“This is,” Bette began slowly, “a… hypothetical equation involving Tina.”

I wrinkled my nose. “Like math?”

Bette ignored me, waited a beat. Her eyes strayed to her hands on the table, fingers spread out with an even space between each of them. Following her lead, I looked down at them, too, wondering if we’d see something interesting. Nah. She has nice fingers, though.

Bette exhaled. “What if-”

“Hey.”

Bette and I both looked up in surprise, the impromptu board meeting cut short so successfully that I felt a little winded. Standing behind Bette was Tina Kennard, and I knew it was Tina for several reasons. One, the caffeine really helps in distinguishing shapes and colors! And two, Bette got this awful deer-in-headlights thing going. Maybe Tina wasn’t supposed to get the memo about the board meeting, but now she was trying to sit in on it anyway.

Because Bette wasn’t saying hi, I figured I’d say something because Tina was just standing there all expectantly as if she was waiting for presents or cake or something. “Hey!” I said with a fake smile. “We were just talking about you.”

Sparing a glance at Bette was a mistake, I realized, because she was glaring at me and shaking her head as if to say ‘Who does that?’

I shrugged.

Bette stood, fixing her hair. “You came. Good.”

Should I stand, too? Was Tina royalty?

Bette indicated the chair next to hers. I watched as Tina moved to sit in it and then Bette started to pull it out for her. Then she seemed to realize what she was doing and stopped abruptly, abandoning the chair when it was halfway pulled out from the table. I chewed on the end of my coffee stirrer.

They both sat down. There was an awkward beat.

Tina said to me, “You’re probably Alice, right?”

I probably was. I had to respect her for breaking the awkward silence, so I nodded. “Yeah, hi.”

“I’ve heard a lot about you.”

I nodded again. “Me too. Only-for you. I mean, I’ve heard a lot about you, too. Hi.”

“Nice to meet you.”

“Same here.” Lies, lies, lies.