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eyes or giving me one of her what-is-wrong-with-you looks, and I didn’t want to deal with it. Not everyone could get away with a spiky platinum blond haircut fringed with hot pink at the workplace. Kat pulled off the look, but only because she was an agent for up-and-coming musicians and actors. For her, dressing funky and a little bit wild helped at work. I’m pretty sure I’d look like a ten-year-old dressed up for Halloween if I tried it.
“Well,” Kat said after a minute, “I think any job where you have to censor your toe color isn’t worth having. That snotty private school isn’t worth it, Whit. I heard that they do a lifestyle questionnaire to make sure your personal life meets their standards. Isn’t that ridiculous? As if they should have any say in what you do with your life as long as you’re doing your job well.”
I had heard about the questionnaire, but I’d assumed it was just a rumor. “I don’t think that’s—”
“Or maybe you don’t care about having sex again.” Kat was still talking. “It’s that guy you’re seeing, isn’t it? No good in bed?”
“Kat!”
“He does look kind of boring,” she mused. “But sometimes it’s the quiet, straitlaced ones who are the most adventurous in bed.” She examined me for a minute, and then added, “Nah, I don’t think so. You’d be way happier right now if he was wild in the sack.”
I smacked her lightly on the arm and took a sip of my coffee. William might not be the most exciting lover, but he was a good guy. Stable, secure and…things had been a little dull in bed. I sighed and changed the subject. “So, what’s the emergency? Just a toe chip, or something else?”
Kat was always having an emergency of some kind. She lived life at full speed, and threw herself completely into everything she did. That passion and energy proved successful for her as a talent agent, but it was a little more problematic when it came to her dating life. Kat insisted she liked the carefree lifestyle of a different guy every week, various friends with benefits, and no relationship that lasted longer than three months. But whenever things ended with anyone she liked more then she let on, Kat called an emergency meeting. Which actually worked in favor for my toes.
“I needed a polish change. I was sick of that other color,” she said, avoiding eye contact. “What was it again?”
“I’m Not Really A Waitress,” I supplied the name of the last bright pink polish she’d had.
“Right. I was sick of it.”
We both looked down to where her nail tech was applying a coat of fuchsia on her toes. A very similar fuchsia to the one she’d just had. I shook my head, took another sip of my latte and said, “You know, Kat. It’s okay to have a relationship with someone.”
She spun so quickly I was impressed the nail tech didn’t paint her entire foot. “I don’t want a relationship,” Kat insisted. “I was done with him.”
“What was his name again?” I tried to keep track, I really did, but it was exhausting sometimes.
“Brice.”
“Right, Brice. So what happened?”
“I don’t want to talk about it.” Kat picked up her cell phone and started flicking through screens. I waited. “He talked with food in his mouth,” she said, dropping her phone to her lap. “I couldn’t stand having dinner with him. It was disgusting. I mean, I don’t want to see what he’s eating. And little bits of food would fall out and Lord knows what was spraying across the table into my drink. How is it that someone so successful and so damn good-looking could go their entire life and not realize how gross their eating habits are?”
I shrugged. Brice was hot.
“So I ended it,” Kat continued. “We went to Blow Fish for sushi last night and he was telling me about his day but I couldn’t focus because all I could see were bits of mashed up tuna sashimi in his mouth. It was revolting. So I broke up with him.”
“At dinner?”
“Yup. And