“Yeah of course! I’ll just work on my article until then.”

With that Shane walked out into the warm sunshine and dialed the number on the paper that Julie had given her.

“Hair by Dan, this is Jose speaking. How may I help you?”

“Hey my name is Shane McCutcheon, I was told to speak to Dan?”

“Oh yeah, you’re Julie’s girl. Hold on a minute.”

A second later someone else came on the line.

“Hey Shane its Dan! My sister already called about you. Could you come in for an interview? Today or tomorrow possibly? I know that’s quick but I’m looking for someone to start fairly soon.”

“Yeah that works great. What about tomorrow in the morning?”

“Sounds good. Bring a portfolio of your work. See you then.”

Shane smiled—or more she forced herself to smile. She had heard that if you smile even when you don’t want to that it could make you happy. In reality, she was terrified of all the changes going on right now and all she wanted to do was runaway from it all, but she knew that wasn’t an option. She loved Carmen and Shay so much—she could never do that to them, but that didn’t stop her from wanting to. She looked back to her phone and called the number for the name of the lawyer that her and Alice had looked up and decided on.

********************************************

Forty-Five minutes later, Carmen joined Shane and Alice at the Planet.

“Hey baby,” Carmen said. “This is a surprise—why did you take off work?” She leaned in for a kiss as Shane placed a land on her waist.

Shane smiled. “I was starting to feel like Ward Cleaver—I needed a break to catch up with my friends and spend some time with my girlfriend before we pick the kid up.”

“Well I’m glad you did. What have you guys been up to?”

“Just talking about Alice’s new article and the crazy people at my ‘work—pretty boring stuff.”

The rest of the lunch the women just chatted about their day-to-day lives and Alice cracked jokes. It helped Shane get her mind off of everything going on and it was nice to be out with Carmen without having to worry about Shay.