shower without me knowing. Pretty good photos of me too.
Maybe last night’s stories aren’t so bad.
Deciding I need to see what Stella’s talking about, I grab my phone and open Instagram, scrolling through the stories until I find Kelsey’s. The first one is a video of her talking into the camera.
“We’re the last of the single girls,” Kelsey says in this hushed voice, like she doesn’t want anyone to hear her. And you barely can, thanks to the noisy bar we were sitting in. “The sole survivors!”
The video switches to me getting mad at her over the Rate a Date app, which I didn’t need the reminder, thank you very much. Next is a video of a bunch of guys sitting at the bar, singing “Happy Birthday” to their friend. They were loud and sloppy drunk, and Kelsey couldn’t stop laughing at them.
Me? I wasn’t interested.
The last story video is of us waiting on the sidewalk for our Uber, me standing there with my arms wrapped around myself to ward off the chill as I stare off into the distance, my breasts looking ready to pop out of my dress. I’m a curvy girl, it’s hard to tame those babies, but jeez, I look like I’m about to explode with boobage, if you know what I mean.
“I hate everything about your story,” I tell Kelsey once it’s finished.
“Ah, come on, it was no big deal.” Kelsey shrugs.
“You make us sound desperate.” She keeps looking at me like she doesn’t understand what I’m saying. “Why did you film those guys at the bar?”
“They were having fun. I thought they were cute.”
“You looked like a stalker.”
“I was sort of stalking them.” She drains her mimosa.
“And mentioning that we were the last single girls.” I point at her. “That’s where you really made us sound desperate.”
I hate that word. Desperate. Pathetic isn’t good either. I don’t want to look like either of those things, you know? Who does?
“I was only speaking the truth! We should be proud of our single heritage,” Kelsey protests.
“I don’t even think that’s a thing.” I catch our friend Sarah watching us bicker and decide to draw her into it. “Is that a thing? Single heritage?”
Sarah frowns. “I have no idea what you’re talking about.”
I’m about to launch into a full-blown argument with Kelsey when I get an unfamiliar notification sound—it’s like nothing I’ve ever heard come from my phone before.
It sounded like a…wolf whistle?
Glancing down at my phone, I see it’s a notification from…
Rate a Date.
Mand.96 just sent you a message!
Frowning, I tap the notification, opening the app and waiting as the mailbox loads. Mand.96. Is that the person’s user name? What if this person is named…Mandy? That makes sense, what with the username. Did I state on my profile that I’m heterosexual? Because I am. Heterosexual. I mean, I did have that one moment when I was in beauty school and we all went out drinking right before we graduated. The night went on and on, and there was a lot of liquor consumed. At one point, I made out with that one girl, but does it really count? It was all in good fun.
She had soft lips and a shy tongue. Her name was Josie. She had pink hair.
Those were good times.
Oops, I’m distracted. Okay, so I open the message to see this person’s profile pic is of a football.
That’s it.
Frowning, I stare at the image for a while. It looks like the person actually took the photo. It’s not some canned stock photo you can find on the web—the angle is weird and the sun is too bright.
Maybe Mandy is really into sports. Though I hate that there’s no actual photo of her face. This feels like a trick.
I read the message.
Hey, you live in my hometown. You’re beautiful.
My heart does a little leap at the beautiful comment. That’s a very serious compliment, though I’m guessing it’s tossed around a lot more freely on a dating app. But still. I appreciate the kind words.
Unfortunately, there’s no name signed, so I don’t know if this person is an actual Mandy or…not.
Lifting my head, I watch Kelsey steadily drink from her new mimosa while she chats with Sarah. Caroline and Candice have their heads bent together, and from the tone of their conversation, I can tell they’re comparing wedding notes, since they’re both our upcoming brides. Stella is currently on her phone, and I think she’s talking to one of her brothers because her voice gets louder