Just Friends

CHAPTER 1

Freya peeled off her clothes and stood in her underwear, contemplating her reflection. She wanted to look her best for Michael tonight. There had been no time to go home to change; she must make do with this cramped ladies' room beneath her office. Her new dress hung from the cubicle door: a cool thousand dollars' worth of palest pink that shimmered with a tracery of opalescent beads a Cinderella dress chosen to make her as feminine and delicate as a porcelain doll. That was the look she was aiming for, less femme fatale, more . . . femme, plain and simple.

Let's go somewhere special, he had said over breakfast on Monday morning, somewhere we can talk. Questions had exploded in her head like popcorn in a hot pan. Talk about what? Why not right here in the apartment? Freya had choked them back. Instead, she'd done a lot of shopping.

But all week long she had carried his words around with her, a time bomb in the pit of her stomach, tick-tick-ticking as the days passed. Was this It? Was she about to become Mrs. Normal, grouching about schools and the state of her suburban lawn?

With a hand that was not quite steady Freya twisted the tap and splashed her cheeks with cold water. On with the war paint. She began to make up her face a pencil to darken the pale arches of her eyebrows, mascara to bring her light-blue eyes into focus. Which lipstick? Scarlet Woman was out, obviously. So, frankly, was Vestal Virgin, a relic of her infatuation with an artist who had left her for a seventeen-year-old. Ah-hah, Crimson Kiss, that was more like it. She slid the color back and forth over her lips, then bared her teeth, satisfactorily white against the red. I floss, you floss, we all floss. God bless American dentistry.

But what if she was wrong? Maybe Michael just wanted to discuss the new service charge for the apartment, or to finalize plans for their trip to England. Freya cocked her head to fix an earring, considering this possibility. No, she decided.

Robyn Sisman is the author of Perfect Strangers and Special Relationships. She lives in London, England.

Refreshing . . . From the opening gun, Sisman delivers pleasant prose, clever repartee, and insight into the differences between men and women. . . . A pleasure to read.
The Boston Globe

Just Friends is just bliss. Witty, warm, and wise,
it s as good as an old movie for romantics.
The Times (London)