For Better Or Worse by Jodi Payne Page B

“But it was Gail’s idea!”
    “What are we, twelve, now?” I called out from the bathroom. I heard Julie apologizing to Anna and then she appeared at the bathroom door. “Our friends know us entirely too well.” She tried to look contrite, but the growing grin on her lips gave her away. Julie was very much one for doing the ‘right’ thing so I loved it when I could get her into to mischief.
    Julie slid into the bathroom behind me and looked at me in the mirror. “Anna reminded me about the function tonight,” she said. “We’re going this time. You got me?”
    I groaned. I had to learn to time my seductions better. I would rather have gone to Anna’s last night and skipped this afternoon’s ‘function’.

2
    Cocktails. What a snore.
    Could someone please find me a group of lesbians that don’t want the warm and fuzzy, traditional noose around their fingers, two and half kids and a dog? Or maybe a few dykes that don’t use recycled toilet paper and spend every Tuesday night in yoga class? Or one, just
one
woman who smokes?
    If one more person asked me if Julie and I were planning a family I would have screamed. I actually considered stepping right into the middle of the damn cocktail party, raising my arms over my head and shouting, “No! We don’t want a family! Julie and I like drinking and dancing and staying out late! We like porn and cigarettes and swearing and we use squeezably-soft
    Charmin! We eat McDonalds! And _le petit morte _ is the closest we’ve ever come to the dreaded bed-death, damn it!”
    Is it so unimaginable to be committed in a relationship but still want to have fun? I swear, in our little lesbian community, the minute you hold hands with someone for more than two dates you’re no longer permitted around the single women. You’re labeled one of ‘them’, the couples, the women who showed up on someone’s doorstep with a U-haul.
    For the record? It was a Ryder Truck. Stick _that _ in your pipe and smoke it. Although with my luck, _you _ probably don’t smoke, either.
    I sighed, and it didn’t go unnoticed. Julie put a hand on my back. “You’re bored.”
    “Oh my God, yes.” I said, turning and giving her a fake, plastered-on smile.
    “I’m sorry, but I was invited and I couldn’t say no.”
    “You’re too nice, Jules. You should have let me tell them no.”
    Julie laughed. “How about another drink?”
    “Mmm.” I smiled, that sounded like a great idea. “How _about _ another drink?” I replied with a wiggle of my eyebrows, and accepted the fingers Julie slipped into my hand to drag me over to what passed for a bar.
    She was looking good that afternoon. It was a Saturday so she didn’t have on one of her school outfits. She was wearing her red top, which made her red hair look less red and more auburn, and it had a lovely v-neck dip that showcased the cleft of her cleavage nicely. Her khakis were nothing to write home about except where they clung to her ass, right on the crest, round and lovely.
    “I’ll have an amaretto sour and my girl here will have a cosmopolitan.” I said to our hostess. She gave me an uneasy smile in return and then looked to Julie for help.
    “Two white wines, and ignore Gail, Sandy; she’s ornery today.”
    White wine. God, how… grown up. Get me out of here.
    “Julie!” Came a voice behind us. I cringed at the sound.
    “Marion! Hi!” Julie smiled in her girlish way and gave the woman a politely platonic hug.
    “Marion, this is Gail. I’m so glad you finally are able to meet her!” Julie seemed genuinely pleased. “Gail, this is Marion, I’ve told you about her. Marion teaches English.”
    “Hello, Gail,” Marion said, turning to me. “Julie has told me a lot about you.”
    “Uh oh. That can’t be good,” I said, giving Marion a grin. I kept the hand that wasn’t holding my wine glass in my pocket.
    As predicted, Marion laughed uproariously at one of the most overused icebreaking quips ever, and then she winked