Accidental Makeovers Read online

  She rolls her eyes and grabs the drink menu.

  “I don’t know why I’m looking at this. I can’t have anything but water. But Katie, they have bread pudding here, don’t they? I wonder if that would coax this little person out of me.”

  Katie works here at O’Malley’s, but it’s her night off. She leans over to point out the best labor inducing treats on the menu. Or at least that’s the way the overdue mama is thinking.

  Cassie’s husband, Jon, is the bass player in Chain, rounding out the rest of the group. He’s an insurance adjuster, which makes for an interesting dynamic in the band. Brandon is a writer of serious literary fiction, and of course the Buczkowski brothers own and operate an air conditioning and refrigeration business. The day jobs and personalities of the band members are quite different, and that has been known to spark a little conflict at times.

  “So aren’t you due any day, Cassie? Should you even be out?”

  Zoe looks worried. She watches people get tattooed and pierced all day, but probably doesn’t want to witness the carnage of Cassie giving birth near the stage where she performs on Saturday nights, at this favorite venue of the band.

  I was in labor forever, but Cassie’s first baby, Owen, came quickly. They barely made it to the hospital, and they say subsequent babies come faster.

  “I’m overdue. I’ve had more than enough.” She shifts in her chair and almost pouts. “And my mother-in-law is driving me crazy with the christening plans.”

  Cassie and Jon moved here from Florida a few years ago, leaving both sets of grandparents behind. Jon’s huge family is close-knit.

  “Are they really that religious?” Katie motions for the waitress so she can order some snacks and desserts for the table.

  “They’re intense about their cultural heritage. They live near the Bulgarian Cultural Center in Sarasota, and the concentration of their countrymen is high enough to have a Bulgarian Orthodox Church. We don’t have one here, so they expect us to schelp down there. We did it with Owen, so there’s no getting around it.”

  “Wow, I’m glad I’m Jewish. Plus I can’t imagine ever having a baby.” We all look at Zoe, probably thinking the same thing. Where would she put one in that skinny, little body?

  Zoe is from Chicago, and while technically Jewish, her family is not practicing. Kind of like the way I was raised.

  Katie finishes with the waitress and turns back to the group, addressing Cassie. “Do you have names picked out? You didn’t find out the sex, right?”

  “No, we didn’t. And it’s all top secret, at least for a few days. Or hours if I can ride home on a bumpy road.” She notices the alarmed looks and says, “Relax, obviously Jon dropped me off. He’s driving me nuts, too. He keeps staring at me with a worried look. Not sexy at all.”

  Only Cassie would be thinking about sex at nine and a half months of pregnancy.

  Probably eager to stop talking about babies, Zoe says, “So, Bianca was telling us about her latest argument with Max, and her amazing new job opportunity.”

  Katie goes on to summarize my under-the-table, covert meeting with Raven, her incredible offer, and my bonehead boyfriend’s lack of support. “And he keeps calling her Birdie, which she hates.”

  “He calls you Birdie? I think that’s cute.” Cassie is tapping her belly, as if that will cause her water to break.

  “Really? I guess it could be cute. Most of the time he says it to get out of trouble. He does mean it in an endearing way, though.”

  I dig into the Irish nachos, wishing the pet name would magically endear him to me.

  “I bet Zoe thinks it’s stupid.” Cassie looks at the girl in black, assuming she scoffs at cuteness.

  Zoe plays with the peeling wrapper on her beer and says, “Actually, I like it. I wouldn’t mind being called Birdie. How did he come up with that in the first place?”

  I go on to explain that he started calling me that after I had broken up with him a couple of times. He said ‘my little birdie keeps flying out of the coop.’ Of course he didn’t get the fact that his ‘coop’ was a dirty studio apartment occupied by an immature, overgrown…anyway, I don’t share that part with the girls. I hate to keep complaining about something I haven’t figured out how to fix.

  “I know, let’s all pick bird names for each other!” Katie’s enthusiasm surpasses the number of drinks she’s had.

  And yay, I started a game. Where’s the waitress with my second hard cider?

