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“Why am I friends with you again?” he asked.

“Because I’m adorable and I make you happy?”

“I’ll give you adorable,” Max began. “The happy bit has always been up for debate. Now, if you’re done being silly, I need to talk to you about something important.”

Sally rubbed her hands together.

“Ooh, finally I get to learn the great mystery of why we’re here!”

Max pursed his lips and looked out the window. Sally knew from having worked closely with him that something big was on his mind and once again she felt a little afraid, certain that the big thing was medical related, despite what he had told her on the phone last night.

“I know you like reading,” Max began. “Do you read any lesfic?”

What the fuck? Curveball!

Sally chuckled.

“Lesfic, Max? I’m, like, totally surprised you even know that term!” She took a sip of her coffee. “Next you’ll be telling me you know what ‘wlw’ stands for.”

Max sighed.

“Women-loving-women, every idiot knows that.”

“Yeah, every lesbian idiot,” Sally countered. “I can’t imagine it’s that common a term in your heteronormative world.”

“Just answer the damn question. Do you read any lesfic books or not?”

Sally nodded.

“Almost exclusively,” she told him.

“Fine. I need your help with something,” Max stated.

Sally nodded to indicate he should go on.

“Have you ever heard of a lesfic writer named Jillian Ashley?”

Sally’s eyebrows shot up. Heard of her? That was like asking a baseball fan if they had ever heard of Babe Ruth.

“I just finished her latest book! It was amazing!” Sally stared at Max for several seconds. “Seriously, how do you know all of this? Lesfic? Jillian Ashley…?”

Max went back to looking out the window for a moment before eventually turning back to her, holding Sally’s green eyes with his grey ones.

“I’m Jillian Ashley,” he said.

Sally blinked.

It sounded like Max had spoken to her in English yet the words he had just said made absolutely no sense to her. Seriously, what was he talking about?

“What are you talking about?” Sally asked aloud. She felt as if her question should have been more profound, somehow. But the shock of what he had just said rendered her unable to come up with anything close to profound.

“I’m Jillian Ashley,” Max repeated. “I wrote those books.”

Sally squeezed her eyes shut and briskly shook her head.

This makes zero sense!

After taking a deep breath and then a fortifying sip of her coffee, Sally said, “Jillian Ashley is a woman. She lives in Oceanside. She’s a lesbian. She writes books for lesbians. Really, really good books.”