Chapter Nine
Chapter
Nine
Dylan Monroe wasn’t Dylan Monroe anymore.
She was someone else entirely. She was Lennox. Or maybe Fallon. Or Delilah or Nova or Frankie or some other badass-sounding name. She twisted, viewing herself in Ramona’s full-length mirror, marveling at how different she suddenly felt in a uniquely beautiful dress and a wavy blond bob.
Behind her, she heard the bedroom door open, Ramona coming back in from changing in the hall bathroom.
“I can’t believe how much I love this dress,” Dylan said, still surveying herself. “It’s so—”
But she cut herself off when she spotted Ramona in the mirror. She blinked, trying to process what she was seeing, the Wild West come to life in New Hampshire. Ramona stood in the doorway in brown pants and matte leather chaps, and she wore a textured maroon button-up shirt with some sort of tie Dylan didn’t have a name for. Over that, a tweed vest fully buttoned and formfitting, Ramona’s…well… chest very much filling every fiber. A low-slung leather holster belt around her curvy hips and a dark brown hat completed the ensemble.
“Wow” was all Dylan could think to say.
“You think?” Ramona said, smoothing her hands down her full thighs…thighs that looked…very good in those chaps.
Dylan shook her head to clear it.
“No?” Ramona asked.
“No! I mean, yes! God,” Dylan said. “Sorry. You just…had that on hand? It looks straight out of a cowboy movie. Or cowgirl, I guess.”
Ramona’s freckled cheeks went a little pink. “It was a project. For a class.”
“Wait, you made that?”
“No, just designed it. Well, I did make the vest, but that’s all.”
“Oh, that’s all,” Dylan said, still flabbergasted. “It’s really good.”
“Thanks,” Ramona said, then looked Dylan up and down. “You look perfect.”
Now Dylan’s face washed warm, and she knew she had to get her shit together. Of course— of course —she’d noticed yesterday that Ramona was cute. Beautiful. Sweet and gentle and altogether lovely, but with the knowledge that she was also queer—bi just like Dylan, even—Dylan felt the room tilt.
And it just kept tilting.
No.
Absolutely not.
Impossible, stupid, and completely unnecessary, especially as Ramona didn’t deserve to have her entire world potentially— probably —ruined by any attachment to Dylan Monroe.
Friends.
That’s what Dylan wanted. Nice, normal, everyday, never-end-up-in-a-tabloid friends.
Downstairs, a door slammed, startling them both out of their awkward-as-hell staring.
“Ra-Ra!” a voice yelled. “Let’s move it! Oh, sorry, Mr. Riley.”
Ramona laughed, rubbed her forehead. “That would be April.”
“Right,” Dylan said, glad for the mention of another person. “Let’s go, then, Ra-Ra.”
Ramona rolled her eyes, and the two of them headed downstairs, where a man with salt-and-pepper hair and khakis stood in the foyer talking to April, who was costumed as…well, Dylan didn’t really know what.
“April, why does it appear you’re being carried around by an extraterrestrial?” the man asked.
April laughed. It did, indeed, look like she was being carried around by an extraterrestrial—her head was visible atop a small human body filled with air from a motor in the back of the costume, while behind that, a bright green alien held on to her with three-fingered arms as though taking her back to its planet.
“It’s just for fun, Mr. Riley,” she said. “Costume bowling. Miraculously, not my idea.”
“That is miraculous,” he said, then glanced at Ramona as she and Dylan hit the bottom of the stairs. “Well, look at you two.” He met Dylan’s eyes and held out his hand. “Hi there, I’m Steven Riley.”
“Hi, I’m D—”
But her mind froze, blank. She wasn’t Dylan. Didn’t want to be, but she had no idea who the hell she was, all names flying right out of her head, addled by Ramona and chaps and freckles, so now she just stood there gaping like an idiot with her hand in this man’s while he frowned at her.
“Dolly,” Ramona said. “This is Dolly. She’s visiting for the summer.”
“Dolly,” Mr. Riley said. “Haven’t heard that name in a few decades. It’s lovely. Nice to meet you.”
“You too,” she managed.
After that, things were a blur. Olive and Marley appeared, still costumed from earlier in the day, and then she was in the front seat of Ramona’s car—some sort of SUV crossover deal—buckling herself in while Olive and Marley tried to help April fit into the back seat.
“Just deflate it!” Marley said, and April groaned.
Dylan laughed, relaxing a little more as Ramona settled into the driver’s seat and started the engine.
“Dolly, huh?” Dylan asked.
Ramona froze, just for a second. “Sorry. It just popped into my head. I guess from when you mentioned it earlier.”
“No, it’s a good name.”
Dylan glanced out the window as April finally fit herself in the car, a memory sliding into her brain.
Hello, Dolly…well, hello, Dolly…
She smiled at her reflection in the window, remembering the beach and fireworks, her first kiss with a girl in a cherry-print shirt. She wondered where that girl was now, where she lived, if she’d ever visited Clover Lake again.
“It worked though,” Ramona said, pulling her out of her thoughts. She backed out of the driveway, all three passengers in the back seat still fussing about the tight quarters caused by the alien.
“What did?” Dylan asked.
“Your costume. My dad didn’t recognize you at all.”
“No? Does he know who I am? You know, normally?”
Ramona smiled. “Oh yeah. He loves Evenflow. Still listens to them at least once a week.”
Dylan laughed, spread her hands over her skirt, and then felt the short ends of her blond bob.
“Well, hello, Dolly,” she said softly, then settled back in her seat as Clover Lake’s downtown swished by in a blur of golden summer evening light.