  My mind wanders back to my problems while my friends discuss nonsense. I thought they would at least ask me about the job, but I did talk to Katie and Zoe about it when I first arrived. They are creative types, so they understand, but the conversation became boring pretty quickly, since I have no details. It could all be a bunch of bullshit and I will feel like a fool for telling anyone.

  I decide to play along with their game, and as I get ready to announce my suggestion for Katie’s name, I spot Claire looking around the bar for familiar faces.

  Katie doesn’t notice and jumps in with, “Okay, so Zoe is Song Bird. That’s obvi! And Cassie is Dirty Bird because of her and Jon’s tendency to…” Katie’s pale skin turns pink as she scrambles to complete her thought, now that she’s committed to it.

  Cassie is laughing as she says, “You can say it. Yes, my husband and I have sex in other people’s bedrooms at parties. And band practices.” She covers her mouth, but Cassie never blushes. “Oh hi, Claire.”

  Claire certainly knows about this propensity of her and Brandon’s mutual friends. Cassie and Jon have been caught doing it at their house on more than one occasion, and the last time it involved a lot of drama surrounding mystery panties in the bed while Claire was on a business trip. Only they weren’t Cassie’s.

  And that brings me to their neighbor Diamond, the real panty culprit, who I sincerely hope doesn’t show up tonight.

  “Hi, girls. Mind if I sit down? I’m here for the late Sunday afternoon karaoke. Brandon thinks it’s stupid, and not ‘real’ singing, so he won’t come. But it works out well since he’s home with the babies. So what are you ladies up to?” She shoves her huge baby mama purse under the table and takes a deep breath.

  Claire and Brandon have been together for a few years now, and married for about a year and a half. They have two adopted babies, seventeen-month-old Aidan and two-month-old Aurora. Yes, they adopted an instant baby, the month after their wedding. Claire had a hysterectomy a couple of years before they met, and her infertility has always been a hot button of sensitivity. Luckily Brandon was all for adoption, since he and his sister were both adopted.

  The couple went through a rough patch a few months ago, but they seem to be happier lately. But not only did Diamond plant her panties in their bed while Claire was away, she left a pregnancy test in their bathroom trash for Claire to discover. It’s one thing to make a play for another woman’s husband, but to use her biggest fear to trick her into leaving her husband…well, that’s taking home wrecking ‘ho’ to a new level.

  Fortunately my sort-of brother-in-law, Rob loves a good ‘ho’ and was able to coax a confession out of Diamond, along with everything else he wanted. By some miracle, or stroke of bad luck for the rest of us, she forgave him for recording her admission of guilt, and now they’re dating. Or whatever Rob does with women he keeps around a while.

  The girls proceed to explain their ridiculous bird name game to Claire, and as I excuse myself to the ladies’ room, I hear them pick Flighty Bird for Katie. It’s nice to know that your friends are in sync, as that was the name I was going to pick for the girl who dumps guys faster than Diamond opens her...never mind. Don’t judge, don’t judge. I hear my mother’s voice reminding me we don’t have much room to talk.

  I did dump Max at least once or twice to date other guys, but for the record, Mom and I have never tried to lure a married man away from his family. At least I assume she hasn’t.

  The restrooms are down a long flight of stairs at O’Malley’s, and I decide to wait to
view my text messages until I get to the bottom. I’ve seen a couple of drunken idiots take a tumble on these stairs and it’s not pretty. I don’t know how Claire survived because she could really knock ‘em back in her pre-baby days.

  I reach the ladies’ room and sit down on the little couch. I got a text from my mother telling me that Max and Rob apologized and squished her in a monster hug. That’s good, I guess.

  And Max sent me…oh, seriously? That man needs to stop sending me pictures of his…oh my God. I hold it up to the light for a better view. It is quite impressive, but some day our son is going to get a hold of our phones and...oh well, he already sees his dad’s assets when Max lets Mick shower with him, but he doesn’t need to see it on Mommy’s phone. The child will be scarred for life.

  I sigh and resist the urge to encourage him by sending him a sexy text back. Plus, I am still mad at him and he doesn’t deserve to get off that easily. I smile at my pun—I have no desire to help him get off either way. At least not right now.

  As I head into the stall to pee, I wonder why I used to enjoy this sort of thing. Am I getting old and boring? Or bored with life in general?

