Lisa
"Remind me again why you lie to everyone about this fake girlfriend of yours?" Jin asked.
Jin is my best friend. When I moved to town three years ago we immediately hit it off and developed a very interdependent friendship in which we found ourselves in each other's company much too often, much to the annoyance of Jin's sister, whom he lived with (I was at their apartment much too often for her liking). When we weren't hanging out at their apartment, Jin and I often met at Alice's, a little hole-in-the-wall pub run by a feisty Irish mother and her three sons.
"Because I don't want to hang out with my co-workers after hours and make small talk about work because we realised that we have nothing in common and have nothing else to talk about. Then I'll feel awkward that we have nothing to talk about, so I'll drink to give myself something to do and to distract myself from the pure awkwardness of it all, and then I'll get drunk and you know what happens when I get drunk." Jin laughed. "I'm not going to get drunk in front of my co-workers and if I'm not going to get drunk, what's the point of going to party or happy hour?"
"Wow." Jin said and sipped his drink. "At least your co-workers don't drop bugs on your desk and stick gum in each other's hair."
"Your 'co-workers' are children."
Jin grinned. "Yeah, but if Stacey puts one more roly-poly on my desk, I am going to lose my shit."
"If you didn't want bugs on your desk, I don't think you should have elected to be a kindergarten teacher."
"But they tell me how much they love my ties or my hair and I could really use the self-confidence."
"Remind me to visit your classroom when I need a compliment."
Jin winked. "But more on point..." Jin said, directing the conversation back to my work. "Why don't you just say that you don't want to go to your work events?"
"I can't seem like I don't want to be around everyone. That would just make me look bad. Plus my boss loves parties. If I outright rejected all of his parties, I'm sure he would pass me up for the projects that he'd put me on. If I paint myself as a devoted girlfriend, then I'm not such an anti-social party pooper."
Jin frowned. "I really don't understand this logic of yours."
"And it's also because Nancy is being a total dick about it again."
Jin smirked. "Maybe Nancy is just trying to hit on you and really wants to figure out if this girlfriend is real or fake, so she can swoop in."
"Oh, God. Don't even joke about that."
"Is that why you're worried about getting drunk in front of your co-workers? Because you might hook up with Nancy?" I glared at Jin, who laughed. "Noted. No Nancy." He glanced at me and quickly muttered, "I still think that's why you won't drink with her."
"What?" I snapped.
"Nothing, nothing. Go on."
I took a sip of my drink. "I think she's started catching on though. She asked me what my girlfriend's name was today and I panicked. Thank God my phone rang when it did."
"You don't even have a name for your fake girlfriend?"
"Good point. What should my fake girlfriend's name be?"
"Jennie?"
"Jennie? Like your sister? You want your sister to be my fake girlfriend?"
"What? No. Jennie is here."
I turned in my seat to see Jennie waving at us from outside the window of the bar. Jin waved her in.
"Hey guys." she said, while pulling off her snow sprinkled coat, beanie, and scarf. She wore a sharp suit and exhaustion.
"Hey Jennie." I said. "Drink?"
"Please. Old Fashioned."
I went to the bar and ordered her drink. When I returned, Jennie was smiling at whatever Jin was telling her.
"So, Jin tells me that you're still lying about the fake girlfriend." Jennie said, accepting the drink.
"Of course I am. I'm not going to a work function after work."
"You need more friends." Jennie said.
"No, I don't."
"My brother is your only friend."
"You're my friend."
Jennie frowned at me. "You're friends with my brother. I only hang out with you two idiots because I live with him and you come over all the time."
"Wow, I'm hurt. I thought after three years, that you would have grown to like, maybe even love me. I had no idea you felt that way about me, Jennie dearest."
Jennie sipped her drink, totally unimpressed.
"I do have other friends." I muttered.
"She doesn't even have a name for her fake girlfriend." Jin whispered. Jennie laughed and I stuck up my middle finger.
"Shouldn't you at least have a name for her?" Jennie asked.
"That's what I said."
"That seems like the most basic part of the lie."
"I agree."
"Anyway." I interrupted the siblings' banter. "Enough about me. How are you, Jennie?"
"Just peachy." She took a long drink of her Old Fashioned, draining half the glass. Jin and I exchanged looks.
"Just another dick weed at work making my life hard. He thought that he could work on a case without me, because fuck me, right? A woman can't do the job as well as he does. As you'd expect, he fucked it up, which is why I'm coming home at..." Jennie looked at her watch. "... 8pm instead of 5pm. I spent the entirety of the afternoon fixing all his fuck-ups."
"Is it Taehyung again?" Jin asked.
"Of course it's the bloody moron Taehyung!" Jennie snapped with an eye roll.
"Taehyung, like your ex-boyfriend, Taehyung?"
"The one and only moron in my world."
"Sounds like we both need new co-workers." I said and raised my glass.
Jennie sighed and raised her glass against mine. Jin lifted his too, but we both pulled our glasses away.
"No, not you." I said.
"Why not me?"
"You teach six-year-olds the alphabet and then run around with them at recess. Absolutely not."
"But they put bugs on my desk."
"I'd take bugs over that asshole Taehyung." Jennie said.
"I'd take bugs over that bitchy Nancy." I agreed.
"I'll cheers to that." Jennie said. Our glasses resounded with a satisfying clink.
