Page 40 of Changing Tides

“I don’t know. Something simple and honest,” I say.

Amiya’s mouth twists as she thinks.

“Got it!Frumpy, tired single mother seeks attentive, average-looking man who likes sassy four-year-olds and awkwardly codependent best friends who never go away,” she states as she begins to type.

“Amiya!”

“There. It’s simple and honest,” she says as she clicks away.

I look down at myself in my baggy sage-green sweatpants and white tank, then back to her. “You think I’m frumpy?”

“Terribly so,” she replies.

I slide my eyes over to Leia, who is playing on the rug.

“What about you, squirt?” I ask.

She glances up from her Legos and squints at me. “You should wear more sparkles,” she states matter-of-factly.

My mouth falls open, and I crouch down to tickle her.

“Et tu, Brute?”

Leia starts squirming, scattering the foot-piercing plastic pieces across the porch.

“What’s a brutrey?” she asks through giggles.

“It’s a traitor,” I bellow.

“I’m not a trailer,” she wails.

“Not trailer. Traitor. You’re supposed to be on my side.”

“I am. I am,” she wheezes.

Amiya shuts the laptop and looks at me as I roll over Leia and lie down on the soft shag.

“You could skip the bullshit and just email your profile straight to Sebastian,” she suggests.

I look at Leia, who is lost in her play again.

“Little ears,” I stress.

“Sorry. You can skip the crap and send your profile straight to Hawaiian hottie,” she rephrases.

I push myself up and join her on the couch.

“I’m not interested in pursuing anything with him.”

“Hmm, didn’t look that way when I walked in on the two of you in the hallway last night,” she muses.

“Nothing was going on,” I protest.

“Please. You could cut the sexual tension with a knife. I got high on the pheromones you two were emitting. They were like gasoline fumes about to ignite and burn the house down.”

“You’re worse than a man—you know that?”

She grins. “You mean,betterthan a man.”

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