“‘Kay,” I agreed.

Bette paused for a moment after she’d started the engine up. She blinked at me. “Alice, buckle your seatbelt.”

“Oh, sorry.” I did so, and tried not to let my facial expression let on just how absolutely ***** endearing it was. It didn’t make sense, this attraction to her. I was just drunk. That’s all I could make of it.

“Okay, where do you live?”

“Uh, your best bet is to get on the 405 and-*****. Wait.”

“What?” Bette sighed. She’d already started driving.

“My roommates. It’s-” I shrugged. I’m so ***** at explanations. “Kyle, he’s… a recovering alcoholic and we’re supposed to be really careful about coming home drunk. Or… reeking of vodka, as it is.”

Bette nodded.

“I mean, if I were just a little drunk, I’d try to slip in, but-”

“But my sister decided to douse you in liquor,” Bette finished bitterly.

“Right. I guess I can call a friend and ask them if I can crash for the night at their place.”

Bette pursed her lips together, her eyes on the traffic. Finally she said, “You can stay with me, for the night.”

“No, it’s okay.”

“I don’t want to get on the ***** 405,” Bette said. She cast a glance at me quickly and grinned. “And it’s a little late to be calling people.”

I looked at the digital clock reading on her dashboard. It was just after two. “You don’t know my friends,” I tried to tell her, “they’re like, night owls, it’ll be totally cool-”

“Alice.” As she stopped at a light, she shifted in her seat and fixed me with that look, the one I was already becoming used to as her ‘there’s absolutely no arguing with me’ look. “I feel really guilty about what happened with my sister.”

I started to lie. “It’s not your fault.”

“It’s my fault that you smell like you took a shower in Absolut. It’s my fault you can’t get the interview now. Just let me make it up to you, okay?”

The thing about Bette is that when she’s being sincere, it absolutely melts your insides. I mean, that’s the only thing I can think of to explain why I was looking at her and I suddenly couldn’t breathe; my lungs must’ve ***** liquefied or something.