My turn to shoot the look. “I appreciate your dishonestly for my benefit, but I have mirrors. I know how big I am.”
Dana waved me off. “No one will notice. It’s dark in clubs.”
“It’s also loud. What if it’s too loud for her?”
“Her?” Dana asked, jumping on the word. “Do we know The Bump’s a girl?”
I shrugged. “Well, not technically. It’s too early to know for sure yet. But I saw this to-die-for pink tutu onesie the other day at Macy’s, so I’m hopeful.”
“Well, either way, I’m pretty sure that thing can’t hear yet,” Dana said, staring down at my belly.
“She might be able to. I read in
“Even if she does, the layer of fat will insulate her.”
“See, you are calling me fat!”
Dana swatted me on the arm. “Look, if Crush gets too loud or too crowded or too anything, we can leave. But please come with me. It will be no fun without you.” Dana pouted and batted her eyelashes at me.
The effect was so comical that I couldn’t help the spurt of laughter that escaped me. “Okay, fine. I’ll drag my whale-sized self to a nightclub just for you.”
“Yay!” Dana said, bouncing up and down on the sofa cushion. “Trust me, we’ll have a blast. It’ll be like our last little club night before The Bump arrives.”
“Hmm,” I said, grabbing another handful of popcorn to cover the mild panic that always accompanied imagining my world post-Bump.
“’K, so I just have one more teeny, tiny favor to ask,” Dana said.
I rolled my eyes. “What now?”
She glanced at the screen where “Daniel” was tongue kissing the newly vampireized Lila. “Any chance we could watch something else?
Chapter Two
The next night found me ditching my Snuggie for the first time in months and letting my sofa fend for itself as Dana drove me through the packed Hollywood streets in her brand new convertible Mustang. Cherry red. With the top down. I had to admit, I was digging this last hurrah already.
Crush was located on Sunset Boulevard between Highland and Vine, in a black, square building set between a posh Italian restaurant and a women’s boutique that specialized in pumps in size 11 and up. A single blue neon sign above the door was the only indication anything interesting lay within. That is, if you didn’t count the line of women in tiny skirts and guys in skinny jeans spanning the side of the building, hopefully eyeing the door. Guarding the unassuming entrance stood a guy who looked like a heavyweight champ, a pair of black sunglass over his eyes despite the absence of sunlight.
Luckily, being that Dana and her plus one were on the list, we marched straight to the front of the line and were let in immediately. I thanked the gods for small favors. My shoes were already starting to bite into my feet as we entered the noisy room. In all honesty four-inch, pale pink, patent leather pumps probably weren’t the most practical choice for when With Bump, but, my like my fav T, they were on the list of things I was not willing to give up, pain or no pain. Especially this pair. They were part of my new spring collection I was calling “Heaven in Heels.” The entire collection was done in soft, ethereal colors, and I was just three shoes away from completing it. With any luck, they would be walking the runways in New York in a matter weeks, and hitting exclusive boutiques everywhere in just a few short months.
At Dana’s suggestion, I had matched my Maddie originals with a pair of cropped, black stretch pants and a long sequined tank that used to be a dress, but with the basketball protruding from my mid-section, was now more of a long shirt. But the overall effect was sparkly and cute, and if you saw me from the back, you could hardly tell I’d put on fifteen pounds.
Dana, on the other hand, looked like she’d come right from the set of one of her Lover Girl cosmetics shoots. She was in a tight, red mini-dress and tall, spikey red heels, and she wore a pair of silver earrings that dangled all the way down to her shoulders. I sighed watching heads (both male and female) turn her way as we entered the club. Oh, to be slim, hot, and un-bloated again.
“Isn’t this place great?” Dana yelled to me above the pounding bass.
I nodded. “Great,” I agreed, meaning it.
The interior of the club more than made up for the lackluster exterior. Plush red velvet lined the walls, pairing with shiny chrome fixtures and pendant lights. One large glass bar sat in the center of the room, packed two and three deep as people jockeyed to get the attention of the dozen bartenders in tight black shirts behind it. A pair of staircases snaked along the two opposite walls, leading up to a second floor where a DJ was playing music at top volume, spinning remixes of pop songs while bright blue, red, and green lights flashed across a crowded dance floor.
I had to admit, it looked like Ricky’s financial advisor was a good one. The place was packed. On the dance floor dozens of wanna-be starlets crushed up against each other as VIP’s looked on from private booths lining the walls. I could only imagine how much Ricky was making off this place, even if he was only making it off one- sixteenth of it.
“Let’s get a drink,” Dana said, grabbing me by the hand and threading her way to the far side of the bar where there seemed to be a small gap in the crowd waiting for drinks. After a minimum of elbowing, we finally made it to the front.
“What can I get you ladies?” yelled a bartender that was pierced in about fifteen different places. That I could see.
“Pom-tini,” Dana yelled back over the noise.
“And a cranberry juice,” I reluctantly added, really thinking a Pom-tini fit the atmosphere perfectly.
He nodded, then grabbed a couple of glasses.
“Excuse me,” I heard behind me.
I swiveled to find a girl with long dark hair wearing a lot of eye make-up and very little dress, scowling at me. Her feet were encased in black, satin pumps with heels that ended in deadly looking silver spikes, making her tower over my 5’1?” frame. Behind her a redhead in an equally tiny dress, hers with a fashionable one-shoulder strap, and equally high heels did an equally ugly mirror image of the scowl thing.
“I’m trying to get a drink, here?” Dark-haired Girl said, her voice doing a bored-slash-annoyed thing.
“Sorry,” I mumbled, trying to shimmy to the left a bit in the tight space. “I’m just waiting for my cranberry juice.”
The girl did an exaggerated sigh, throwing her long hair over one pale shoulder, and she and her friend tried to squeeze past me. Which was a losing battle. The bar was packed with bodies, and there was nowhere left for me to get out of the way.
“I’m sorry, it’s just really busy here-” I started.
But the girl ignored me, turning to her friend. And even through the crowded club I could hear her pseudo whisper, “Freaking whale’s blocking the whole bar.”
I froze, feeling steam gather between my ears. “What did you just say?”
“What?” she asked, blinking at me in mock innocence.
“Did you just call me a whale?”
“Did I?” she asked, still playing dumb.
“Yes. You called me a whale.”
She shrugged. “Well, you’re taking up way too much room, and you’re not even drinking,” she said, waving a manicured finger at me. “That is, like, way not cool.”
“Uh oh,” I vaguely heard Dana say beside me. But my full being was focused on Skinny Bitch Chick at the moment.
I clenched my teeth together. “For your information, I
