“He did what?” Hattie still stood, her light jacket half off and half on.
The ice cream parlor was empty except for us. Most people weren’t crazy enough to eat ice cream on a chill night like this. It had begun to rain, not heavily, but enough to make the air that gusted in the door smell sweet.
“Look, that’s not the worse part,” I said.
“You got dumped by Len, and that’s not the worst part? What did you do? Propose to him?”
“No, I-”
“Did you beg him to take you back?”
“No. Um-”
“Did you run into the restaurant with your eye makeup all smudged from crying?”
“No-”
“Did you-”
“Stop. Let me talk, okay? It’s not anything that happened tonight. The worst part is...”
Hattie tugged her jacket the rest of the way off, sat down across from me, and leaned in as if drawn by a magnet.
The words were stuck in my throat. I couldn’t look my friend in the eye.
“Do you have cancer?”
“No.”
“Pre-cancerous-”
“No.”
“Did another relative die?”
“No.”
“Is your dad getting divorced and your step mom about to throw you out of her old house?”
I shook my head.
“She going to charge you rent?”
“No.”
“Your last painting got rejected?”
“No.”
“The Church is going to ex-communicate you for your subversive art?”
“No.”
“You’re pregnant with Len’s baby?”
“No.”
“You’re pregnant with someone else’s baby?”
“No.”
“You registered as a Democrat?”
“No-”
“You’ve decided you’re a lesbian?”
“No, just-”
“You voted for Obama?”
“Stop!”
“Look, I love you, but if you join the liberals, our friendship is over.”
“I did not join ‘the liberals’.” I made air quotes. “So spare me the lecture about Obama being the antichrist.”
“An antichrist, not the antichrist. The scriptures say-”
“I’m thirty.” There. I’d said it. “And nine months.” Three months away from the dreaded age of thirty-one, when I would be too old to go to church in the singles ward. My records would be sent to a regular old family ward full of married couples and children.
Hattie sat back, then grinned as if she’d won a bet. “I knew it!”
“You did?”
“Well, I knew there was some reason you were dating my loser cousin.”
YOU ARE READING
Paint Me True: Sample Chapters
RomansaI will upload a chapter a day until I have a good sample up, and then I'll upload the rest once the book is no longer exclusive on Amazon. Eliza Dunmar is about to turn thirty-one and fears her best days are behind her. Soon she'll be too old to att...
