Bette blinked several times as she tried to wrap her mind around what was just said.  “Girlfriend? Girlfriend?”

“As in *****.  I’m *****.  So was my ex.”

Bette’s head moved up and down quickly and she continued to blink and stare at Gail Sturges.  “That’s neat.  Really, that’s cool.  I don’t have a problem with that.”

“Why would you?”  Her blue eye and gray eye pierced her in just the way Ash’s did when he wanted to know more of her.

“I don’t.”  Bette shrugged. 

“Yeah, but why would you?”

“I don’t.  It’s cool.”  Bette’s eyes lowered slightly as she took a long, slow look at her friend.

“I can’t say that it’s cool, but it is.”

“Yeah, fine.”  Bette picked up her tiny cup of espresso and took a long swallow that left her body shaking.  She was close to spraying it straight out in front of her.  She frowned as she finished what was in her mouth.  “I’m such an airhead.”

“That, you’re not.  It’s powerful, huh?  Got a real kick.  I guess I’ll make that number 73 on my list.”

“What?”

“My list of when not to come out to someone.  Never come out to anyone when they’re drinking espresso–the look on your face.”

Bette didn’t know what to say.  When she had arrived at Willoughby’s it was in the hopes of inviting Gail out for an evening with her and Ash and maybe one of Ash’s friends.  She mentioned it in passing to her boyfriend, thinking it would be fun for him to get to know this woman whom she was spending a significant amount of time with.  If Gail had had a boyfriend, it would have been just four friends hanging out.  If she had been single, it would have been a possible blind date.  Gail was single, but this put an entirely different spin on it.  “I’m sorry, Gail.  I had no idea.  I’m just a little surprised.”

“No reason to be sorry.  You wouldn’t have known.  I don’t wear a sign around my neck, you know.”

“Yeah, but you don’t look like a…”  Bette froze, knowing how that sounded.  She had heard comments like that leveled at her many times.  ‘Gee, you don’t look black or half-black’ or the word she hated most, mulatto, because it sounded like she should be on some plantation, hiding from the mistress of the house who hated her because she looked too much like her husband and one of their slaves.  Why people couldn’t get their mouths to produce the word ‘biracial’ was beyond her.  “Sorry, I didn’t mean that.  I – I…I’m sorry.”