Twenty minutes later.

Damn, I should have picked up a coffee maker on the way home from the elementary school. Zoey's house has every cooking gizmo and gadget under the sun in her well-organized cabinet.

Clutched in a death grip in my hands is the coffee bag full of beans, and a part of me resists the real urge to pet the coffee bag and say my precious like it's the One Ring. I take another quick glance into her kitchen cabinet. Its beauty would put any Scandinavian woodwork design magazine to shame. And no damn coffee maker. Not a filter, not a grinder, not a single bit of anything coffee-related. I give the neat kitchen a dirty look. I know evil when I see it. No coffee maker? Seriously?

Like a drug dealer in some Breaking Bad episodes, I roast the beans in a flat pan and then pop them in a blender. I use another pot to very carefully distill the sweet juice of the gods. The liquid gold pours out, and every drop counts. Not the best-made coffee ever, but the coffee hits the spot.

I take my cup out the door to the porch. Steam comes up in flavorful plumes and a herbaceous burnt gift. Coffee made without a machine and I feel like a hero. A backlog of business inquiries, tweets, and YouTube comments waits for me, and I dig.

-YouTube Comment Section on ForNoah-

@Corker [Insert witty, interesting comment here]

Re: ForNoah [Insert witty, interesting reply here] lol Admin - Tari

I heart the comment.

The sun moves across the deep blue sky. My fingers type away each reply on the managed YouTube accounts. Finally, I'm in control of my little world, conquering the administration dragons. The sound of crunching tires on the driveway alerts me to the approach of my cousin's old pickup, an ancient Ford that's seen better days, but it's got that old, worked on, beloved look to it. The door opens up and out tumbles my party drunk best friends and a sober driver rolling her eyes at the bunch.

"Hey," I wave.

I quickly get into a video call with Zoey. "Let's knock out these introductions."

"Hello," Zoey says.

I check the calendar on the phone and see she's set for the rehearsal for The Tour YouTube singing contest later tonight. The reality TV mixed in with a singing show's time commitment is insane. She crowds into the camera, her long dark hair going everywhere. My best friends walk up the porch, and I introduce them as they climb the steps.

"Hey, Zoey, this is Carly from the CakeMe YouTube channel." Carly waves to the little phone camera. Her short haircut is just above the shoulders. Carly's sun-kissed honey skin has a pleasant glow to it for the thumbnail pictures later. She mouths at me that she finished the Spanish show notes for the post. One less thing for me to worry about. My Spanish has never been strong.

"This is her Assistant Pastry Chef Jo-Lee Sunny. Her channel is Half Ass Southern Bell," I say to Zoey in the video call. Jo-Lee smiles at the camera, the hint of her Georgia southern belle past never leaving her. Although Jo-Lee is older than all of us in our twenties, her vibrancy cannot be denied. Jo-Lee is like a nice Chacha brandy that has a good aged wine vodka finish. She kisses me on my cheek as she passes by me, her white skin a contrast to my darkness. I catch the scent of peaches that always seems to linger around her.

"I'm Eve tech support," my cousin Eve cuts into the camera. She hits me with the large grocery bag and barely misses me with the camera. Eve's warm round figure bumps into me again, just like we were little kids in a fake fight. Her thick, expressive lips slip into a mischievous smile. I give my cousin some side-eye and then smile back. Eve winks at me and the booze she was hiding behind her is waved like a trophy.

"Sparkling wine and orange juice. It's going to be one of those, huh?" I question.

Carly whispers into my ear while hugging me. "Yeah, we bought it."

In a fast non sequitur, "You should have moved in with me." She frowns at me with those words, and I feel a little guilty. I could have moved in with Carly and it might not have turned out badly. Same arrangement as me staying, but presumably for life if she could have her way. Carly has always been just one of those, my people type person since we met in high school. It would have been comfortable, but a bad idea. Carly spins back to the video camera and exclaims Zoey on the call. "What is Noah's favorite food?"

