Page 12 of Between the Lines

“Shit.” Breathing a bit heavily from her dancing, she looked around the room, a bit lost.

Dressing up? She hated it.

Socializing with human beings who weren’t part of her social circle? She hated it even more. There was a reason that she chose to make a living from behind a computer screen.

If she tried to stay home, though, her sisters would drag her bodily from her room, and experience had taught her that Amy went for the hair, the bitch. Sighing as though the world was ending, which the stone in her gut told her it was, she shuffled across her room to her tiny closet.

She hoped that Ford would be okay with ripped jeans and a T-shirt, because that was all that she owned.

“Aah!” Opening her closet, she ducked when something flew through the air. Batting at her head as though something might be nestled in her hair, she exhaled on a laugh when she realized that the flying object had been something swooshing on a hanger—a dress. No wonder she hadn’t expected it.

A dress. What the hell?

Scowling, she unhooked the hanger from her closet door. A note fluttered to the floor as she did.

Jo,

No, you can’t wear jeans to the open house. Wear this instead.

Meg

(PS: Matching shoes are under your bed.)

“Shit.” Jo groaned out loud. She did not wear dresses. In fact, she mostly wore men’s clothing. She was used to people wondering if she was a lesbian—the way she dressed, the way she carried herself, the lack of any long-term relationship seemed to invite the question. She’d even wondered herself for a while if the lack of sexual interest she’d had in men since Theo was because she wasn’t attracted to them as a species.

One female fling later and she’d discovered that that wasn’t right, either. She was who she was—not a lesbian, not a boy trapped in a girl body. She was just Jo, and she was far happier when she dressed how she wanted, behaved how she wanted, dated—or didn’t—who she wanted.

She thought her sisters understood that, and she felt her infamous temper rise as she examined the offensive garment.

The fabric was actually quite nice—some kind of heavy, silky stuff, none of that wispy, flirty fabric that always made her feel like she was half naked. The top part had a halter neck, which she liked, and though the back dipped lower than she was comfortable with, she actually quite liked the fact that the tattoo on her back—a stunning phoenix inked by her sister Amy—would be shown off.

That left the skirt part, which she didn’t think she could get past—except that when she examined it, it wasn’t a skirt at all, but rather shorts. Meg had gotten her what she supposed would be called a romper, and the relief was like chugging icy lemonade on a scorching-hot day.

A quick glance under the bed showed that her older sister had had enough sense not to get her high heels, either—the shoes Meg had chosen were flat, gladiator-type sandals, with straps that wound up her calves. She could deal with that.

After slithering into the simple garment and struggling with but ultimately conquering the shoes, she looked in the mirror and thought that maybe, this time, Meg had known what she was talking about. Jo didn’t feel like she was playing dress-up, she was fairly comfortable and she wasn’t wearing jeans—everybody won.

Flicking a glance at the time on her phone, she saw that she only had five minutes to get across the grounds to the hotel. With any luck, her sisters had already left, and no one would try to attack her with lipstick or a hair straightener.

“Slayyyyy.” Giving one last look in the mirror, she tried out the word that Amy used whenever she was trying to tell someone that they were looking hot. She placed a hand on her hip and tried out a seductive, come-hither expression before bursting out laughing.

Ironic for someone with a blog called Jojo Kink, she thought as she clattered down the stairs and out the front door, that its owner wasn’t the least bit, and had never been, sexy.

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