Dana considered the option but refuted it quickly. She didn’t want to take the chance of running into anyone else yet, not Lara, and certainly not Alice. She just wasn’t ready to talk to her about what had happened last night and to find out what exactly it had meant to her. Or maybe, she wasn’t exactly ready to hear the worst thing that Alice could tell her right now: that the kiss meant nothing and that nothing between them had changed. Either way, reality wasn’t Dana’s strong suit in situations like this one, and today was no different. "You know what, do you think I can just come by your place instead?"

Shane didn’t get what the difference was, but she figured that would be revealed in due time. "Sure. I’ll see you in a bit."

"Okay," Dana breathed, but Shane had already ended the call. She put the receiver down and stumbled back to the refrigerator to try to at least put something in her stomach. The thought of eating right now made her nausea double in intensity, but she knew she couldn’t do much on an empty stomach. She wondered what she’d say to Shane. Should she tell her everything that happened? Surely she’d find out from Alice eventually. But still, Dana had the sinking suspicion that somehow Shane would see her as the bad guy in all this. If only she could remember exactly what happened, she’d have a better picture to paint for her friend. But right now, the cobwebs filling her head, woven by shot after shot of tequila, were making it nearly impossible to piece the entire night together.

She took a sip of her coffee, hoping the hot liquid would somehow help dissipate the sharp hint of anxiety stirring in her gut. For the life of her, she couldn’t really remember how the night ended, why Alice left and if it was in a fit of anger, despair, or something worse. She knew that she probably shouldn’t have called the writer to pick her up from the bar in the first place, ranting and raving like a drunken lunatic that she belonged to her ex-girlfriend, who was probably off focusing on making it work with the new girlfriend. That much she remembered, and instantly felt remorse over it. But the other part of the night…the kiss, no wait…kisses, that they shared. Try as she might, Dana couldn’t bring herself to feel any regret over something like that, something that just felt so damn right. She wasn’t able to just be mature about it and wish it hadn’t happened like she knew she probably should simply because it made things all the more complicated. Dana hated complicated, and she hated messy. But when it came to Alice, none of that really seemed to matter much. She didn’t even care how scarily overwhelming and intense the force between them seemed anymore. She only knew that she wanted to feel it again, and have Alice feel it too. She was tired of living a life of denial and suppression. All that mattered this morning was the way it felt to hold Alice again, to feel her hot breath on her face, to take in the scent of her hair, and experience the sheer bliss of being able to kiss her one more time. It was as if she lived her life in a dream-like state of numbness and being with Alice again made her come alive. And even if it was the last time she’d be able to kiss Alice for a long while, Dana couldn’t bring herself to regretting one second of that euphoria.