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  Somebody knocked on the door, and when Min opened it, Bonnie was standing there in her chenille robe holding a teapot. “I made cocoa,” she said, and Min felt the tears start. “Oh, baby,” Bonnie said and came in, putting her arm around Min, balancing the cocoa pot in her other hand. “Come on. We just need to talk about it.”

  “I thought I was so smart,” Min said, fighting to keep her voice steady. She took a shuddery breath. “I kept thinking I had it all under control.”

  “I thought you did pretty well,” Bonnie said, putting the cocoa pot down on the sewing machine table. She took a cup out of each pocket, and Min laughed at her through her tears.

  “Where’s Roger?” Min said. “I don’t—”

  “He’s asleep downstairs,” Bonnie said, picking up the pot. “He’s worried about you, but it gets to be midnight and he clonks right out for a solid eight hours.”

  Min laughed again and then sniffed. “If I’d had any brains, I’d have grabbed Roger that first night.”

  “Roger would bore you to tears,” Bonnie said, handing her a filled cup. “Just like I’d have shoved Cal under a bus by now.”

  “You would have?” Min sniffed again.

  “Oh, please, that master of the universe act?” Bonnie said. “That’s one scared man you’ve got there. I don’t have the time for that. I want kids, I don’t want to marry one.”

  “He’s a good guy, Bon.” Min sipped her cocoa and began to feel better.

  “I know,” Bonnie said. “And some day he’ll grow up and be a good man. In the meantime, he broke your heart so I’m mad at him.”

  “No, he didn’t,” Min said. “He tried not to be with me.”

  “No, he didn’t.” Bonnie sat down next to her on the couch with her own cup. “He had every opportunity in the world to get away from you and he passed up every one of them to be with you.”

  “That’s because he couldn’t charm me,” Min said. “It wasn’t—”

  “Oh, stop being such a baby,” Bonnie said, and Min jerked her head up and startled Elvis. “Well, listen to yourself. You’re miserable, but it’s not his fault and it’s not your fault. Well, screw that.”

  “Bonnie” Min said, scandalized.

  “What do you want, Min?” Bonnie said. “If life were a fairy tale, if there truly was a happy ending, what would you want?”

  “I’d want Cal,” Min said, feeling ashamed even as she said it. “I know that’s—”

  “Don’t,” Bonnie said, holding up her hand. “Why do you want him?”

  “Oh, because he was fun,” Min said, smiling as she blinked the tears away because she was so shallow. “He was so much fun, Bonnie. And he made me feel wonderful. I was never fat when I was with Cal.”

  “You’re never fat when you’re with Liza and me,” Bonnie said.

  “I know,” Min said. “He was almost like you except I couldn’t trust him and he really turned me on.”

  “Maybe that’s why he turned you on,” Bonnie said. “Somebody you couldn’t handle.”

  “Yeah.” Min let her head drop back against the couch. “He was exciting. I never knew what was coming next. And neither did he. We fed off each other. What dummies we were.”

  “I wouldn’t rush to use the past tense,” Bonnie said. “So back to the fairy tale. Tell me your happily ever after.”

  “I don’t have one,” Min said. “Which is why I’ll never get one.”

  “Mine,” Bonnie said, “is that I marry Roger, and we have four kids. We live in a nice house in one of the suburbs with good schools, but not one where everybody wears plaid.”

  “Makes sense,” Min said, and sipped her cocoa again.

  “I’m a stay-at-home mom,” Bonnie said, “but I do keep a few clients, my favorite clients, and I watch their portfolios like a hawk so I don’t lose my edge. And word gets out, and as the kids get older, I add to my client list because there are so many people who are dying to get me.”

  “That’s not a fairy tale,” Min said, putting her cocoa cup down. “That can all happen.”

  “And our house,” Bonnie said, as if she hadn’t heard, “becomes the place everybody comes home to, for the holidays and everybody’s birthdays, everybody comes to us. And we have these big dinners and everybody sits around the table and we’re family by choice. And you and Liza and Cal and Tony are all godparents to our kids, and every time there’s a big school thing, you all come out and cheer our kids on—”

  “I’ll be there,” Min said, trying not to cry.

  “—and none of us will ever be alone because we’ll have each other,” Bonnie said. “You’re going to like my grandchildren, Min. We’re going to take them shoe shopping.”

  “Oh, Bonnie,” Min said and put her head down on the couch cushion and howled, while Bonnie stroked her hair and drank her chocolate.

  When Min had subsided to a few gasping, shuddering sobs, Bonnie said calmly, “Now you.”

  “I can’t,” Min said.

  “Well, you’re gonna,” Bonnie said. “It starts with Cal, right?”

  “Why?” Min sat up and wiped her face with the back of her hand. “Why does it always have to start with some guy?”

  “Because it’s a fairy tale,” Bonnie said. “It all starts with the prince. Or if you’re Shanna, with the princess, but still. It starts with the big risk. You’re all alone sitting on a tuffet, on in your case, an Aeron, and this guy rides up and there it is, your whole future right there before you—”

  “What if he’s the wrong one?” Min said. “Accepting for the moment, which I don’t, that the whole thing starts with the prince, how do you tell the prince from—”

  “The beast?” Bonnie said. “Honey, they’re all beasts.”

  “Roger isn’t,” Min said.

  “Oh, please,” Bonnie said. “He’s down there snoring like a bear now,” and Min laughed in spite of her tears. “You really think Cal’s a mistake?”

  Min swallowed. “Well, logically—”

  “Do not make me dump my cocoa on you,” Bonnie said.

  “I don’t have anything else to go on,” Min said. “How am I supposed to know?”

  “Tell me your fairy tale,” Bonnie said. “It’s just between you and me, nobody else will ever know. If you could have anything you wanted, no explanations, no logic, just anything you—”

  “Cal,” Min said. “I know that’s stup—”

  “Stop it,” Bonnie said. “God, you can’t even dream without qualifiers. Tell me your fairy tale.”

  Min felt the tears start again, and she gathered Elvis up and petted him to distract herself. “It’s Cal. And he loves me, so much that he can’t stand it, as much as I love him. And, uh,” she gulped back tears, “we, uh, we find this great house, here in the city, maybe on this street, one of the old bungalows like the one my grandma used to live in. I’d like that. With a yard so Elvis could stalk things. And maybe a dog, because I like dogs.”

  Bonnie nodded, and Min sniffed again.

  “And I keep working because I like my work, and so does Cal because he loves what he does.” She sighed. “And sometimes he calls me up and says, ‘Minnie, I’ve been thinking about you, meet me at home in twenty minutes’ and I do and we make love and it’s wonderful, right in the middle of the day . . .” She stopped to sniff and Bonnie nodded.

  “And sometimes we go to Emilio’s, we meet all you guys at Emilio’s, like every Wednesday, we all meet, and we laugh and catch up on what’s happening, and when you and Roger have your kids, Emilio adds more tables, and he and his wife and kids eat, too, and Brian serves us, and sometimes we go out to your house . . .”

  Bonnie smiled and nodded.

  “. . . and the guys watch the game and hoot and moan, and you and I and Liza and Emilio’s wife sit out in the kitchen and eat chocolate and talk about all the things we’ve done and they’ve done and laugh. . . .” Min took another deep breath and realized she was still crying.

  “And then Cal and I go home,” she said, her