  After I wash my hands, I check my messages one more time. Oh, I have a voice mail, too. It may be a follow up to Max’s…oh no, I don’t recognize that number.

  ‘Hello, Bianca this is Eric Kimball, Raven Alexander’s business associate. Forgive me for not calling sooner, but I wanted to see if we could meet early this week to discuss the business venture in our Richmond salon.’

  My heart beat quickens. It’s so exciting, but terrifying at the same time. Is this a job? A business opportunity? Charity? I guess I’ll find out when I call Eric back.

  One thing is for sure—he doesn’t sound like an old guy.

  I go back upstairs and our table is boisterous and chaotic, with everyone laughing and drawing pictures of themselves as birds on their placemats. Even Claire has joined in.

  “Hey, they named me Looney Bird.” Poor Claire doesn’t get out much anymore, so I can see why this is great fun for her. “Oh, and by the way, I think Diamond knows you guys were meeting here. I was telling Brandon when she was picking Ruby up earlier.”

  Diamond lives right across the cul-de-sac from Brandon and Claire—renting Claire’s old house. Brandon and Claire met when he moved into her neighborhood, and when they moved in together, they decided to rent out her house.

  This should have worked out fine, but the new tenant, Diamond, the sexy, young divorcee, used her similarly aged child, Ruby, as a way into the Harmon home on a regular basis. Since Brandon works from home, this has been a recipe for disaster.

  Unfortunately, Rob’s intervention has inserted her into our friend circle, and made her my pseudo sister-in-law! I’ve tried to be nice to her, and she has gotten a little better. But it’s hard to trust her. Claire has done a remarkable job of forgiving, but she is subscribing to the ‘keep your friends close and your enemies closer’ philosophy. Plus her little Aidan loves Ruby.

  Cassie is shoveling bread pudding and ice cream into her mouth, but manages to say, “So tell us about this job, Birdie.”

  They all start giggling, and Zoe starts flapping her wings. And with the cape-like sweater she’s wearing, she actually resembles a bird getting ready to take off. Suddenly, she puts her arms down, almost knocking her beer into Cassie’s belly. “I just thought of something hilarious! Diamond should be Dirty Bird. Too bad it’s already taken.”

  Claire chimes in and says, “Zoe, we agreed we weren’t going to publicly bash her anymore.” She cracks a smile because after all—it’s hard to let it go when a much younger woman comes on to your much younger husband. “Okay, I’m going to put my song in. Anyone else going to sing?”

  Zoe shakes her head no and distracts herself with something in her purse. She probably thinks it’s silly, just like Brandon. I can’t sing to save my life.

  Cassie is still peering at me and I realize I didn’t answer her question. “Oh, the job. Well, I’m not sure if it’s a job with a salary, or a business opportunity where I have to find my own clients. I’ll find out soon enough, though. The business manager called and left a message.”

  “Does he sound cute?” Katie’s eyes widen at the mention of a new man on the horizon.

  “Aren’t you dating someone?” I swear this girl goes through men like I go through baby wipes on Mick’s butt.

  She waves her hand in dismissal. “Yeah, but he’s so…nice. You know?”

  I want to say, ‘No I don’t know.’ I wouldn’t know nice if it bit me in the ass. Although, that’s not fair either. Max is nice, but I need a lot more than that from a life partner.

  Suddenly a new voice joins the conversation. “You definitely don’t want nice. It’s so boring. I really dodged a bullet when Brandon decided his morals were more important than his…oh, Claire’s here.”

  Diamond places her hand over her huge, pouty lips. Every time I see her I wince, and think we should take her to the hospital for possibly fatal bee stings.

  Everyone says hello to the newest guest at our table—some of us more begrudgingly than others, since she’s an uninvited addition.

  Claire comes back to the table, and the two blonds exchange icy greetings. Claire is quite a bit older than the rest of us. She just turned thirty-nine. She was reluctant to marry a younger guy, but she also has her ‘grown-up’ circle of friends, as she jokingly refers to her work colleagues and older girlfriends.

