The Accidental Girlfriend

“Well, my date last night sucked,” Madi said, sliding a slice of ham and pineapple pizza onto her paper plate. “He totally catfished me. He was easily pushing fifty and did not have the body his Tinder profile said he did.”

“I told you to ditch that app,” I muttered around a mouthful of pepperoni and cheese. “It’s the worst.”

Tina nodded in solidarity. “I’ve never been happier since I deleted it from my phone.”

“Yeah, well, I like it.” Madi paused. “Most of the time.”

“It’s fifty-fifty,” Iz said. “Jared’s sister has been using it since her breakup. I helped her look through some guys and hoooooey, some are a treat, but the rest of them…”

“They should be euthanized,” Tina finished. “They’re either married, catfishing, or their looks are prettier than their personalities.”

“I’ll drink to that!” I raised my wine glass, and we all clinked. “All right, so Madi’s date was a bust, Iz visited her doctor to complain about things she decided to put her body through—Tina?”

She chewed, looking up thoughtfully. “I think I’m going to adopt a cat.”

“Really? You do know they’re assholes, don’t you?” As if he’d been called, my gray-and-white cat, Henry, strolled into the room. He studied us all with dark brown eyes before pausing by Cara’s pram and sniffing it for a moment. Seemingly unimpressed, as was his default mood, he trotted over to us and looked at all of us.

Then he bounded up onto the sofa and plopped on top of Iz’s head.

I bit the inside of my cheek. I swear I wasn’t laughing. Okay, maybe I was a little bit. She was sitting there with a slice of pizza hanging out of her mouth and my cat on her head. She looked utterly ridiculous, especially when Henry flicked his tail around to stroke her cheek.

“Lauren,” she said slowly. “Your cat is sitting on my head.”

Honestly, there was no way to reply to that, was there? Except there should have been because Henry had issues.

Henry liked sitting on people’s heads. He always had done, ever since I’d brought him home from the shelter when he was nine months old. It’d been cute to start with, but now he, well. He wasn’t exactly a small, cute kitten anymore. In fact, he probably needed to go on a diet.

It wasn’t comfortable when a fat cat sat on your head.

With a sigh, I got up and walked over to her. Henry meowed his displeasure as I extracted him from my sister’s head and deposited him in the hallway next to his scratching tower.

“We’ve talked about this,” I said to him. “If you have to sit on people’s heads, at least have enough manners to wait until they’re done eating.”

He mewled, turning around and showing me his butt.

Such a polite boy.

Rolling my eyes, I left him to sulk and probably pee in one of my shoes. “There. He’ll leave us alone now.”

“Until he wants one of our heads later,” Madi pointed out. “Back to catching up. Recap: Iz went to the doctor, I got catfished, and Tina wants to adopt a cat who doesn’t sit on people’s heads. What’s up with you, Lauren? Please have something juicy. The older we get, the less crazy these girls’ nights are getting.”

“The last time we went out, you were the one who got tired at nine-thirty and wanted to go to bed,” I reminded her.

She groaned, reaching for her wine. “The shoes, man. They’re so high, and there’s only so many times I can be perved at by kids.”

“Those kids are only four years younger than you, and it’s easily solved by either wearing a fake engagement ring, pretending to be a lesbian, or simply wearing a shirt that covers your tits,” Iz pointed out.

“She has a point,” Tina said around a mouthful of food. “Just wear a sweater and sneakers. Problem solved.”

“When did this become a shame Madi party?” She sniffed and leaned back with two slices of pizza on her plate. “And Lauren still hasn’t told us what’s new with her.”

Three pairs of eyes turned to me, but only my sister was smirking.

Because she knew.

Nothing.

There was a big fat nothing new with me.

“Um…” I grabbed another slice of pizza before setting my plate on the floor in front of me. “I looked for new curtains for my bedroom?”

“Lauren,” Tina groaned. “How is that exciting?”

“How is thinking about adopting a cat exciting? I’ve done it. Look at where it got me.”

Iz pulled a hair from her mouth. “She’s not wrong.”

Madi leaned forward, pushing a loose curl behind her ear. “Curtains, Grandma? Really? You work in a bar. Are you telling me that nobody asked for your number? Did nobody eye you up? Nobody wanted to bend you over and—”

Cara cut her off with a snuffle.

We all froze. I don’t think any of us breathed for a good ninety seconds until my niece filled the room with sucking sounds as she made good work of her pacifier.