That was yet another reason why. I was like an island, adrift without pals to help me move and make me laugh and drink cheap wine with me while I lamented ex-sex that hadn’t even led to an orgasm. At least that I could remember. So that probably meant a big fat no, it had not.
I narrowed my eyes on Ally’s attachment. Hmm, had she sent over the right file? This had almost nothing on it. About as little as the new page in my planner.
Quickly, I texted Ally back, sure she’d sent me an early file instead of the updated one.
Her response?