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“Hey, you didn't look me up on social, bitch.”
“I’m sorry, Ora. I meant to. I just… there’s been a lot going on.”
“Tell me about it!”
“You too?”
“No. I mean tell me all about it.”
Next thing I know, I'm meeting her down near the docks at a local coffee shop-slash-dive bar. It’s off the ‘Strand’, the main street of old turn-of-the-century buildings where they have festivals and parades every year. The rusted sign reads Money$hot$ and it’s no less odd on the inside.
The walls are papered with old pinups, risqué prints of bombshells. It’s almost charming. In a dingy, off-putting kind of way.
The coffee, at least, is good. They put booze in most everything they serve, and I go along with it given the day I’ve had so far. Ora waves as I grab my drink, tucked into a booth near the back.
“My sweet, good goddess, Hell! You are just as luscious as I remembered.”
“And you’re exactly as vibrant and energetic as I remember.”
“Is that a compliment? It didn’t sound like one…”
“I promise, it is.”
“I wouldn’t take it any other way, my sweet Hell.”
“Still sticking with my nickname, I see.”
“Hell yeah! You look good as hell, and we’re going to raise some, too!”
I get the feeling she’s never going to run out of ‘hell’ puns to throw around.
“I guess I could use a new identity after this dumpster fire in my life blows over.”
“We need more drinks. Then you can finish the story you started the other night at our ‘slumber party’.”
Over the next couple of hours, I do just that. There are a few tears and more laughs. I can’t believe how good it feels to talk it out, mostly. I don’t even bother censuring a thing.
Including my encounter with a certain tall and stunning stranger at the party.
The only thing I gloss over is my new roommate and bodyguard.
I’m not sure how secretive I should be about him, but better safe than sorry.
Ora is attentive the whole time. She makes jokes about things frequently, interjecting crass comments, but it keeps the conversation moving, lighter than it should be.
It’s refreshing.
She offers me interesting and sometimes outlandish advice, ideas on how I might go about fixing my problems or just telling certain people to go fuck themselves or slashing their tires or breaking their knees if need be. Most of it isn’t useful, but it is funny as hell.
Some of it is informative. Ora knows a lot of people on campus and around town. She’s heard a few things that actually pertain to me and my situation, oddly enough.
“Yeah, ol’ Todd McMannus has been flapping his lips about how you went rogue. Brought coke and worse to one of his parties to get him in trouble.”
“In other words, dump all the blame on me for everything.”
“Yep. That’s what my cousin Sasha said. She’s in another sorority down the block. Every one of them has been raided by the cops in the last week on the pretense of making sure the campus is safe and drug-free.”
I spend the next few minutes fretting and scrambling over my options, trying to think of an alternative that I haven’t thought of. “Any chance you know of anywhere I could work?”
