Previously.

            Alice had happened to glance at her watch. “*****, I am late. I’ll talk to you later Dane.” Alice said giving Dana a friendly kiss on the cheek. “Bye”

            Dana sat there watching Alice leave. She lightly touched her cheek, still warm from Alice‘s lips. She was so in love with Alice. Touches like those, even if friendly always made Dana feel all warm and queasy inside. “Bye” Dana whispered to her self. She was totally fucked. Maybe Subaru would make an ad campaign for her again. But instead of ‘GET OUT. AND STAY OUT.’  It would say ‘Dana Fairbanks has fallen for her best friend Alice Pieszecki. And now she is *****.’ Maybe something a little shorter, but that would do. Maybe it would force her to tell Alice, just like she was forced to tell her parents. Dana smiled at the memory of how Alice had accompanied her to tell her parents. True it did not work out how she wanted it to. But she knew that if she went alone. She would never have gotten through it. Lara had been there for her afterwards, but Alice was too. And some how Alice made it all better. Alice always made it all better.

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            It was not that Alice was late; it was that she could not stand to listen to Dana talk about Lara. She knew that it was wrong that she just kept walking out on Dana, every time that she mentioned the chef. But Alice just could not listen. She could not be the friends she was supposed to be. Call her selfish for thinking of herself right now, she might agreed with you. Alice knew that she was being unfair, but would you honestly want to sit there and have your heart ache, and tears build up. No, no one would; Alice did not want to. So she just kept walking away from Dana.

            It was easier, and less painful.

            She was also *****. Her conscious was kicking in, but so was her heart. She was being split in two. No, three. Her brain was telling her that she was being a bad friend, and just forget about these feelings for Dana; that she is her friend. The other side of her brain was telling her to walk away, that it would hurt less. Her heart was saying you love her, tell her. Alice was being pulled in all different directions, and she was exhausted. She was tired, and she needed help.