Chapter Three
Wine, Whining, & Warnings
Arie is nestled on the beige sectional wrapped in a cozy blanket when Isla walks into their shared apartment thirty minutes later.
She’s changed into her lounge pants and oversized tee with a glass of wine in one hand, the remote in the other.
A far cry from the no nonsense business bitch that left for work this morning.
The open bottle of wine sitting on the coffee table might as well have been a lighthouse calling Isla home. She kicks off her heels at the door and makes a beeline for it.
Forget dignity. Forget tonight. Forget The Gay.
“Hey, I was just going to –”
Isla holds up a hand to her best friend while she pops the cork with her teeth, spits it across the room, and slugs the remaining contents.
“…text you.” Arie finishes.
Contents drained, gasping for breath, Isla drops onto the sectional.
Arie’s eyebrows rise, “Ohhh.” She winces. “That bad, huh?”
“He’s gay.” Isla says matter-of-factly, turning to face her friend.
Arie chokes on her wine, “What?” she manages to say after a rough coughing fit.
“Oh, exactly what I said,” Isla replied. “Ben is gay. A big fat G.A.Y. Not just a red flag, but a WAVING FLAMING FUCKING RAINBOW GAY FLAG.”
Arie manages to hide her chuckle with another cough.
“He puked at the sight of my cooter, ARIE!”
Well, that did it.
That put Arie over the edge. She was in hysterics.
Tears rolling down her face.
And moments later, Isla was crying from laughter too.
“You have got to be kidding me?” Arie somehow manages to ask in between fits of uncontrollable laughter.
Isla wipes her eyes, “Okay, maybe he didn’t vomit but he was definitely gagging. It was like a scene out of a horror movie.”
They both try to contain their laughter, but the banter is endless and the laughs just keep coming.
After a few more minutes, sensing Isla needed another drink, Arie makes her way to the kitchen and grabs another bottle of wine along with an additional goblet before Isla decides to polish this bottle off as well.
Isla starts from the beginning and gives her friend the details. From drinking the bottle of wine at dinner. All the way through to the horrible image ingrained in her memory.
Arie sensed the red flags right away.
Her best friend’s dating life had been a dumpster fire since college.
Whether Isla did it out of desperation or some silly hope that true love actually existed, Arie would never understand.
“So you thought he wasn’t that interested in dinner, yet you still went home with him?” Arie asks when she returns with the filled wine goblets.
“I thought he was nervous about it being the third date. You know, liquid courage and all. ” Isla’s defense starts to wane.
Arie raises an eyebrow, “So it would be okay if he just had a drinking problem?”
“Yes!” Isla yelps - “Wait, No… ugh!”
She throws her face into the couch pillow. “Why can’t I meet a normal guy for once? One ready not to waste my time and energy.”
“Just stop dating.” Arie states. “Why don’t you think I date? I see what you go through and no thank you. I love my peace and I have expectations no one has even come close to meeting.” She shrugs.
“You also act like a celibate and swear off any man who even looks in your direction.”
Arie smirks, “I enjoy frightening them off – means they’re too weak.” She sips her drink.
Isla thanks Arie for topping off her glass with a slight slur in her words, “I don’t know how you do it. Just work and come home. No social life –”
Ouch.
“Uh, I have a social life…” Arie interjects.
“You know what I am…” Isla continues, ignoring her friend's comment. “Tired. No – done with these boys who like to pretend they are men.” When she takes another sip, a drop of wine splats on the black cocktail dress.
Arie makes a mental note to send Isla the dry-cleaning bill.
“Will you stop that,” Arie snatches the couch blanket away from Isla as she’s about to dab at the wine stain with the Hermès throw her parents gifted her for Christmas a few years back.
“And give me that too...” taking the wine glass out of her hand before Isla has a chance to spill any more of the drink on anything else Arie owned.
“Heyyy… I was drinking that!” Isla cries.
Arie ignores her tipsy friend and places both wine glasses on the marbled coffee table before turning back to Isla.
She grabs her friend’s face with both of her hands.
“I mean this is the nicest way possible,” Arie takes a deep breath and says in all clarity. “You are a grown ass woman who is worth more than any of these men are willing to give you and I’m sick and tired of hearing you complain after every date you go on. Or worse, when you think they have potential, they fill your head with hope, and then —boom— they turn out to be gay.”
Isla’s eyes bulge as she listens to her friend, her lips still squished together like a fish.
“I know you’re a hopeless romantic and all you want is to find a love like your parents,” Arie continued. “And it will happen one day. But let it find you, and stop chasing these losers.”
Arie releases her best friend’s face, gives her a warm hug, and tells her she’s heading to bed.
A heaviness settles over Isla. Maybe it was at the mention of her parent’s great love.
Or, maybe it was the exorbitant amount of alcohol she consumed tonight.
Isla adjusts her jaw back into place, hearing what her friend is saying — and maybe listening for the first time in years—Isla couldn’t deny it.
Arie wasn’t wrong.
Everything she said was absolutely true.
Isla wanted so badly to recreate the kind of love her parents had that she’d convinced herself almost anyone was worth the risk if they showed her the slightest bit of attention.
In truth, all Isla had ever wanted was love.
The kind of love with happy endings.
The kind of love that sweeps you off your feet.
The kind where making love lasts all night long and leaves you seeing stars.
The kind where someone worships every inch of you simply because they can.
That’s the kind of love Isla has always dreamed of.
But how else was she supposed to meet anyone?
She wasn’t going to spend her life going to work and coming home like Arie did.
Sure, Arie lets loose sometimes, but most days she was too busy in Business Bitch Boss mode to think twice about men, let alone a relationship.
“Oh, one more thing,” Arie swings around before shutting her bedroom door behind her, “whatever you do, do not dry heave on that carpet tonight.”
Isla face-plants into the couch cushions and lets sleep claim her.
Tomorrow she could deal with her questionable life choices.
Tonight, she was too drunk to care.
