#TripleX by Christine Zolendz, Angelisa Stone Read Free Book Online Page A

the one brewing in my stomach that only a heaping pile of 2,000 calories could satisfy. The truckers thankfully accepted the shoveling of food in my mouth to be the end of our conversation.
    I scarfed down half my food and got out of there before I could have any more horrifyingly nasty images. Heaving breasts? Really? The only time I’ve ever had heaving breasts is when I had to walk up four flights of stairs on my daughter’s fieldtrip at the Statue of Liberty.
    I ran through the parking lot so fast I actually got cramps in my legs, the intense kind that shot daggers of icy glass up my legs. Hey look at that, I was exercising . And wouldn’t you know it—my breasts were once again heaving as I gasped for air, praying to not die in the parking lot of a greasy truck stop diner. I climbed back into the minivan, locked all the doors, and called Angelisa.
    “Where are you?”
    I was so out of breath, all I could answer her with were grunts and pants.
    “Please tell me you are not butt dialing me while having sex,” she yelled into the phone.
    There were a few more seconds of heavy breathing. Angelisa stayed on the other end like a damned federal agent listening in from a surveillance van.
    “No. Ugh. I think I’m having a heart attack. I just ran for like, ninety seconds straight. Tell my girls I love them,” I panted.
    She laughed. “Okay, so when are you getting here? I was going to go to the Y tonight.”
    “Maybe three more hours. I don’t think I’ll stop again. I’d rather pee myself.”
    “What?”
    I started the van as quickly as I could and peeled out of the truck stop lot on screeching tires. “Wait, hold up. Did you really think for a minute that I’d be having sex with a strange man when I called you?” I asked, merging onto the highway.
    “Well…”
    “Okay, so I need to give you some updated developments about my vagina. Like on the spot correspondence, as I travel. I don’t think I have the guts for a one-off. I think that maybe people who do that are like lying, when they say it’s exhilarating. Because all I see is ax murderers chopping me into pieces and hairy bent penises. And I tried to write and I can’t. I just can’t.” I spewed incoherently. I swerved into another lane and screamed. “Oh my God. At the rate I’m freaking out, look for me on the next episode of Cops ,” I yelped.
    “What the hell? Are you drunk?”
    “No. But, that is a terrific idea. Do you Ohio people have those cool drive-through liquor stores? If so, I’m hitting that place before I get to you.”
    “Yep. We got The Brew Thru out here.”
    “I may move to Ohio.”
    “Okay, well, pick up some wine coolers,” she instructed.
    Wine coolers? They still sell that stuff? “Sure, it’ll be like 1980 all over again. We could even do our hair all big and slap on some leg warmers.”
    She hung up on me.
    After another two hundred miles of road behind me, my air conditioner spat out a suspicious substance from its vents, wheezed, coughed and then just died. I took the first exit I could, Exit 229, which led me in to the lovely town of Youngstown. And by lovely, I mean ghetto, so I drove right back onto the highway and rolled down the damn window. It didn’t look like the kind of place I had enough pepper spray for.
    Another hundred miles behind me, and I was drenched in sweat, hanging my head out the car window like a damn dog. When my GPS barked out my last exit and destination, I cried tears of joy. Literally cried.
    Walking up to ring her bell was a noisy affair between the rub of the wet denim of my jeans and my thighs.
    There was a beautifully landscaped garden and a very expensive sports car parked in the driveway. Why couldn’t my husband get a new sports car to drive instead of a new girlfriend to ride? Angelisa was so freaking lucky.
    A little pint-sized football player answered the door.
    “Who are you?” His eyes squinted narrowly at me through his helmet.
    “Christine,” I said, trying to