Fancy Love

Fancy Love: Part 10

“So she’s really coming?” 

“Jess, that’s the third time you’ve asked,” Ailec said, laughing, “And yes, she’ll be here at seven.” 

Jess glanced at her watch for the fifth time in ten minutes, “I can’t believe Carmen Roberts is coming to my house.” 

Ailec picked up a bottle opener, pried open her beer and clicked it against Jess’s, “Well, she is. Could you try not to be a hopeless groupie chick when she arrives?” 

Jess tilted her head pretending to think, “I can try,” she mused, “but I’m certain I’d fail so I’m determined just to go with it.” 

“Go with it?” Ailec said, quirking an eyebrow. 

“Yep, go with it... the flow that is.” 

“How very reassuring,” Ailec muttered, gulping back a long swallow of beer. A knock at the door interrupted. Ailec looked at Jess and rolled her eyes. The woman seemed to be vibrating with excitement, and scampered off to answer the front door before Ailec could move. She leaned against the kitchen bench, taking another swig of her beverage, her first beer really was going down a treat. 

“It’s only Tom!” Jess’s disappointed voice called from the front hallway, and moments later the two wandered into the kitchen. 

“Beer?” Ailec asked, directing the question at Tom in way of greeting. 

“Thanks, after Jess’s welcome I’ll need to drown my sorrows.” 

“Carmen Roberts is coming... I thought you were her, and well, you were a disappointment because you weren’t.” Jess said, hopping up and down and grinning. Ailec turned back to the fridge, grabbed a beer, opened it and slid it over the counter to Tom. 

“Thanks Al... and pull the other one Jessie.” 

Jess smiled hugely at him, and then said smugly, “You’ll see.” 

Tom raised an eyebrow at Jess, turning to Ailec, “She’s for real?” 

“Yep.” 

Tom blew out a breath, run a hand through his hair and then looked down at his outfit – jeans and a t-shit, “Am I under-dressed?” 

“For what?” Ailec asked, eyes twinkling. 

“For making a good impression, of course,” Tom said with an exasperated sigh and eyes raised skyward. 

Ailec laughed at the look and then shook her head, “Tom, nothing you could wear would help with that.” 

The doorbell rang and Ailec moved quickly around the counter, “I’ll get it,” smiling sweetly at Tom as she dodged away from a slap aimed at her as she passed. 

“You’re not nice, you know,” Tom said.

Ailec ignored him. She’d spent the afternoon obliquely answering a multitude of questions from Jess about their famous guest, giving very little information away about the billionaire, but apparently giving enough away about herself to have Jess enthusiastically investigating the possibility of a crush. Ailec had denied it, not fervently, as that would have been a dead giveaway, but enough to throw Jess off the scent. Lying to herself, however, was another thing altogether, so she dutifully acknowledged the butterflies frolicking in her stomach as she approached the front door. 

Opening it, she could already feel herself smiling like a maniac, matters only getting worse as Carmen was suddenly right there, standing on the front porch of her best friend’s house, a bottle of something in one hand and a whole watermelon in the other.