Liar's Guide to True Love by Wendy Chen Read Free Book Online

couple of months. Well, this last girlfriend, I guess. They were so disgustingly happy I couldn’t stand to stay for more than a couple of drinks the last time I saw him. He’s single again, thank God.”
    “Sounds like every other man out there, going around breaking hearts without a second thought.” Suzanne again.
    “The thing about Nick really is that underneath it all he’s dying to find the right woman, and he just doesn’t waste his time once he figures out they aren’t the one. He just doesn’t know that’s what he’s doing.” Kate pauses to wink at someone to her left. “I mean, why else wouldn’t we have slept together in college? I was never his type.”
    Two martinis later we are still waiting for Nick but are unable to launch into full-on girl talk mode since his arrival is “imminent.”
    “All right, best public bathroom,” Kate says.
    Mia narrows her eyes. She’s really thinking about this. “At the top of the list are the posh hotels, of course. J. Crew is next, I think. Clean, and there are always so many people in there that no one notices you’re just making a dash for the toilet.” Sometimes I get such a kick out of how Mia has an opinion on just about everything. And her way of making snap judgments that make life seem so simple.
    Speaking of “the toilet,” I excuse myself.
    And get on a very long line for the ladies’ room. And I don’t mean one or two girls waiting to check their makeup. There are full on five— five —women in front of me, all looking as if they are ready to murder the next one out of a stall.
    Twenty dollars a martini and this place can’t afford a bigger bathroom.
    Unfortunately for me, I have to go. I mean I have to go. I try to act casual. I shift from one foot to another, pretending like I am just impatient and eager to rejoin my date. I pretend to check my watch, as if it’s time that I’m afraid of losing and not control of my bladder.
    One man after another goes in and comes out. It’s so unfair. They probably all pee into a trough at the same time.
    I resort to unbuttoning not one, but two of the buttons on my jeans to relieve the pressure on my bladder. (Luckily I have not adopted the super low-rise fashion). I don’t know if it actually helps, but I am willing to try anything. I rest my arm across my hip so that no one sees.
    There are three girls ahead of me. One is telling her friend about the married man she has started sleeping with. The other is trying desperately not to look like she is listening in. I consider telling them that I am pregnant so that they’ll let me go ahead of them. But they look so young that that excuse might entail a lengthy explanation of the restroom needs of hormonal, bloated mothers to be.
    Another guy exits and makes his way back to the bar. I’ve had it with the injustice. Urgency makes me bold when the next guy steps out. “Umm, excuse me, but is there anyone else in there?” Damn! Why does he have to be cute? He looks around to make sure it’s him I’m speaking to.
    “In there?” He points to the men’s room. “No.”
    The women stop talking and shoot me the kind of dirty look I might give a twenty-two-year-old who had too many shots and expected her male friends to take her home.
    “Well, would you mind waiting here and making sure no one walks in on me?” I am resting one hand on the door frame and fiddling with my earring with the other, trying to make him feel both sympathetic to my need, but not worried that I’ll wet myself right in front of him. (The earring fidget is a nervous habit, but he doesn’t know that.)
    He looks me up and down and grins in a way that would have made my knees weak if they weren’t already. “Sure.”
    Wow. Maybe I am more unconsciously alluring than I thought. I had gone to the gym every day this week. Maybe I’ll buy him a drink. As long as Kate’s friend is joining our party, Suzanne won’t mind one more guy. I could even snag a date out of this. I could