Dottie 4.
I grab my glass of wine, and take a sip, shifting on my stool at the high-top table my sisters and I are occupying in our favorite after work bar. Today was a looooong day and I’m not the only one glad it’s over.
“Ok, ok. So, the McGivern’s were irritating as fuck. I’ll give you that.” Rose concedes, raising her own glass to Blanche and I. “But I’d rather deal with the McGivern’s of the world than the Abbott’s. At least the McGivern’s possessed the money they were looking to spend.” We groan in unison at the memory of the Abbotts from two years ago.
Blanche drops her glass of whiskey a little forcefully on the table, glaring at each of us in turn. “How the fuck did you three overlook the fact that they drove a Geo Metro? I didn’t even need to do a credit check on them to know they didn’t have two fucking nickels to rub together, let alone a million dollars for a home in Ballantyne Country Club!”
“I thought…” Sophia begins, losing her bravado after just two words. Always the quiet of the four of us, Sophia has the biggest heart and the softest voice. Not to say Blanche, Rose and I are heartless, we’re just more…pragmatic. And sometimes that means cold hard truth with little to no feelings whatsoever. Alright, maybe we’re heartless.
I give Soph a smile, before giving the response she gave us two years ago, “She believed they were simply being frugal. By driving an older vehicle—"
Rose coughs into her fist, “Clunker.”
I continue, ignoring Rose, “…they were able to save enough money to buy the home of their dreams.”
Blanche grunts, “If wishes were fishes…” I shrug, torn between agreeing with her and understanding how Sophia sees the best in everyone.
“The Abbotts purchased a home!” Soph blurts out after a second. I drop my chin to my chest and chuckle lowly.
Out of the corner of my eye, I see Blanche drop the frown and finally smile at our sweet sister. “Yes, they did. A lovely fixer-upper in Thomasboro.” Her gaze drifts over Sophia’s shoulder, then she winces. “That is now in foreclosure because they were arrested and convicted last year for tax evasion and growing marijuana on the property.”
Soph’s face crumbles, her eyes watery, “Why didn’t you tell me?”
Blanche snorts, waving her hand up and down in front of Sophia, “Uh…because of this!”
“Empathy is a normal human emotion, Blanche Devereaux Goldman!”
“It’s not.” Blanche shakes her head adamantly. Rose and I exchange an amused look over the table.
I clap my hands, drawing everyone’s attention. “Let’s talk about something else! Rose, you haven’t said a word about your date last night. How’d it go?”
Rose looks down her long nose at me, eyes narrowed, and lips pursed. “The fact I didn’t mention it to any of you first thing this morning should tell you exactly how it went.”
“Did this one at least pay for your drinks?”
“Did he shower before he arrived?”
“How quickly did he bring up any penile deformities?”
“Dammit, Blanche!” I toss a rumpled napkin at her. “No one wants to think about Miles!”
Blanche tosses her head back, her long dirty blond hair free of its normal bun, falls down her back. Her laugh is one of the best I’ve ever heard, but it’s loud, drawing the eye of everyone in the bar, especially the males. They hear her laugh and immediately want to start peacocking and preening for her. It’s all lost on her, she prefers peahens.
Slapping her hand on the table, she leans forward, and since she still doesn’t know how to whisper, the entire bar hears her say, “A golden shower and a pearl necklace!”
“What are the odds of being saddled with not one, not two, but three …man issues?” Sophia shakes her head in empathy for Miles. Rose dated him briefly about 5 years ago, but long enough for us to meet. Super nice guy, but man…talk about losing the penis lottery. A condition where his urethra empties through a hole on the underside of his dick instead of the slit on the tip, AND, prostate cancer in his early twenties resulting in its surgical removal, AND, orgasm-induced incontinence as a result. Rose could get past the urethra thing, and not having a prostate didn’t bother her, nor the fact his cock had a severe downward curve, but being peed on while he came on her face was too much.
Don’t blame her.
“He was a nice guy.” Rose laments, resting her chin in her upturned palm on the table.
“I love his holiday cards, they’re so funny!” Sophia giggles, oblivious to the slow turn of our heads at this news.
“You…you’re on his Christmas Card list?” Rose blinks several times slowly.
Soph lifts a slender shoulder, “And birthdays. And we…um…” She trails off, her eyes darting between the three of us and our open mouths. “What?”
