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Krissy giggled.

“Because Rachel totally wants you! I mean, I totally want Rachel, but first she has to get over you.”

Ainsley sighed. Part of her was super excited that Krissy also apparently noticed Rachel’s attraction to her, which meant that Ainsley hadn’t been picking up the wrong signals from her new friend. Another part of her only felt more frustrated at this realization. Ultimately, what could it lead to?

“She’s straight,” Ainsley said, pulling on one of the dresses Krissy had selected for her.

“Straight and curious,” Krissy stated. “Trust me, she’d be gay for you.”

Laughing, Ainsley said, “And what should I do with that piece of information? This dress is fabulous, by the way.” Ainsley was looking at herself in the changing room’s mirror.

“I’m good at this,” Krissy stated. “Let’s go out to the bigger mirrors,” she added, opening the changing room door and stepping out into the vestibule just beyond it, which had several full-length mirrors angled in various ways so as to provide customers with the ability to see their potential outfits more completely. Ainsley followed her and began examining herself in the dress more fully.

“Anyway,” Krissy began, also turning this way and that, “to answer your question: just go with it. If Rachel wants to be curious, let her be curious.”

“I like her as a friend, though,” Ainsley said. “I kind of don’t want to fuck that up.”

“Which is super sweet,” Krissy said. “But I think guys are more likely to be dumb like that, you know? Like, if a supposedly straight guy tried to do something gay with a gay friend of his and it didn’t work out, they’d never speak to each other again. But we’re women; we’re soooooo much more reasonable than guys.”

“When we’re not on our periods anyway,” Ainsley added.

“Well, duh! Sure! But other than that? Waaaay superior to men. You look super-hot in that dress.”

“Thanks. So do you.”

They went back into the changing room together and began disrobing again.

“So, you want to know my opinion?” Krissy asked when she was once more standing in just her underwear, starting to pull her brown hair into a ponytail. Ainsley couldn’t help it. Seeing Krissy like this made her heartrate increase and her center take notice.

Why had they never gotten together, Ainsley wondered? Why shouldn’t they get together now? It would be a whole lot easier with out and proud Krissy than with probably-only-curious Rachel.

It was tempting. Even though she and Krissy had never been anything more than friends, there was always this unspoken attraction between them which, because of either bad timing or circumstance, had never been acted upon. It really was tempting. And Krissy was the type of adventurous gal to make out with Ainsley right here in the dressing room of this shop—and probably do more.

The problem was, Krissy was a bit of a player. Ainsley couldn’t imagine whatever they got up to in this dressing room or in a bedroom turning into anything committed and serious, which is ultimately what Ainsley would want.

“What’s your opinion?” Ainsley said, starting to pull on the next dress as a way to avert her eyes from her yummy friend in see-thro

ugh lingerie.

“Well,” Krissy began, “I’m not entirely sure you can even have a normal friendship with Rachel unless you get this sexual tension addressed.”

Ainsley thought about that. It made sense. From the very moment they first met, she and Rachel had had this sexual energy flowing between them whenever they were together. And though it hadn’t impeded Ainsley from recognizing that there were other wonderful attributes about Rachel which made her want to become close friends with the realtor, that sexual energy was nonetheless distracting.

And how long was it going to last? A few more days? A few more months? Every single time they got together in the future was Ainsley going to have to keep pretending her center wasn’t soaked?

“So, how do you suggest me and Rachel address this sexual tension between us?” Ainsley asked Krissy as, once more, they left the changing room to admire themselves in the other mirrors.

Krissy shrugged.

“Either you tell her you’re not interested in being an experiment—which we both know would be a lie because you’d totally be interested in being Rachel’s experiment. I mean, I would totally be interested in being Rachel’s experiment! Like, she could bring a lab coat and test tubes over to my place any fucking day.”

Ainsley started laughing so hard she almost snorted.

“Or…” Krissy went on, “you guys just have sex and see what happens. You don’t have to marry her and if she gets all weirded out and it becomes all awkward between you two, well, fuck, Ains, you already have a lot of friends.”

Ainsley nodded, resolving to think more about it throughout the day.

“But I hope you remain friends with her,” Krissy said. “Because she is really, really good at volleyball!”