  We all settle into easy banter, with all of us helping to keep Claire and Diamond on opposite ends of the table. I momentarily forget about my own anxiety while I listen to the troubles and thrills of my best girlfriends. This is another thing I learned from my mom—single mothers especially need to have a strong network of women in our corner. And I do consider myself to be a single mother—there’s no ring on my finger. And if there was, Max would probably have gotten it out of a box of Frosted Flakes.

  I sigh as Claire leans in to say something on her way to the stage to sing.

  “Did you hear Diamond talk about using her assets at Hooter’s? She was comparing it to you getting your break in the makeup business. I had to bite my tongue to avoid saying, ‘Well, maybe you should consider stripping, if you really want to monetize your assets. Or how about porn?’ I know, I’m going to hell.”

  This is how Claire copes. She smiles publicly, but she continues to vent with a select few who share her distaste for Diamond’s assets, and how she’s used them.

  I smile as Claire saunters off to grab the mic and perform a Stevie Nicks song. Her co-worker, Justin turned her on to karaoke while they were in Key West, on the infamous business trip.

  I still wonder if he turned her on to anything else. She was pretty quick to pack up and leave Brandon when the ‘panties in the bed’ debacle first blew up.

  One thing I can say for Max—I do trust him with other women. But I’m not sure if I can trust him with me.

  CHAPTER FOUR

  Max

  It’s seven in the morning, and I am up, showered, dressed and waiting outside my brother’s girlfriend’s house to pick him up for a full day on the job. And where is my sweet girlfriend? Yep, sleeping her brains out. That really chaps my ass.

  I want to honk the horn to get Rob’s ass out of the house. I guess if I had a girlfriend like Diamond, I would have a hard time leaving, too.

  Their relationship is new, and Rob has no responsibility for her daughter, or her house. He retreats back to his dingy studio apartment—the same one I used to inhabit with the piles of crap everywhere, the stereotypical empty refrigerator, and the bathroom with no lock on the door. For some reason, that one really annoyed Bianca.

  I glance over at Brandon and Claire’s house across the street. You would think they would be up by now with two little ones, but Claire has given me shit for honking early in the morning. Instead I do the modern thing and text my lazy brother. I laugh to myself as I think of Sharon’s urban slang. ‘Doin’ the pooch.’
So ridiculous. Actually, he’s probably doin’…

  The door to the van opens and in jumps my big brother, in more ways than one. I’m a big guy, but damn, Rob is huge. Too bad his brain isn’t as big.

  “Mornin’, little brother. So what do we have on today’s agenda?”

  He rests his coffee mug in the holder as I spot Diamond peeking out from behind the partially closed front door—blowing kisses. I can easily see that she’s wearing nothing. Maybe if I back the van further down the cul-de-sac I can get a different view…

  “Yeah, she’s pretty amazing, right?”

  “You lucked out. She’s not a nag, either. Don’t tell me she packed your lunch, too?”

  Rob also has a bursting lunchbox on the ground between his legs.

  “Sorry, man. She’s a great cook. I’m gonna have to get to the gym more often or all this muscle’s gonna turn to flab.”

  “Bianca didn’t even hear me get up. But that’s fine by me, because I was not interested in continuing last night’s argument.”

  “She still going on about that makeup job?”

  Rob turns the heat up. It’s ridiculous that we’re going to fix air conditioning when you need heat in the morning. But that’s Richmond. This time of year there are three seasons every day.

  “Yeah, that and all her other ‘problems’ with me.”

  “Did you tell her about your new baby? You’re pickin’ that up tomorrow, right?”

  “No, I didn’t tell her. But she’ll love it. I’m not worried about that. Actually, both of my new babies are coming in tomorrow.”

  “Sweet, that’s great timing for band practice this week. Did you tell our buddy, Brandon?”

  “Yeah, he’s cool with it. You’ll need to drive the van so we can debut all my new treasures at once.”

  “No problem. So is Bianca meeting that guy? You have nothing to worry about there. I’m sure he’s one of those scrawny suit douchebags. Like Jon.”

  Rob laughs, but really Jon’s a good guy and the chicks like him, too. Funny how Cassie never seems to be jealous—she needs to teach Claire a lesson, but I can barely handle dealing with my own woman.