As we were waiting for the waiter to return with the receipt, Tina and I chatted for a bit. After I signed the receipt and left a tip, we decided to head over to The Planet for some coffee and to wait for the girls to show up. After making some small talk, Shane and Alice walked in; they ordered some coffee and joined us at the table.

“So Tina are you ready for tonight?”

“Um, yeah, why wouldn’t I be,” Tina asked, looking at me.

“Shane is merely suggesting that since you’ve never been to Milk, you will be marked as fresh meat.”

“Fresh meat?”

“It’s a tacky term the WEHO gay community has for new faces. You should have seen the reaction I got when I first went there,” I said, “you’ll be ok.”

“Do I look nervous?”

“Like a scared woman going to her first gay club,” Shane said and laughed, “oh shit, there’s my girl.”

“Is Dana meeting us here too,” I asked as Shane got up and walked away.

“No, she’s meeting us at the club,” Alice said as Shane walked her cute red-head to the table.

“Girls this is Lara, Lara this is Bette, Tina and Alice.”

“Hey, I remember you all from the hospital.”

“You ready to dance your pants off Lara,” Alice asked and grinned.

“Of course,” she said and smiled.

“Are we ready to go?”

“Yep,” I said and we all hopped up. The Planet was only a few blocks down from Milk so we decided to walk and Kit so graciously agreed to drive us all home.

As we walked to the club, Alice and Shane kept talking about how much they were going to drink. Trying to get Lara to loosen up, she was a bit younger than us and it was her first time hanging out with us. She had been to Milk before but hadn’t been since she graduated from culinary school and her friends moved to different cities. Tina and I walked behind them, listening to what they were talking about and laughing. I was unsure what Tina was thinking, she was so quiet, I didn’t want her to be uncomfortable. I wanted to converse with her, but I couldn’t get my mouth to open, so we walked in silence. As we got closer, we could see crowds of people in the street and in front of the club. We could hear the music spilling onto the street, the closer we got the louder the music became, and my heart started to beat rapidly.