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“And chocolate shavings.”

“Yes, good one! And I bet she adds a shot of espresso.”

Sally nodded.

“Ooh, yeah! She needs that extra caffeine for all those late-night writing sessions. And I bet her sex life is off the charts! I mean, she’s the woman who wrote Chapter 25.”

“God, yes,” Lisa groaned. “Anyway, her sex life has to be better than mine. I’ve never had a dry spell like this, Sal!”

“Preaching to the choir,” Sally replied with a deep sigh. When was the last time she had sex? It would have been Orla, which means…before Thanksgiving? It was April now!

“I’m doing the same thing,” Lisa said after Sally had been quiet for a few moments. “Figuring out how long it’s been.”

Sally laughed.

“I don’t understand,” she then whined. “We’re hot! Why are we not having sex, like, every night?”

It really did confuse her. Sally knew she was a desirable woman: lithe and long-legged, she had a runway model’s height of five-ten, with the physique and looks to match. Growing up, she had even been encouraged by many to explore modeling as a career but her natural shyness made the idea of showing up for cattle call auditions nauseating. She was much happier as a graphic designer.

And Lisa was flat-out gorgeous as well. Not nearly as tall as Sally, she was curvier and had an exotic beauty created by a Chinese mother and a Native-American father.

How they both didn’t have girlfriends now was a mystery.

“Anyway, I’m not going to dwell on it,” Lisa sighed. “Otherwise, I’ll reach for the tequila and you know that never leads to good things. Listen, I gotta go…I promised Mom I’d come over to watch the new season of American Horror Story with her.”

“Fun,” Sally said, though it sounded anything but. She had never taken to that show personally. She and Lisa promised to speak tomorrow and ended the call.

No sooner had she put her phone back down on the sofa cushion when it rang again. This time, it was her best male friend, Max.

“Hey, babe!” she greeted enthusiastically. She always loved hearing from Max.

She heard him sigh deeply.

“How many times do I have to tell you?” he said. “Having a lesbian call me ‘babe’ is weird. Cut it out.”

“Sorry, babe!” Sally replied, knowing he could hear the huge smile on her face in her voice.

Max sighed again.

“God, you are such a child sometimes,” he murmured.

“Well, compared to you, I am,” she rejoined before adding, “Babe.”

Last month she had helped Max celebrate his fifty-first birthday. That had been three weeks after he had helped her celebrate her twenty-eighth.

“So, what’s up?” she asked.

“What are you doing tomorrow?” Max inquired.

“Um…nothing. Which means I’m all yours.”

“Excellent. I’d like to buy you lunch, talk about something.”

Sally felt alarmed. The last time someone Max’s age had told her that he needed to talk to her about something, it was her Dad because her grandmother had died.

“Is everything okay?” she asked.

“Everything is fine. No one died and I just had a physical last week during which my doctor declared me immortal. So, stop panicking.”