Page 43 of Home to Me

"Wait a second," Sam said archly. "You live in a small town and are going on a pseudo-date with someone who you consider “just” a friend, though you lost your virginity to him ten years ago, and the part of this scenario that you're worried might get complicated or awkward is whether or not your coworker sees you on the date or not?”

"Not everything's some big drama," Lauren said, but she could already feel her cheeks beginning to flush.

Amanda and Sam stared at her with twin looks of so-not-buying it.

“What?” Lauren shrugged.

Karina, smiling slyly, said, "I don’t know, maybe there's a part of the story that we're all not hearing. Could that be the case, Lauren?"

Lauren sighed, dropping her face into her hands and shaking her head.

"Oh, Lord," she groaned. "Okay, so here's the deal. Ben and I hooked up. In Aspen. Well...Grand Junction, actually."

Reluctant to view her friends' reaction to this revelation, she inched her fingers apart and slowly peeked out through the gaps. They were looking at her, mouths agape—but not in a horrified way, she was relieved to see. So Lauren took her hands down and sat up straighter.

Karina shook her head, impressed. "You little secret slut, you!" she cried.

"Come on, Karina. It’s not like that."

"Oh, are you kidding me?" Karina said. "In the space of the last ten minutes, I've found out that one of my best friends has actually slept with two of the hottest guys I've ever seen. It's a very big deal. Aaaannnddd you deserve a very big pat on the back."

Sam and Amanda both laughed.

"So you don't think I'm a horrible person?" Lauren said. "Going back on my ideals? Saying that I hated him and thought he was the most annoying person ever and then turning around and sleeping with him? You don't think that's weak?"

Amanda looked at her, shaking her head at Lauren's foolishness. "Please, Lauren," she said. "We could all tell that you were head over heels for him. You even admitted that you wanted to sleep with him. It was really just a matter of time until this happened."

"Yeah," Sam agreed. "It was pretty obvious."

Karina wrapped up by saying, "There's really only one question left to ask."

Lauren groaned and said with trepidation, "What might that be?"

Karina laughed. "Well, I was going to say that the only question left to ask is 'Was it good?' But now that I think about it a little more, I realize that the only question left to ask that really matters is—who else do I know that you've slept with?"

--- ~ ---

Lauren walked into the great room at the Hope Falls Recreation Center on Eric's arm and knew that she should, by all accounts, feel like a princess. She was walking into a fancy event, in front of the whole town, dressed in a gorgeous gown and perfectly made up, on the arm of one of the most handsome and eligible bachelors Hope Falls had to offer.

Yet she found it hard to muster up any excitement or enthusiasm for the night ahead.

Still, she told herself, it was important that she put on a good face, shake off her worries about Ben, and enjoy the night to the best of her ability.

It wasn't Eric's fault that the electrical impulses connecting her heart and her brain were getting crossed. This was his night—the Hometown Heroes Ball was, after all, about policemen first and foremost—so she needed to do her part to be happy, to be cheerful, to show him the best time she possibly could, her own emotional state aside. Eric had asked her here as a friend. The least she could do was be a good one.

Lauren pasted a wide smile on her face and looked around the room more carefully. People she’d known and loved her entire life were seemingly everywhere her eyes rested.

Sue Ann, who not only owned the café but was also Ryan's grandmother, was chatting with Henry, who was Amanda's godfather as well as the town's acting mayor.

A few feet to their left, she saw Karina's grandmother Renata, who was being enthusiastically chatted up by Bernie—who was now not only Karina’s manager, but hers as well.

Renata, an elegant and reserved beauty, was clearly doing nothing to encourage Bernie's shameless flirting—but she was doing nothing to discourage it either. Rather, she stood by, her facial expression smooth and immovable, rewarding Bernie every once in a while with the tiniest twitch of her lips that, if you were to interpret it in the most generous way possible, could conceivably be viewed as the beginnings of a smile.

Bernie, for his part, was obviously employing this interpretation with great enthusiasm, because he lit up like Times Square every time Renata's lips twitched even slightly. He was clearly infatuated with Karina's grandmother and ecstatic at any bit of positive feedback he was able to get from her.

Eric pulled Lauren out onto the dance floor, smiling at her gallantly and saying, "May I have this dance?"

Lauren laughed and gave a little curtsy, replying, "But of course!"

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