Page 8 of No One Like You

“I’m sorry… Did you say roller derby? What is roller derby?”

“It’s a sport, on roller skates. It’s uh… hang on.” Tasha whipped out her phone and quickly started typing. “Oh, yeah.” She typed a bit more, then looked up and grinned at her friend. “Oh yeah, you and Sophia are in for a treat! Guess what we’re doing tomorrow afternoon?”

“Uh, I’m not playing roller derby.”

“We’re not playing, we’re watching. There’s a juniors doubleheader tomorrow. Trust me, you’re gonna have a blast!”

“I could tolerate watching softball because I played it, and I always enjoyed watching you play soccer, but I’m not sure that I want to watch a bunch of dudes on roller skates hitting each other.”

“That’s the thing. It’s not dudes. This is primarily a women’s sport. It’s very open and inclusive. Body positive. It’s all the things you’re gonna want Sophia to learn. Oh…”

“What?”

“Okay, you might hate me later, because I bet that Sophia might get hooked.”

“Tasha…”

“It’s cool! You probably won’t really hate me. More like that love/hate kinda thing.”

“Tasha…”

“Trust me, this is going to be the best thing ever.”

“And how did you hear about roller derby anyway?”

“Uh, I went on a date a while back. This guy was super excited about seeing hot chicks hitting each other.”

“You’re not helping your case.”

“Well, he was super disappointed. I think that he was expecting fishnets and fistfights and what we saw instead was this amazing sport played by people who kept their clothes on. Anyway, that was our second date and there was not a third. I did hook-up with one of the skaters another time.”

“You hooked up with one of the skaters? But, you said that this was a wo— Oh…”

Tasha looked over at Megan, desperately hoping not to see disgust on her face. “Yeah, I wasn’t sure how to bring that up.”

Megan’s expression stayed pointedly neutral. “Well, some things have definitely changed since college.”

“Yeah. I guess you could say that.”

Tasha breathed a small sigh of relief as she saw a devilish grin start to form on Megan’s face. “Oh no, Tasha! You’re not getting away that easily. I want details, girl! I mean, I don’t need every detail, but how did this happen?”

Tasha grinned back, glad that her friend seemed fine with this bombshell. “Okay, here goes…”

CHAPTER 6

CINNAMON GIRL

As the trio clambered into Megan’s car, a random thought popped into her mind.

I gotta get HOP cards for me and Sophia.

Yet another item on a list that seemed to get longer every time she thought about it.

Megan was feeling unmoored. Just thirty-six hours ago, life was normal; routine. Then there was Brad’s infidelity, the long drive to Portland, reconnecting with her college roommate and (renewed) best friend, and then finding out that Tasha was a lesbian. Okay, maybe not a lesbian—Tasha said that she wasn’t calling herself anything right now, because she needed to figure herself out. Anyway, it was a lot for Megan to process in a short amount of time. Unmoored seemed like the perfect word right now.

Priority list. What is important? What do I need to concentrate on and what is noise? Concentrate on what needs to get done. Everything else is noise.

Brad? As unbelievable as it might have seemed, given that they had been married for a decade, he was just noise. Definitely the kind of obnoxious noise that she didn’t need right now.

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