Page 22 of The Snowball Effect

Emma worked hard to maintain boundaries between all aspects of her life, and the Felicity partdid notmesh with the Regan part. It went against everything inside of Emma. Those were two worlds that she liked to keep very separate in her mind.

“Well, my first guess is that this was some sort ofPretty Womansituation. You picked her up – oh, wait. No. I think she’s a little older than you are. So, scratch that.Shepickedyouup, and you two engaged in a torrid affair. Before things ended miserably because her shitty coworker hit on you.” Regan paused, tilting her head up in thought before she shook it. “Nah, that one isn’t really working for me.”

“Really? It sounded very plausible to me.”

“Okay! What aboutNotting Hill? You were at work one day, years ago. Just a normal gal, living your life. She’s a celebrity…” Regan trailed off, shaking her head again. “Nope, that one doesn’t work, either.”

“And why is that?” Emma regretted that she’d asked the second the words left her mouth. It was like adding fuel to a gas fire.

Regan stared at her, incredulous. “Because if she was a celebrity, I would know who she is. Obviously. I was raised on tabloids. Celeb gossip is one of my favorite subjects.”

“Right.That’swhat makes that plot impossible.”

“Yup,” Regan popped thepsound. “Oh! Okay – what aboutThe Proposal?”

“You gave up on Julia Roberts plots so quickly,” Emma remarked, steering the cart toward the very back of the store, where the freshly-baked bread was.

“You’re not giving Julia right now.” Regan studied her critically. “I guess you would have been Hugh Grant in that scenario. Either way–”

“Oh mygod.” The words burst from Emma’s throat with a groan. “If I give you the most basic of information, can we stop with the movies?”

The satisfied smile on Regan’s face told Emma that this had been exactly her plan all along. Emma hated that she was impressed. Or, if not impressed, she could somewhat appreciate that Regan had known she was being a shit, at the very least.

“Her name is Felicity. We were together. We broke up.”

The six-word overview of her onlyrealrelationship felt like so little, like it wasn’t nearly enough to describe what had transpired between them.

But it was also all she was willing to give Regan. Plus, brevity was the soul of wit and all that.

Regan gasped so loudly, so dramatically, Emma jumped. “You’re into women?!”

“Keep your voicedown,” she hissed, looking over her shoulder. The last thing she wanted was for Regan’s shout to carry and actually reach Felicity.

“Well, sorry!” Regan’s tone and expression were anything but. She, thankfully, lowered her volume as she whisper-shouted, “I just – we’ve known each other for two years! How did I not know this information?”

“Probably because you know very little about me,” she succinctly summed up.

“And whose fault is that?” Regan needled, tapping her finger insistently on Emma’s shoulder.

Emma cut her a glare.

“DoesSuttonknow?” Regan asked, dropping her hand back to her side, tilting her head in thought. “Because she never mentioned it to me, either.”

“No,” Emma clarified. “Because Sutton never pries for information, and it was never relevant to bring up.”

“Not relevant?!” Regan cried out, making Emma wince at the volume yet again as she tossed her arms into the air. “Sutton –your friend– went through her own sexual awakening crisis last year, and you said absolutely nothing! Nada! Zilch!”

“Her sexual awakening wasn’t about me,” Emma pointed out, baffled as to how that was relevant. “And I never went through any sort of crisis, so I don’t really think our experiences were comparable.”

And the truth was that Sutton never asked Emma for advice or expressed that she was actually incrisis, as Regan proclaimed. Sutton had talked to Emma about her burgeoning sexuality, but it had always felt to Emma that Sutton had appreciated Emma merely lending an ear rather than commentary. Which she was clearly getting from Regan.

Regan stared, clearly dumbfounded. “You are so… weird.”

And Emma simply could not control how her mouth fell open in disbelief. “Pot calling the kettle black, in a major sort of way.”

Regan was unrepentant. “Yeah, but at least I own it!” She jabbed herself in the chest with her thumb before doing the same to Emma. “You think you’re normal!”

Good. God.

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