Blanche snaps hers shut first, “I’m not surprised. Girl can make friends with anyone, anywhere, anytime.”
Rose stares at Sophia for a second longer, blinks rapidly, and then meets my eyes. “Why don’t we talk more about your ‘uplifting’ experience the other day, Dot. Describe again the magical wand and the dastardly handsome wizard who wielded it.”
“No.” I grab my wine glass quickly, sloshing a bit on my blouse when I bring it to my lips in avoidance. I already waxed poetically about Ezra and his talents; I don’t need to rehash it for my sisters. Even though I’ve just about burnt out my Rabbit vibrator from overuse every night since our encounter.
“Come on. Are you gonna see him again?”
“Can’t. Won’t even if I could.”
“Ezra, right?” Blanche asks. I nod. “Ok, so you met just outside the elevator in Ben’s apartment building, on his floor, so he must be one of Ben’s neighbors. Ask Ben for help.”
I nearly spit out my wine, coughing unattractively. In a croaking voice, I clarify, “You want me to contact Ben, who I had been on a date with and left because he was an entitled, self-centered, misogynistic prick, and ask for his help in finding the dude I then immediately had sex with on the elevator ride down to the lobby?”
Blanche and Rose share a look. Rose reaches across the table and pats my hand condescendingly, “Good dick is hard to find.”
I slip my hand out from under hers with a glare and a snort, “And bad dick is hard to lose…I’m not reaching out to Ben.” Then because I can’t help myself, I mumble, “He won’t stop texting me.”
Blanche plants her hands on the table and stands up, giving her the chance to tower over me since she’s so freaking tall and I’m not. “He’s what now?”
“Apparently, after much consideration, and some internet searching, he believes he overreacted to my nipple situation and would like to give me a chance.”
“Another mastectomy fetish?” I avoid Rose’s knowing eyes and spin my empty wine glass on the table.
“I’m gonna give him a cockectomy and then I’m gonna knock on every door on his floor and find magic peen.”
“Ok, first, we aren’t calling him that. His name is Ezra, I know his first name at least. And second, you aren’t going to do anything to Ben because he isn’t worth jail time.”
Blanche laughs again, throaty and boisterous and slightly evil, bending her elbows and bringing her face inches from mine. Her eyes, a sharp hazel swirl, glitter with malevolence. I swallow hard, knowing she would never physically harm me in any way – her trapping me in the dryer as kids because I cut her Barbie’s hair is not the same thing at all – because this is why she is so formidable in the courtroom. She rarely gets to stretch her legal legs because she mostly practices real estate law, but the few opportunities she’s had over the years have not ended well for opposing counsel.
“I’m offended you believe I would ever, EVER, be caught, sister.”
“Sometimes, I get a lady boner and it feels wrong because she’s my sister.” Sophia whispers to Rose, a pained expression on her innocent face. The tension snaps and the four of us dissolve into girlish giggles just like we did when we were kids curled up in one of our beds under the sheets with flashlights reading magazines.
Several drinks later, bad dates, fantastical elevator sex, and tragic peens forgotten, Soph’s phone chimes and her face falls as she reads whatever’s on the screen.
“Soph, what is it?” I ask, leaning my head on her arm as we wobble out of the bar to find our rideshare. We stop on the sidewalk. The cool winter days of North Carolina giving way to cooler evenings, so we huddle together.
“I get notifications…uh…when dad—”
“Hiram Goldman is a sperm donor at best, Sophia Petrillo, he is not and has never been a dad.”
Soph’s cheeks heat, having nothing to do with the amount of wine she drank this evening. “I know. But it’s hard…”
Rose and I cuddle closer to her when she stops speaking.
“What’s it say, sweetie?” Rose encourages her.
“He’s expanding into Cuba.” She looks up at the three of us with such big eyes, confused and guileless, “Why would a Miami real estate broker and developer expand to Cuba?”
“I don’t know.” I offer helplessly. We’re 35 years old and none of us have ever been able to understand our father and why he does the things he does. It hurts to try, so we stopped. At least three of us did. My poor Soph.
Blanche steps back, fixing her pencil skirt and sleeveless blouse, before striding confidently toward our rideshare idling at the curb. Over her shoulder, she pins us with a stern gaze, “Whatever it is, if Hiram Goldman’s involved, it ain’t good…or legal.”