Page 51 of Not Mine To Love

“You guys are making it really hard to be on a diet,” she said.

“Diets are a waste of time,” Piper chimed in.

“Piper, you could eat candy bars and pizza every day and not gain a pound, so spare me.”

I was used to Dana and Piper arguing. It seemed to be just how they communicated. It was clear that they were best friends. I felt privileged to be part of their inner circle. I learned a lot about them over the years. They helped me grow up, which sounded kind of funny to admit. It was hard to believe I was so young when we first met. And now they were a huge part of my life. I considered them my best friends. So why then had I not told them about Julius? But then again, there wasn’t anything to tell, right?

“Ladies, I need your help. My life is all upside down. What should I do?”

I took them by surprise, clearly. They just shot me puzzled looks. “Exactly what is upside down?” Piper asked before taking a bite of her burrito.

She closed her eyes and moaned in pleasure. “This is so, so good.”

Dana and I laughed.

“I need a career. I have a degree that I worked really hard for, but yet, I’m not doing anything with it.”

“You’re preaching to the choir. I didn’t do anything with my degree for like a decade,” Dana said. She was a stay at home mom and hadn’t started working until after she was divorced.

“Oh gosh, I don’t want that to happen to me.”

Piper almost choked on her burrito, and her eyes were filled with laughter. Dana, on the other hand, didn’t look as amused.

“Sorry,” I said, feeling really badly. “I mean… there was nothing wrong with what you did. I just don’t have an excuse. I’m not raising a baby or running a household…”

“Or still married to a chauvinist,” Dana added in happily.

“What’s a chauvinist?” Meredith asked.

“Nothing, hon. Mom’s just being testy again.”

Meredith shrugged her shoulders as if fine with that answer and started to eat, humming as she did. She was just so cute.

“I think I should be doing more with my life, you know?”

“Well, why don’t you do something with those photography skills you have?”

“I am doing something.”

Everyone stopped eating and gave me a look.

“Hey, it pays the bills,” I said in my defense, knowing what they all were thinking.

“Paying the bills is great and all, but you’re too young to not follow your passion. You earned a bachelor’s degree and that’s great. But photography is your love. You should do something with that,” Piper said helpfully.

“Yeah, but what?”

“I can set up a website for you,” Dana offered. “A real one.” She was a marketing genius. She went from barely knowing what Twitter was to managing several Twitter accounts and other social media pages for not only her company but also a few side gigs. She was getting paid pretty well for it. I was proud of her.

“That would be great, but how do I get clients?”

“That’s my specialty,” Piper said. She ran a really profitable translation business that spanned the globe last time I had heard.

“We can come up with a business plan, if you want,” Piper continued. “And I can give you some ideas for recruiting clients, especially those who are abroad.”

“That would be so amazing,” I said, feeling honored and touched by their kindness.

“It’s a plan then.”