Chapter 1
I was going to shoot her with a crossbow if she didn’t stop.
My sort of best friend kept looking at the mountains, her mouth wide in wonder. “Aren’t these beautiful, Kelly?”
“Yeah,” I said, “Really pretty.” I wasn’t in the mood. I hadn’t been in the mood since picking her up and loading all her clothes and makeup into my VW bug. I really hadn’t been in the mood since she practically begged me on her knees to go with me to the Ren Faire in Millinocket, the one that was known internationally as a real Ren Faire.
Ever since I moved to Boston I had always heard about North Hampshire. It was a part of Maine that was split off from the US and Canada, hedged in by mountains and rivers, and lived like Medieval England. Every five years they had a large Ren Faire and opened up a section of their world to the public. Crammed into a space about the size of the big island in Rhode Island, were hundreds of thousands of people.
And I had to bring her along.
First, you have to understand: I was looking for a guy. It had been five long years since I’d had anything even close to a friend with benefits, and if you think guys get it bad, well, so can girls.
Meanwhile, my friend, Marina, was a beautiful light-skinned blond with stunning blue eyes. Tall and graceful in heels or barefoot, she was the exact opposite of my more Mediterranean looks: dark haired, dark eyed, olive skin. My family was Spanish and Moorish in descent. I was told my dark looks made me look exotic. Maybe in an Irish funeral, but not so much in Boston.
Marina was a model, and I was the admin. Luckily my boss didn’t want the dumb blond admin three cubes down; he wanted someone capable. That’s me.
Capable but without a boyfriend. Marina had tons on her arm. I don’t know why she wanted to hang around with me.
Maybe because I’m the only one who listens when she complains – oh, and I got her down off the ledge. Literally.
She was with the photographer and had changed into something but hadn’t come back. It wasn’t until we hear the sirens outside that we saw she was on the ledge, barefoot and in a Carmen Marc Valvo gown. The wind whipped around her hair like a halo, and she was beautiful, but I saw a hurt woman out there.
I leaned out the window and talked to her. I listened to her tale of woe, which, to be honest, wasn’t anything spectacular like being abused or anything like that – she wanted to be Joe Normal, not the beautiful swan in a room full of ducks.
Fine, fine, I just sat and listened, and from that moment on, she was my BFF. Of course, guys wanted to date her, not me, which I found out the first few times I went with her places. This was going to be no different.
Or so she thought. I was going to do my thing. Alone. And find my own guy who would like me for me. I already had it all planned out.
We found ourselves in a massive traffic jam, and as soon as I saw parking, I turned into it. We were still about ten miles out from Millinocket, but at least there would be a shuttle to Millinocket and I wouldn’t have to fight this traffic.
She had pink suitcases – pink! – while I had an old Army-Navy surplus bag. It had all my clothes and my purse, my money, and now my keys in it. I hefted it over my shoulder and looked at her pink suitcases. She had four suitcases and only two hands. She looked at me for help.
I grumbled, grabbed one of the suitcases. “You can’t take all of this.”
“Why not?”
“Because we can’t carry it.”
“Oh, I’ll just get someone to help. Excuse me?” She walked out into the street where someone was flagging cars. “Excuse me, can you help me?”
I don’t know how she did it. He dropped what he was doing and came to take her suitcases, yelling at someone else to take his job.
(Still in maintenance mode, rewriting an old story of mine.)