“Oh, fine… just visiting with Riley, plus finishing up my internship at the hospital and getting ready for D.C.”
“I heard about Georgetown – congratulations!”
“Thank you – but I couldn’t have done it without Riley.”
“Bullshit, Meg – you totally did it ALL on your own. All I ever did was write a few checks.”
I was struck by the fierce pride Riley had for her sister. The same pride I’d heard when we talked outside the skeezy no-tell motel in Seattle.
The type of pride she was totally lacking in her own accomplishments.
Megan dissented, and Riley insisted, and Ryan brought it back to the here-and-now. They chatted for a few minutes about what Riley and Megan had been doing, which surprisingly included a couple of Broadway shows.
“Oh my GOD, Ry, kill me now. PLEASE,”
Riley gagged.
Ryan laughed, then turned a bit serious. “Hey… you haven’t seen or talked to Derek, have you?”
“No, why?”
“He’s supposedly in New York.”
“Thank GOD – somebody to drink and chase tail with. Oh – except he ‘n Blondie probably patched that shit up by now, I’ll bet. Is that why he’s in town, cuz she lives here?”
Riley knew about the fight in Vegas?
It made sense; she hadn’t left yet when the confrontation between me and Derek went down.
“That’s why he’s there,” Ryan said. “But
she’s
not.”
“What? How do you know that?”
He glanced at me; I raised my eyebrows like,
Is it safe?
and he nodded.
“Because I’m right here,” I said as I pulled my chair next to Ryan’s.
The expression on Riley’s face was absolutely priceless. First there was shock, then confusion, then glee.
“HOLY SHIT! Blondie, what the fuck’re YOU doing there?!”
There was a young woman sitting next to Riley, and the contrast between them couldn’t have been more striking. Whereas Riley was outrageous – even just hanging out and doing nothing, she had a full-on spiked mohawk going, now dyed shocking pink – her sister was absolutely normal. Megan had a full head of reddish-brown hair with bangs, clunky plastic-rimmed glasses, and a flowery shirt conservative enough to wear to a hospital internship. She was more plain than cute, but there was real kindness in her features and intelligence in her eyes. There wasn’t any physical resemblance between them, but that made sense, since Megan was Riley’s foster sister. They hadn’t actually met until Riley was a teenager.
“Hey, Riley. Is that your sister?”
“Oh, yeah – hey, Megan, this is that journalist chick for Rolling Stone I was telling you about!”
Wow!
I thought. I was very pleasantly surprised to be introduced like that. After all, it was Riley we were talking about. I was expecting something a lot less respectful and a lot more salacious, like –
“She’s the one banging Derek on the side,”
Riley continued.
“Or WAS, anyway.”
There it was.
“Riley!”
Megan scolded.
“Well, it’s the truth!”
Riley said, again like a five-year-old justifying herself.
“Hi, Megan. It’s a pleasure to meet you.”
“Hi, Kaitlyn – a pleasure to meet you, too. I’ve heard a lot about you.”
I groaned. “From her last comment, I can only imagine what.”
She laughed.