supplies on the coffee table, and it could have been any of the last three years, watching her work on any number of projects for which she decided a three-paneled poster board was necessary. And, if I’m being honest, I always did. On projects we did together, Jamie never let me do any visuals. She once said my handwriting looked like that of a child on cough medicine writing a letter to Santa. I wasn’t even mad, but I gave her the silent treatment for as long as I could anyway, not wanting to give her the satisfaction of being right and funny. I lasted maybe a minute before bursting into laughter. I smiled even now.
“What?”
“Nothing,” I said. “You’re right.”
Jamie blinked at me. “What?”
(It was possible I’d never said those words, in that order, to her before.)
“You want some water? A snack?”
“Do you have a ruler?”
“Umm. I think so. I’ll look.”
I went into the kitchen and opened one junk drawer after another. (We’d started with just one—my mom liked to joke that the rubber bands and paper clips and instruction manuals and tape rolls were breeding.) Near the back of the third, under a waxy sheet with a single gold-miner stamp remaining in the corner, I found my ruler, orange plastic and rough-edged from ten years of use. I brought it and a bag of chips and two glasses of water back into the living room, where Jamie had written SAVE TRIPLE MOON COFFEE SHOP at the top of her poster board in pristine purple block letters.
“Purple for gay?”
“Yeah,” said Jamie. “I was gonna do rainbow, but that seemed over the top.” She took the water I offered her and downed half the glass in one go.
“Should you do a black outline?” I suggested.
“No.”
I rested my chin in my hand, using my palm to suppress my smile. Jamie drove me crazy, and right now, for some reason, I missed it. She held a black marker in her hand, hovering over the board, and we both stared at it for a minute, waiting for the rest of the plan to fill itself in.
“I still think we should do a benefit concert,” I said.
“What if we got someone famous to be the face of the campaign?” said Jamie.
“Who? Like Ellen?”
“No, not like really famous, but like California famous. Like Linda Weller.”
“Who?”
Jamie sighed pityingly. “Our state controller?”
“I’m sorry,” I said, “but I didn’t know that was a thing until right now. Which makes me think she is maybe not that famous.”
“Influential, then. She handles budget stuff. So she’s possibly even more powerful than a high school band.”
I ignored the dig. “Is she queer?”
“Does she have to be?”
“It would be nice.”
“Well, sure. She could be. I don’t know. She has a husband. But she refers to herself as an ally.” Jamie was flustered, frustrated I wasn’t immediately convinced by her brilliant idea.
“So, probably not.”
“If you know of any queer, local, powerful politicians and/or celebrities who would care about the preservation of a small lesbian coffee shop, I’m all ears,” Jamie huffed. She watched me think about it, looking annoyingly smug.
“Fine. I don’t know anyone.”
“Thank you. I’m writing down Linda Weller.” Jamie triumphantly uncapped a blue marker and began drawing a large L in a prominent, central position on the board.
“Leave some room for other ideas, too,” I said. “Like Sweets.”
Jamie sighed. “Fine.” After about an hour she finally finished Linda Weller’s R and selected a new, light pink marker and wrote Sweets in small, barely visible letters on the right-hand panel of the board. “There.”
“Are you kidding?”
“What?” Jamie sucked in her cheeks, trying not to laugh. Which made me laugh.
“You’re such an ass!”
“I know. I’m sorry. I’ll write over it in blue.” She uncapped a new marker and traced thinly over her work. “How’s that?” She was