Chapter 10: The Second Thing

Marina‘s idea for Radar was rather inspired-it was classier than Milk and closer, too, since The Planet was near my place and Bette’s place. Even Bette liked it. It was her idea to go on Saturday. I liked it for a lot of reasons, one of which was that Bette and I had been dating for over a week now and everyone knew that which means that the amount of girls hitting on Bette had greatly diminished.

So had the amount hitting on me, too, but I got over it.

“Hey,” Bette said, returning to my side and handing me a beer. “I just want to tell you that Sunny’s here, over at the bar, and that I know she’s here.”

“Ah,” I said, smiling. “That’s good of you to tell me.”

Bette brought her lips close to my ear: “I don’t want you to think I saw her and that I was not telling you on purpose.”

“You thought this out pretty thoroughly.”

She nodded. “I’m good at avoiding fights.”

If she wanted to believe that. I took a sip of my beer and then put it down. “You wanna dance?”

Bette raised her eyebrows at me and grinned. “Are you asking me so that you can make Sunny jealous?”

“Uh, yeah.” Sliding my arms around her neck and leaning in a bit, I added, “I like dancing with you, too.”

“Oh, I see.” She wrapped her arms around my waist and pulled me closer. “It’s one of those two-for-one deals.” Pressing her lips against mine briefly, she murmured, “Is she watching?”

I peeked over her shoulder. “She’s either watching us, or she’s checking out that hundred-footer behind us. I’m inclined to believe the former.”

Now it was Bette’s turn to check over my shoulder. “Me too.”

Out of the corner of my eye, I noticed Sunny making vulgar hand gestures. The thought of Bette actually dating her still seems a little ridiculous, but it’s probably got a lot to do with my mindset at the time.

I think so, anyway.

The second thing that led to my falling out with Bette happened only a few days after the first-Friday night. We had been getting along okay, and this second event didn’t really change much, because neither of us acknowledged it. I don’t know-that might have something to do with the fact that Bette probably didn’t know that I was too upset.