Page 139 of ClickBack

“I saw him.”

“Then stop looking at me like that.”

“How am I looking?”

“Like you’re waiting for me to remember you’re here.”

“I don’t have that problem with you.”

Her eyes settle on mine. She reaches for her drink without finding the straw, and I move the glass into her hand.

Brenda laughs. “Leave that woman alone. We’re talking about Blair Underwood.”

“Talk,” I tell her. “I’m listening.”

“That man has been fine for decades,” Yvonne says. “I respect the commitment.”

Brenda turns to me. “Could you get in touch with Blair Underwood?”

“For what?”

“Ask if he’d come to one of these.”

“We just saw him,” Malcolm says.

“On a screen, Malcolm.”

I look at Giselle. She is very busy folding her napkin.

“I don’t know that man,” I tell Brenda.

“But you know people.”

“He’s off today,” Giselle tells her.

“I’m not asking him to go get him today.”

Giselle loses the fight with her laugh. I reach for my drink. Came here to meet her friends and got assigned to bring Blair Underwood to the next one.

Malcolm looks at his wife. “You got me right here.”

Brenda pats his arm. “And I appreciate you, too.”

“Too?”

She kisses his cheek, and he tries to continue looking offended while she straightens his collar. They order without consulting each other. She changes his side because she knows he will ask for hers when it comes, and he tells the server to bring both.

I like them. I like knowing Giselle has people who can get her laughing over something she did years before I met her. I want to hear the stories she hasn’t thought to tell me yet. I also want the chance to be in one without the whole room knowing it from a picture somebody stole.

While we wait for the food, Malcolm tries again.

“All I’m saying is, there was a point they could have stopped.”

“Where would you have stopped?” Yvonne asks me.

“Watching? Nowhere. I wanted them to get away.”

“Exactly,” Brenda says.