Page 1 of March

CHAPTER 1

Sophie had been invited to hang out with Monica, who didn’t use to be the kind of woman who used the phrasehang out. A Louisiana native originally, Sophie had been living in New Orleans for four years now, so she was more than familiar with the city and the French Quarter, but she rarely went out. Part of that was because she wasn’t much for the nightlife. An occasional drink with friends was fine, but going out every night hadn’t ever interested her, even when she’d been in college. She’d left New York and moved here when she was twenty-eight years old. Back then, she’d spent a few months exploring the bars and clubs that were notorious around the US and the world, but she much preferred staying at home, reading a good book or watching a movie while she drank hot chocolate that she often made from scratch with her favorite dark chocolate and mini marshmallows.

She’d only agreed to go out tonight because Monica had mentioned it would be good for her to meet her new friends since she would be sticking around for a while now. Sophie had moved to New Orleans for work, so she hadn’t made a lot of new friends here, and sitting in a cubicle all day, essentially pushing paperwork around, didn’t offer many opportunities for socialization. In hindsight, she knew she’d made a mistake leaving Arnette Assets, which was Monica Arnette’s family-owned corporation, but she hadn’t known it then. The place Sophie worked for now had made a lot of promises that they hadn’t kept. She’d been told she would be a director, but instead, they’d made her a manager. She’d also been told she would have a team of fifty people under her, but she only had three. They’d sold her on the fact that she’d be in the room helping to make decisions, and they’d stuck her in the cubicle for most of the time every day.

Part of the problem was that when she signed the offer, her current company had been on the brink of filing for bankruptcy. Sophie had only found out about it after she’d already packed up her entire life in New York and moved, giving up her very nice job for a quieter life in New Orleans, so when they’d kept her on but gave her the manager role with a huge pay cut from their original offer, she hadn’t had much of a choice but to agree to it. Ever since then, though, she longed for a promotion or to find a job that actually interested her, but whenever she searched and interviewed, nothing panned out. Monica being in town had been perfect timing. Sophie was reaching her end where she was and couldn’t keep this up much longer. She needed a change. She needed a raise and a promotion. She needed to be involved in leadership discussions and decision-making. She needed Arnette Assets. She planned to talk to Monica about it in a few days once she’d had a chance to update her resume and really pitch herself well, but maybe she could bring it up tonight just to see if there was any reaction from Monica about the idea.

When she pulled open the door to the dueling piano bar that seemed just Monica’s speed, Sophie looked around and spotted a booth with five women and just enough room for her to join them. To make a professional yet approachable impression, she had dressed better than she normally would for going to a bar, choosing to wear nice jeans and a collared shirt with a blazer over it, so she pulled down on that blazer, hoping it hadn’twrinkled on her walk over in the humidity, and made her way to the group.

“Hi,” she said when she approached the booth where Monica Arnette was sitting with her new friends and her new girlfriend, Bridgette.

Monica looked genuinely happy when she glanced up, and Sophie wasn’t sure she had ever seen her old boss and friend lookthishappy.

“Oh. Sophie, hi,” Monica replied, smiling. “Everyone, this is my friend, Sophie. She used to work with me at Arnette a long time ago, but she lives down here now, so I thought I’d invite her to join us, if that’s all right.”

That was one of the things Sophie had always appreciated about this woman who had turned into her friend over the years. Monica, the owner’s daughter and next in line to take over Arnette Assets one day, had been Sophie’sbossback in the day, but whenever it came up how they met, she always said theyworkedtogether.

Sophie smiled back and took a look around the table. Monica was sitting next to her girlfriend, Bridgette, who had her hand on Monica’s thigh, and another woman was sitting on their side of the booth as well. She looked younger than Sophie’s thirty-two, maybe around Bridgette’s age or a little younger. Across from them, there were two more women, one a brunette and the other a blonde, and the two of them looked way too cozy with each other to just be friends.

“Thank God! I don’t have to be the fifth wheel now. Please, sit down,” the one sitting on Monica’s side said.

When Sophie took the only remaining free spot to sit down, Monica introduced her to the group, and she nodded to the women she now knew as Kyle and Melinda next to her. The one who had just said something about being a fifth wheel wasnamed Jill. Sophie waited for Monica to say more or help her start a conversation, but she turned to Bridgette instead.

“Sophie, how long have you lived here?” Melinda asked.

“Oh, about four years this time. I technically grew up around here but moved away for school. You?”

“All my life. Kyle is new, though.” Melinda pointed to her girlfriend. “Just last month.”

“Oh, that’s really new,” Sophie said.

“Yeah. I’ve been here for about two months, though,” Kyle added. “I’m almost done moving. We’ve been working on the house.”

“You moved here for Melinda?”

“No, I moved here for me. But she was a nice bonus.”

“We don’t live together yet. Kyle inherited a house in the Garden District, and she’s been doing some work on it, but she’s also got to move all of her stuff in. I have a very nice apartment, though, that she gets to stay in whenever she wants.”

“Tonight?” Kyle asked.

“Whenever you want, babe,” Melinda replied before she kissed her on the cheek.

Monica and Bridgette rejoined the conversation then, and they all engaged in some small talk. Jill seemed to be only half-interested in whatever they were talking about, and Sophie wondered if Monica had set her up. If she’d done so, she was really bad at it because Jill was all the way on the other side of the booth, and they could hardly talk to each other over the sounds of the pianos and the others in the bar. Jill was cute, to be sure. But while she had that blonde, blue-eyed, all-American girl look about her, Sophie hadn’t ever really gone for that. Then again, Sophie was assuming Jill was gay or at least into women since she hung out with four lesbians, but she could be wrong.

She was enjoying the night, but after a while, she was beginning to regret not having found a chance to talk to Monicaabout maybe returning to Arnette. When Monica and Jill got up to go to the bathroom, she considered going with them in an attempt to get Monica alone for a moment, but they were gone before she could get up herself, and the moment had passed. This, of course, left her at a table with three women she didn’t really know all that well.

“So, do you have any embarrassing stories about my girlfriend? I’d love to hear one,” Bridgette said.

Sophie only really hadone, so she leaned over the table and began telling it to a very interested Bridgette. When she was about to get to the funny part, though, she stopped mid-sentence because Monica was back now, and she was standing behind their booth, glaring at her.

“Was what?” Bridgette asked her when she didn’t finish her sentence.

“Uh… Nothing. She was just the best boss in the entire world and did nothing worth making fun of ever.” Sophie gave Monica a fake smile.

Monica sat down next to Bridgette and said, “Hi, babe.”

“No!” Bridgette laughed. “Soph was just about to finish telling me an embarrassing story about you.”

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