Page 6 of Perfect Mess

Once Janet saw the chocolate fountain and the ponies, her mood completely flipped. She was no longer winking, she was smiling.

“See, this isn’t so bad.” I pointed at a pony for visual reference. “When you fall off the horse, you just have to climb back up and ride again.”

Jason Rosenbocker, former captain of the lacrosse team, whose once infamous six pack had since grown into a full sized keg, hoisted up into a saddle, then tumbled over the other side. We heard the thud all the way across the yard.

“Sometimes it’s better to just stay down,” said Ralph.

“What about you, Mary?” Janet aimed a sharp glare in my direction. “You never get on the horse at all.”

“That’s because she’s waiting for Mr. Right.” Ralph made a little quote-thing gesture with his fingers.

“No,” I corrected. “I’m waiting for Mr. Perfect.” Which was true. I was waiting for Mr. Perfect, who didn’t exist. Accepting that all relationships were doomed to failure made things much easier because you didn’t have to get your hopes up.

Janet wagged her finger at me. “You can’t pick love, Mary. Love picks you.”

“If love worked, I’d be out of business.” As a divorce attorney, Ralph was always a pessimist with matters of the heart, one of the many reasons he never settled down.

“I thought we came out here to get drinks.” I had to get our mission back on track.

“Yes,” Ralph and Janet answered, once again in unison.

I figured the sooner I got Janet hammered, the sooner she would stop being so picky, and we could begin with the hooking and the upping. And then, with the night’s mission complete, I could go home and change into pajamas and binge watch Alaska survival shows while consuming my body weight in ice cream.

When we got to the bar, Janet ordered a cider. Ralph picked a pilsner, and I opted for the blood orange sour. I was a sucker for a pucker.

“Oh my God, oh my God, oh my god!” Janet squealed like a twelve-year-old girl at a Jonas Brothers concert having a seizure. “Look at the baby cows!” I swiveled my head to where Janet was pointing. There was a whole pen of cows just past the pony rides.

“Oh, my goodness, they are so freaking cute!”

They looked like cows to me. Only smaller. Though even from thirty yards away, I could tell that they emitted the same amount of stink as the ones that were fully grown.

“Look, you can feed them a carrot.” There were tin pails hung along the fence. People were pulling carrots from the pails to feed the not fully grown but fully odored cows, a practice I found both stupid and disgusting.

Janet, however, was all-in. “You want to feed them a carrot? Let’s go feed them a carrot. I’m going to go feed them a carrot.”

Drinks in hand, Ralph and I moseyed our way over to the cow pen, where Janet had already grabbed a fistful of carrots. “Here, try one.” Janet tried to hand me a carrot.

“No. Thank you. I’m good.” A sign on the gate read, Warning! Do Not Lean on Fence! I took a few steps backward to ensure a safe distance.

“Look how cute they are.” Janet patted one of the miniature cows on its head.

I wrinkled my nose after getting a strong whiff of hay. “You have a thing against cows?” Ralph asked.

“No. I don’t have a thing against cows. Specifically. I just don’t like animals.”

“What animals?” Having already distributed her first round of carrots, Janet stuck her hand in a pail and removed another fistful.

“All of them.”

“What about panda bears?” Ralph was holding his carrot by the very tip, a wise precaution to avoid being bit. “Everyone likes panda bears.”

“I’m allergic to bamboo.”

Janet finished feeding a cow her carrot and stepped back from the fence. It was apparently still hungry because it tried to squeeze its head through the gate to come after her. “No, no Simon. You’ll spoil your dinner.”

“Who’s Simon?” Ralph looked as confused as I did.

Janet pointed to the cow. “He is.”

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