Page 68 of The Last Dance

Jimmy makes his way back to his office, slamming his door behind him and knocking all the framed photos from the wall to the floor.

I’ve been here two years. I was not prepared for this much change in the last week. I’m starting to feel like my world is crumbling all over again.

*

Tonight, I promised Noah I’d start packing. I’ve put it off long enough. My lease is up soon and if I don’t pack now it’s really gonna get stressful. We invited Claire and Ben over to have dinner and make a night of it. Now the night will be not only about me packing up the apartment I’ve lived in for a decade but me losing the job I loved as well. Sounds like a real pity party to me.

I open the door to my apartment, the smell of greasy no-good-for-you delicious pizza hitting me in the face. Noah walks around the counter with his arms out.

‘I’m so sorry about your job, babe.’ He wraps his arms around me as soon as I drop my bag onto the floor. I lean my head against him. ‘But don’t worry, you’ll find another one and until then you’ll be fine.’

I texted him as I left my building. He was as shocked as I was.

‘So, what exactly happened?’ Claire asks, turning away from the box she’s filling with kitchen items.

I glance to Noah.

‘I haven’t told them the details yet.’ He shakes his head with a small smile.

I nod, grabbing a slice of pizza and hopping up onto a bar stool and turning towards my living room. ‘Well, we went to the Dangerous show, ya know, and Karmen wasn’t exactly honest with me abouthowshe had such a connection with them.’

‘Uh-oh…’ Ben is sitting on the couch watching TV, but he turns his attention to me. ‘I have a feeling a panty-thrower story is headed our way.’

‘Worse,’ I sigh. ‘Matthew is her ex and she apparently still has a thing for him.’

‘And he wasn’t exactly over her either,’ Noah adds in.

‘Our interview took a weird turn. I only had a couple questions out when I realized they were very obviously into each other and I couldn’t run it knowing what she was doing to Henry. They were all bad-mouthing him and I couldn’t hurt him like that.’

Ben drops the remote, scrambling to pick it up and put the batteries that have rolled across the floor back in. I watch him for a minute until he looks up with a goofy grin.

‘Sorry,’ he says, gently setting the remote on the coffee table in front of him as if it’s made of glass.

‘Anyway, I had another story, one I’d found on my own and everything. But Trevor got to Jimmy first. He’d only accept the Dangerous story and gave me only two options. Either write it and end up hurting Henry or stand up for him and lose my job.’ I grin, my teeth gritted like I’m in pain. ‘I couldn’t write a fake story. You guys know I’m a terrible liar, so, I stood up for him.’

‘You lost your job for Henry?’Claire is now standing in the middle of the living room, her jaw agape and eyes wide. Ben stares at me, a huge weird grin on his face.

I shrug my shoulders. ‘Looks that way.’

‘I can’t believe you did that after what he did.’

‘That’s actually not the worst part,’ I say, hoping to blow past the Henry thing. I don’t exactly want to get into how my feelings are changing for Henry in front of Noah or Ben. Mostly because that also means my feelings for Noah are changing and I’m not ready to face it yet.

Ben laughs. ‘How much worse could it get?’

‘It’s me…’ I point to myself as if that explains it all and he nods. ‘Imighthave told Jimmy that I’d build my own site.’

Ben bursts out another laugh, making me feel terrible that I even said it out loud. I know it was a bit ballsy but he doesn’t have to make me feel like total shit.

‘Stop laughing at her, Ben!’ Claire demands.

‘I’m not laughingather. Just the whole thing really.’

‘Why is it funny?’ Noah asks.

‘It’s notfunny. I just happen to know a guy who could actually help make this happen. If that’s really what you wanted, that is. He could help you build a site that couldeasilycompete with PDX Weekly.’

‘Who?’ Noah asks, my heart sinking a little bit more with each passing second. Claire told me all about Henry’s new job venture. From what I know, his clients are people not starting a website to write about things as trivial as local reviews. He’s probably the most expensive web and graphic designer I could choose. There is zero way I’m asking him for help. I can’t afford it, for one thing. Plus, things are weird as it is.

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