“Thank you, Bette.  Thanks.”

“James, what would I do without you?  You’re my main man.”

He grinned so widely that practically all of his teeth showed.  “Where is your space?”

“Hmm,” she said, walking him to the door.  “I thought we’d look for a place on the CAC’s dime.”

“Yeah, we’ll look,” James muttered as he left the office, excitement rolling off of him.

_____

There was so much to tell Suzanne that Bette hardly knew where to start.  They had spent last Monday talking about a ‘current event,’ Bette’s strained father-daughter relationship.  In just a few days, they had a lot more ground to cover, but not much time.  She jumped on the first item that she knew would require some time.  “So, we’re getting along very well.  We were really connected, kissing.  Making out, actually, and our friends saw us together again.  It was right and I had just said that to her when my half-sister, Kit called.”

“How did Kit’s call change things?”

“Kit was pissed that I had been less than kind to her…Ivan, the person, woman she’s seeing.  We had gone out, they had been dancing, while they were on the dance floor, who should come up to me, but Candace.  When Kit saw Candace, she thought she needed to save me from myself, so she concocted a way to distance me from Candace.  I didn’t want or need her chaperoning me, so I insulted Ivan.  Then Candace, I guess, propositioned me…”

“You guess?  Surely, you’ve seen enough of the world to know if you’ve been propositioned.”

“Okay, she did.  But Suzanne, let me explain what happened earlier.  I had eavesdropped on a conversation between Tina and my next-door neighbor, Tim.  Tina was cruel, spiteful, hurtful.  She just went for the jugular.  Granted, she didn’t know I was there, but it—it made me just ache inside.”  Bette told Suzanne all that she had heard.  “Candace was sitting there, propositioning me, telling me that I was wanted and my mind kept going back to what Tina had said, that I wasn’t capable of love.  I think I wanted to prove her wrong.  I decided to leave with Candace.”

“Hmm.”