North of Normal

Chapter Twenty Seven

"Polly?"

Polly very gingerly lifted the pillow from atop her head and squinted in the dim light of the bedroom, then thrust the pillow back down over her head to drown out all noise and light coming from the outside world.

"Are you here?"

Polly sighed heavily, and then threw the pillow to the side, convinced now that the voice calling from downstairs was not a figment of her imagination, but instead was Mae looking for her.

"Polly? Your car is out front, so I'm guessing you're here..."

"I'm up here," she said hoarsely, clearing her throat and attempting to sit upright in the bed before sinking back under the covers in defeat.

If you drink a really good merlot, you usually won't get a hangover – that was the rule Polly had been taught years ago.

However, if you drink an entire bottle of pretty cheap merlot, you are going to pay for it in the morning, Polly mused as she heard Mae's footfalls on the stairs, and then saw the door being flung open. "You look awful," Mae said by way of greeting, and Polly would have laughed harder at her astute observation, except that it hurt her head too badly.

"I'll give you a million dollars if you'll bring me coffee, aspirin and a handgun."

"What's the gun for?"

"To blow my brains out when the aspirin doesn't work. Or to shoot the balls off Chase Colton. I haven't decided," Polly said matter of factly, and Mae laughed heartily.

"Lover's quarrel?" Mae asked innocently, to which Polly only glared. "What happened?"

Polly looked at her, her eyes silently pleading, before Mae laughed and turned around. "Fine, one coffee, coming up."

Minutes later, Mae was stretched across the bottom of Polly's bed, both of them sipping coffee while Polly tried to clear the cobwebs from her mind. "So, basically, I turned into a spastic ball of overly emotional female, and while it felt like vindication at the time, now I just feel like an idiot. And so I decided to overcompensate for my idiocy by drinking an entire bottle of merlot on my own. And now I'm in desperate need of a lobotomy to relieve the pressure in my head."

"What happened?"

Polly took a deep breath in then blew it out slowly through her nose, yoga style. "Chase and I have been... growing closer since I've been here, right?" Mae nodded with a slight eye roll, so Polly continued. "Well, we were... close, once before."

"How do you mean?" Mae asked.

Polly sped through the next sentence."Chase and I slept together once after his graduation and in all the time since we've been reacquainted, he's never mentioned it. I figured it was either embarrassing to him, or hadn't come up in conversation..."

"I'm sensing a big 'but' coming down the pike..." Mae trailed off as Polly nodded emphatically.

"No, it wasn't that he didn't want to embarrass me or get into the emotion of it. It was that he didn't remember we'd slept together. A pivotal moment in my entire life, and he doesn't remember because he'd knocked back too many PBRs at the party. Now, I feel stupid for two reasons: for being so overly pissed that he doesn't remember, and also for reacting like an idiot when he didn't remember. I should have played it cool and funny, but for some reason... I don't know, Mae. It just really shattered a part of me."

"He was your first, wasn't he?" Mae asked gently.

Polly flushed, and then nodded slowly. "Yes, but he definitely doesn't know that. Talk about humiliating. The guy that took your virginity doesn't even remember the act. Ish."

"But I bet the guy that Chase is now feels bad about it, and that he'll apologize. And you should forgive him. And then crawl into bed with him and make new sexy memories," Mae said, doing a little chest shimmy to drive her point home.

"Mae," Polly said in a warning voice, biting her lip to keep from laughing at Mae's smooth moves. "Cool it."

"I'm serious! I'm still on Team Chase here, not Team Husband Cheater Man!" Mae exclaimed. "Jump him."

"You're like a little parrot, just repeating the same thing over and over and over again," Polly said, but not without affection for her young friend. "I just wish... I just wish Chase knew how much that night meant to me, even if it didn't mean a damn thing to him."

"I think that's fair," Mae said reasonably. "Women place a lot of emphasis on the milestones like that, and while guys don't, they have to respect how we feel about it. And he should apologize, even just for being an idiot. But I really think you should hold off on shooting his balls off, because the holding cells in Houghton aren't the greatest, and then there'd be the hassle of having to find your own lawyer unless you represented yourself..."

Polly arched an eyebrow at her younger friend. "What do you know about what the holding cells look like in Houghton?"

Mae ducked her head and took a big gulp of coffee, making Polly laugh. "Fine, fine, I won't ask..." Polly said, her tone wheedling, even as she waited to see if Mae would take the bait. "Alright, fine. So, what are you working on today? Do you need me to stick around or anything?"

"Nope, I'm good," Mae replied. "I'm going to work on getting all those new gutters installed today, but I'm going to need some help from a couple of guys – it's a bitch being short sometimes, ya know?"

"Short but cute," Polly replied. "Better than tall and gangly like me."

"Oh yeah, right. You're truly horrid, Quasimodo. Put a bag over your head now and shuffle around so no one can see the horribleness that is your hangover," Mae retorted.

Polly laughed, and then pressed a hand to her aching hungover head. "Actually, the bag idea doesn't sound half bad right now..."