Page 19 of So Not My Type

She knew she wanted more. She wanted a damn soulmate. A woman to come home to, to sit with in front of the red-brick fireplace on a Sunday morning with endless sugaredColombian coffee and an afghan they’d crocheted together. She wanted to hike at Snoqualmie Falls, and take selfies at one of the rainbow intersections in Capitol Hill, and eat dim sum in the International District. She wanted to lie under the cherry blossoms at the University of Washington and marvel at how the quad turned into a sea of cotton candy. She wanted to watch the salmon swim at the Ballard Locks and watch the cruise ships leave the port and snuggle with a fat rescue cat while binge-watching rom-coms.

She wanted love. Even if she had no idea how to make space in her life for it.

From the corner, a woman peeked up and gave her a look. A definite,definitelook. Sophie clicked from the app to emails, but the words muddied. She glanced back up, her eyes skimming the dark pixie cut highlighting a sloped neck. The woman’s outlined ruby lips looked a bit like Ella’s. Yesterday, Sophie noticed Ella’s lips curved up in the corner in a rare smile, and the tiniest dimple appeared. A flutter started in her gut.

Wait, nope.What the hell am I doing?Why compare this stranger to Ella? See, she needed to get laid. Now she was having warm thoughts about her highly annoying, yet beautiful, co-worker.

The woman tossed another look, with her lashes fluttering beneath her downcast eyes. Sophie set her phone upside down on the table—the universal sign for “I’m open for conversation.”

I’m doing this.She might be rusty, but Sophie could absolutely do this. Her outfit was cute, her makeup on point, her loins were rising from hibernation. She tugged on her jeans, took a quick sip of her coffee, and stood.

“Hey,” the woman said.

“Hey.” A deep voice behind Sophie responded and a man passed her to approach the woman at the table.

Sophie froze. Her cheeks, chest, even her ass turned red.I’m dying. Seriously, just bury me. As the man approached, Sophie slunk back into her chair, and focused hard on her phone. Flipping back open the dating app, she scrolled through pictures until she could unbury herself from the six-feet-deep embarrassment coffin.

Face after face, she swiped and swiped. Choosing a hookup based on a profile picture alone, not on the million other things that were more important to her, made her feel grosser by the second. But she needed someone messy right now, to scratch an itch, so she could focus on?—

No fucking way.Sophie brought the phone closer to her face. Was that… No. Yep. Definitely, yep. Ella’s face in a muted, black-and-white photo, a thin black strap draping off the shoulder, a shy, bit-lip pose, the hint of some glorious, full,robusteven, cleavage that Sophie hadn’t noticed under the suits and sweaters. Right there, right in front of her, on a queer hookup site. The picture could almost be passed off as someone else.Almost.The hair was longer, softer with beach waves, no blunt black bangs. But those signature lips, and the smattering of freckles above her nose, sometimes hidden when her glasses dipped, and that heart-shaped face confirmed Ella’s identity.

Relationships suck. Queer Seattle woman looking for one-night-only friendship. No strings attached, no gushy love match, no need to exchange anything more than an astrological sign. A few hours, some stress relief, maybe some good chocolate.

Ella was queer? Jesus, Sophie was off her game. Her belly tingled, her toes tingled. Even her freaking scalp tingled.

Ugh.

She stood and threw her backpack over her shoulders.

“Sophie!” Charlie called out, and motioned her forward. “Mack and I are going to see if everyone wants to go for dinner next weekend. Can you join?”

She needed a night with friends like people needed air. “I’d love to, but not sure I can swing it. Can I let you know later? Work, you know?” She rolled her eyes and checked her watch. “Speaking of, I’m going to head out. Say hi to everyone for me. Even Remi.” She grinned and skip-jogged to catch the metro.

Maya’s girlfriend was a tough case to crack. Sophie wore her emotions on her sleeve, but Remi… did not. Months passed before she really got to know the woman. She tried not to take it personally at first, which was an utter failure, because how else would she take someone giving her the cold shoulder? Sophie even complained once to Maya, about six months back or so, that she thought Remi hated her. Maya explained how sometimes when kids grow up in the system, their ability to open up takes a long time. Once Sophie let that go, and it seemed Remi accepted Sophie was a permanent, although sporadic, fixture in their lives, things shifted. A few pool nights, mocktail hours, and a random shared love of HGTV shifted Sophie and Remi into buddies.

As the bus trudged through the city, Sophie reviewed a half dozen emails and messages that had come in since logging off last night. The creative team was ready for the pre-strategy meeting, but the passive-aggressive email string indicated that the social and web teams were having a vast difference of opinion. This meant that in addition to being an organizer and cheerleader, Sophie would have to be a mediator. Maintaining a Zen-like state within the office, especially during crunch time, while dealing with fragile egos, was one of the toughest parts of her job.

An image of crying from the dock as the cruise ship left the port among hollers and whistles from passengers filled Sophie’s mind. What if they couldn’t get it done? Training in Ella took more time than what it was worth, and the irritation grew at the loss of productivity. George hovered more these last two weeks than the last six years, and as “approachable” as he may be (I’m just like you guys, he’d say in his five-piece tailored suit), he was still the CEO and it wracked her nerves. In the past week, she’d sent out an email with a typo, failed to book a large-enough space for a strategy overview, and showed up late to an integrated marketing all-hands meeting.

She was frustrated with the chaos Ella brought into her workspace. Unfairly, for sure.Maybe.

The bus pulled to a stop, and she checked the time.Perfect. She had a few extra minutes and needed to hear the voice of reason. She grabbed her cell and dialed.

“Hey, honey!” Her mom’s voice rang through Sophie’s headphones. “What’s going on?”

So many things. She was tired. She wanted this cruise so bad. And she hated working with Ella. Even more, she was irritated with herself that when Ella concentrated really hard, her glasses would slip down her nose and she pushed them up with a charming, doe-eyed look. “I don’t think I’m going to get to go on the cruise.”

“Oh no! Why not?”

Sophie stepped into the bare building lobby and took a seat on a bench. “There’s just no way we’ll finish in time. The deadline’s too aggressive.”

A pause followed. “Do you know your dad last week said he wanted to read every book in the library before he died, going A to Z. That was his goal.”

Her mom—queen of the random responses. “Lofty goal.” But not a surprising one. Her dad had a target to read two hundred books a year, and he almost always exceeded it.

“Yeah, and then as we were talking about it, he quickly realized that they have a constant rotation. Even if he finished, he will neveractuallyfinish because of the new ones coming in, and the old ones they remove. He got pretty down for a few minutes, you know, until he perked up at the idea that he’ll never run out of books to read.”

Made sense. But also, Sophie had no idea what this meant in terms of her not going on the cruise.

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