”Layers,” Dana said, pointing at Shane in wholehearted agreement. ”Layers provide so many options.”

Alice met Tina’s gaze sympathetically as their two friends continued to analyze the romance value of different types of weather and their contribution to the perfect date night. Dana and Shane together could riff off each other for hours, so it was probably best she head this thing off.

”There was water,” Tina pointed out, interrupting them in the name of productivity. ”But I don’t remember it rippling the way you describe.”

”You should pay attention to that stuff more, the ripples,” Shane said, which made perfect sense as Shane treasured the little things in life. Tina, however, was more of a big-picture kind of girl.

”I’ll try and work on that,” she said. ”Put it on the old to-do list. ’Listen for ripples.’”

Dana leaned in, ready for more. ”Okay, so dinner on a bench with a modicum of possible rippling. Maybe a star or two if I remember last night correctly. And then?”

”Then she took me home.”

The room fell into a frozen kind of silence. Shane leaned forward, deflated now.

”Wait. That’s it? Did you invite her in at least? For a quick drink maybe?”

Tina shook her head.

”At least say she came inside.”

”She did not,” Tina said. ”I’m sorry to disappoint you.”

”No, no. That’s okay.” Tina sat back in her chair. ”At least you had the bench.

That’s something.”

Tina stood and headed back to her desk. ”There was a rather hot kissing session in the hallway,” she tossed oh-so-casually over her shoulder, which prompted three excited women to climb over the table and practically tackle her in the middle of the room.

”Kiss #2 is major!” Dana pointed out.

”It does say something,” Alice said, sliding atop her desk.

Shane nodded wholeheartedly, clearly feeling like this was Christmas morning as far as romance went. ”It says they’re totally going to fall for each other!”

Tina held up a finger. ”It doesn’t say that, actually. It says we have physical chemistry and it turns out that Bette is a decent human being. Anything beyond that is simply not going to happen. Let’s be realistic.”

Deflated, Shane walked to her desk. ”So you’re saying you’re hot for her, but that’s it.”

It sounded so shallow when the words were said out loud, but Tina had to call things as she saw them. She had certain requirements for her happily-ever-after, and Bette Porter, sin-on-a-stick, simply didn’t fit what Tina had lined up in her head.

She tried her best to explain. ”I need someone a bit more ordered and structured. Like me. Someone who keeps regular hours.”

She shrugged. ”We’d make dinners together and watch artsy films and maybe adopt a cat.”

”I didn’t even know you liked cats,” Dana said.

”I mean, I probably do,” Tina answered weakly. ”But that’s not the point.

Bette’s incredibly good-looking and, as it turns out, not a bad conversationalist, but the practicality of she and I ever working out in the real scheme of things is in the negative zone. Not even on the chart, and you know how important charts are to me.”

”You’re not going to make a chart right now, are you?” Shane asked. Tina shot her a look and took a seat in her desk chair.

”But here’s the question,” Dana said quite seriously. ”What are the chances of future make-out sessions?”

Tina felt the blush touch her cheeks before she could control it, and that seemed to be all the answer her friends needed to clap and cheer. She shouted over them. ”Hey! Wait. I don’t know! I didn’t say there would be.”

”You don’t have to,” Shane said, chair dancing as she went to work. ”But I have a feeling there’s a good, strong whiskey sour in your near future.”

”Well, have you seen the bartender?” Tina  asked, facing her computer screen. Okay, so maybe this was a little fun.

”And we have liftoff,” Alice said and popped a piece of banana bread into her mouth.

After the laughter subsided, everyone fell into their respective morning routines and the office slipped into quiet. Was it possible that a steamy thought or two crossed Tina’s mind as she organized her email?

Well, anything was possible.

##########################