LITMIR.BIZ

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up at my ceiling fan spinning slowly around and around. It wasn’t a question of when, around this place. It was just a question of who was next.

      chapter

       3

      I didn’t have to wait long. The next morning, Jack, my band’s guitarist, arrived on my doorstep, suitcase in one hand, Fender guitar case in the other.

      “It’s over,” he sighed, setting down his suitcase. “Is my old room still available?”

      I rushed forward and hugged him, my hand instinctively brushing back one of his blond curls from his cheek. “You know the Heartbreak Hotel is always open,” I said, stepping aside and sweeping my arm up toward the staircase in a gesture of welcome. He hefted his suitcase again, which bulged at the seams and apparently contained everything he owned, and walked through the frosted-glass front door. Following behind him, I silently clapped my hands and shook my hips back and forth in a sort of we-hate-Sara-and-we’re-so-glad-she’s-gone dance.

      “She was cheating on me,” he called over his shoulder, looking at me as he mounted the carpeted staircase. “With her cousin’s husband. And you don’t have to look so positively ecstatic that we broke up.”

      “I’m not ecstatic.” I widened my brown eyes to look innocent. “Just mildly pleased,” I muttered under my breath.

      He turned around as he reached the landing. “I heard that.” He faced forward and walked down the hall, continuing, “I know I was an idiot for putting up with her. I know it. But let’s leave the I-could-have-told-you-so-Jack looks alone.”

      I contorted my face into my best effort at looking appropriately sad and nodded. I tried to refrain from taking the remaining stairs two at a time and skipping down the hall to his old room, two doors down from mine. He opened the door and set his suitcase and guitar on the Oriental rug one of Nan’s old lovers, the mysterious Mr. Punjab, had shipped her from India, with a letter professing his undying devotion.

      I sat down on the bed, and Jack came over and sat next to me, exhaling slowly. “Just like old times. Two years ago, was it? The Mardi Gras I found Leigh in bed with her old boyfriend?”

      “Yeah. That was the year we all took leave of our senses.”

      “Well, I can’t say I like finding out my girlfriend was fooling around on me, but I do love this place. I was almost relieved to move out, knowing I was coming here. Knowing you were here. And Nan.”

      “And Dominique.”

      “She’s here? God help us all. Yes…even Dominique. Though if she comes at me with any of her mud masks or aromatherapy treatments, I’m going to lock her in the room with Sadie’s ghost.”

      “She doesn’t believe in Sadie.”

      “Yeah, well, wait until she’s home alone some night and hears the door slam.” Jack draped an arm around my shoulders and pulled me closer to him. “Did everyone know except me?”

      “Know what?”

      “Don’t play dumb with me, Georgie. About Sara.”

      I shrugged. “I don’t know, Jack. You always seemed more in love with her than she was with you, but it wasn’t my place to tell you. Or any of the guys’.”

      “Hey, next time…if there is a next time…I give you permission to stop me. Between you, Gary, Tony and Mike, someone in that band had better talk some sense into me. You guys are my best friends. You’re supposed to prevent me from dating women like her.”

      “And what exactly is a woman like her?”

      “Trouble. Two-timing trouble. I don’t know. See…I’m not even sure I can spot them when I see them. But you can. You knew. It’s that women’s intuition.”

      “Women’s intuition. Bullshit. Look…she flirted with every guy in the room. But even if we had all tried to say something, it wouldn’t have mattered. People in love don’t listen—especially men. You go on autopilot. And the pilot is your penis.”

      He grinned at me mischievously. “Then you better talk to Jack Junior down there and stop me from making another mistake.”

      “I make it a point not to be on a first-name basis with my friends’ penises. As far as I’m concerned, Jack Junior is on his own.”

      “That’s not very nice, leaving Jack Junior with no sense of direction.”

      “His direction is up—and hard. Jack, you—and Jack Junior—always go for the blond-haired, blue-eyed beauty queen with ice water in her veins. Do you not see a pattern?” I shook my head. “Why is it up to me to point out your woefully bad taste in women?”

      “Because I’m a man. We’re stupid. It’s a genetic failing in our chromosomes. I admit it.”

      “Thank God. It’s about time.”

      Jack and I have been friends ever since he joined Georgia’s Saints, our band, replacing our old guitarist, Elvis, who got into channeling “The King.” Shortly thereafter, Elvis showed up at a society wedding in a sequined polyester jumpsuit instead of the requisite tuxedo. We were sad to see Elvis head for fame and fortune in Vegas—or at least a gig singing “Love Me Tender” at this little wedding chapel. But Jack fell into a groove with us, as if he’d always been part of our group.

      I flopped back on the bed. “I am sorry about Sara. I never liked her, but that doesn’t mean I’m happy that you caught the little bitch with someone else.”

      He fell back next to me. “You’re practically oozing with sentimentality, Georgia.”

      “Yeah. I know. It’s one of my many shortcomings.”

      “I don’t know that you have as many as you think. Anyway, I figure a night blinded by tequila, a few clubs, some R and R at the Heartbreak Hotel, and I’ll be over her in no time.”

      I rolled over and kissed his decidedly stubbly cheek. “That’s the spirit…. You’re face is all scratchy. You need a shower and a shave. I’m going to go take a nap before the wedding tonight.”

      “Didn’t you just get up?”

      “Yeah. But that means nothing to us creatures of the night.” I feigned a Transylvanian accent.

      He stretched. “Sara and I fought all night long. A little shut-eye sounds good to me, too.”

      I got up and walked to the door. “Sleep tight. Watch out for Sadie.”

      “I’m more afraid of the wandering drag queen and her mud masks.”

      Hours later, Jack frantically knocked on my door. “You ready to go?”

      “Of course not.”

      He opened my door, handsome in his black tux. “Jesus Christ, you’re not even dressed?”

      “You know I am genetically incapable of being on time.”

      That is my stock answer. I also blame it on pantyhose. And sequins. They’re a deadly combination.

      Sequins are unforgiving. If you want to wear something that screams out that you’ve indulged in a chocolate binge of epic proportions, including Junior Mints, followed by a pint of Heavenly Hash ice cream, wear sequins. If you want to remind the world—no, flaunt to the world—that you use the treadmill in your bedroom as a coatrack, wear sequins. If you want proof that God in heaven, indeed, has a fucking sense of humor, then look in my closet. In the colossal cosmic joke that is my life, I wear sequins every weekend. I live in sequins.

      And so there I was, in my best bra—which simply means my two cats haven’t chewed it—and a body shaper, staring at six sequined dresses like a sparkling, spangled rainbow, and dreading putting any of them on.

      “Gary’s going to kill us,” Jack said, his hair still wet from the shower.

      “You

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