"Carrots or apples. I think the food box always comes with carrots," Zoey guesses.

"It does." I hand the phone to Carly and grab the carrots from the fridge.

"Carrot cake as the collab project?" Carly yells at my back.

"That's fine," Zoey says over the phone. "I have a rehearsal. Thank you for working with our channel." She waves and we wave back.

As we wrap up the call, Jo-Lee takes out the cake flour and all the other ingredients for making carrot cake. Then she pops that cork for the sparkling wine.

"Happy Divorce!" Jo-Lee yells when the cork loudly pops free. She pours the first mimosa and replaces my coffee cup with a champagne flute. "The place is fabulous."

I can't help but shake my head, of course. "Jo-Lee, you're upbeat about the divorce. You hated him from day one. I should have taken the hint."

"I didn't hate him," Jo says. "I hated him for you. You didn't fit together. He was Mr. Safe Bet, Steady Guy. I didn't get you two together, and I call it how I see it."

Skipping over the reply, I turn to answer her other question instead. She's cut a little too close to the bone on that one.

"I'm only in this place for a year, but it's rent free, and I get paid for doing my normal administration jobs." I feel the weight lift a little at the thought of having both my feet on the ground for a little while. "Theo's picking up the kids at 3 p.m. So, only one mimosa for me."

They all exchange looks, then Jo-Lee fills my glass up to the top. She raises her eyebrow at me and drops the bomb while cleaning carrots.

"How are you doing?" Jo-Lee consoles. Her normally reckless smile is gone and replaced with worry.

"Fine," is my cautious answer.

She takes a big drink from the glass and turns her overactive eyebrow on Carly, stirring the batter.

"Are you going to tell us for real?" Carly double-teams me.

"No. If I tell you, it would be real." I reveal. The depth of the truth of everything going up in flames isn't something I want to feel all at once.

"Shit," Eve blurts. She gets up and hugs me like when we were little. Like when my dad was in the hospital and we both knew he wasn't going home ever again. The hug is long in that forever kind of way. Forever love you can only get from family. Every woman in this room is family to me. Family who has seen each other through some shit. My ride or die type family. The more I think about it, the more I don't want to show them because it will all be too real. I am dead broke with a total of two dollars in the bank.

I hear the spoon drop inside the bowl. Then warm arms surround me. The smell of orange juice, alcohol, and that best friend smell. The way best friends smell like fresh birthday cake and love wrapped around me.

"Better," I whisper to them. "I'm getting a bit better." Everyone takes a step back but Carly. She stays just a little longer, pressing her forehead against mine.

Carly whispers to me, "I'll take getting better, love."  

A/n

Recently, I was asked why Tari wasn't sassy. Why she is upset about her life blowing up. About her life being in the shit when she planned the whole thing out perfectly.  "sorta" Together and not together.  I was basically asked by a reader why I let Tari mourn her marriage.  It took me a second to realize I was writing her mourning her marriage. It wasn't because the person wrote it got that was what I was writing. I think the person just wanted sassy and funny. A part of her is going through stages. Five stages, denial, anger, bargaining, depression and acceptance. I think at one point people use to write women being upset about losing marriages more. Then we had a generation of writing where women were sassy and using bats on cars (my favorite by the way light it up)

I am writing chick-lit. Contemporary romance style at that. I like Tari because she might not have her shit together right now but she's always trying. She never stops trying even when she REALLY wants to. It was something about the character that stuck with me. I don't mind her being sad about shit bag butt dialer. Although, I might make some changes in the edits. Thanks for asking about this though (reader :) ) I enjoy the hell outta questions. Don't worry the book isn't all about boohoo her. It's a small part of the book were less than 5000 words in lol. :)

Remember pixies need a lot of orgasms so please remember to share this, like it and do all that jazz.

Every time you share a pixie has an orgasm sharing is caring.

Miss O.P.