Page 30 of Give & Take

Or if I go back to the hell of begging time off work, posting new want ads. Interviews.

Chris has resumed eating her salad, but pauses, frowning. “Wait a minute. Did you just make me give you a pep talk without actually telling me what’s wrong?”

I knew she’d see through me eventually. I don’t know why I can’t just talk about my feelings directly when I’m such a straight shooter when it comes to literally everything else.

I’m grateful she got there.

I grimace. “I thought it might work universally.”

Chris narrows her eyes. Then she grins. “It’s your hot ‘manny’,” she says around a mouthful of salad.

“Oh my God, Chris!” I look around, but there’s no one else on the patio. It’s slow right now, which is why I’m taking my break out here with her. Still, she needs to stuff it. A panicky feeling starts rising up around me like I’m standing on the beach, in the middle of a rapidly rising tide. “Just…it’s never going to happen, okay?”

Chris has been blatant about me hooking up with Raphael. She’s kidding—teasing me—but part of me is fairly certain she doesn’t think it would be a terrible idea the way I do.

Then again, she speeds around a dirt track at a hundred miles an hour on two wheels and a deafening, sputtering motor. For fun. Which reminds me—I dart my eyes to the box on the table, desperate to change the subject. “You bought a new pair of motorcycle boots, didn’t you?” I say in a gotcha voice.

Chris frowns. “Huh?”

I point my chin at the black box on the side of the table, giving her a knowing smile. “You said you weren’t allowed to buy a new pair until next year.”

Chris sets her fork down. “Lana, you’re the smartest woman I know. But do you seriously think this holds a pair of boots?” She holds the box up. Now that it’s in herhand, it’s very clear it’s not boots. In fact, the box looks too narrow to even hold more than some slipper flats. Some clown-sized slipper flats, which are not Chris’s style, regular or clown-length. “Do you know how big motorcycle boots are, Lana?”

“Yes,” I scowl. “So what’s in the box?”

Her serious face spreads into a Cheshire Cat grin, and suddenly, my stomach turns. I don’t have her. She has me. “Why Lana, it’s for you. Remember?”

I lean forward, shoving her hand down by the forearm. “You’re not serious!” I hiss, looking around the patio. We’re still alone.

Unfortunately, she is. She angles the box to me and flashes open the lid. It’s quick—very quick—but it’s enough for me to see the very large flesh-colored penis within.

“Are you crazy?” I whisper-yell. I glance around the patio of the Rusty Dinghy to see if anyone is nearby. Luckily, we're still the only ones on this side of the space.

“I told you if you didn’t go on a date before the summer I was ordering you one,” Chris says.

“You told me that over half a bottle of Pinot! With Shelby! You were joking!”

Chris slides the box across the table at me. “Clearly I was not!”

I slide it right back. “I’m not keeping that.”

“Oh come on, I did a special quiz and everything! Pretended I was you!” She slides it toward me again.

“And I qualified for the jumbo-shlong?”

Chris laughs uproariously. “I may have embellished the answers. Just a little.”

She lifts it up and hands it to me. But she barely holds onto the end of the box, and the lid pops open. I think it’s going to be fine, but to my abject horror, the thing begins to tip out.

I scramble to catch it, but in horrible slow motion, the thing falls with a thud on the table, knocking Chris’s fork out of her salad, along with a few leaves, which land on the thing.

I grab it. “Have you lost yourmind?” I exclaim, grabbing the thing with a wobble and stuffing it under the table. “Chris!”

We may be alone on this corner of the patio, but we're still at a restaurant, and the beach is busy on the other side of the railing.

Chris has her hand over her mouth, and I see tears escaping her eyes. She’s notsorry.She’s trying not to die from laughing!

I reach one hand out and slap it on the box, dragging it under the table. “I’m going to kill you!” I whisper.

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