Part 2

Make Me a Match
By Diana Holquist

(Page 2 of 3)

"I would have invited you if you hadn't disappeared off the face of the earth for ten years," Cecelia said.

"No you wouldn't have."

Cecelia paused. "No, I wouldn't have." An odd pressure built in her fingertips. She rubbed her hands together, trying to halt the tingling. Oh, hell. Too late, she stilled her hands. The hand-rubbing was her only tell-the one unconscious movement she made when she held lousy cards. And Amy was the one person on earth who knew it.

Amy watched Cecelia's hands with a raised eyebrow, then she looked to either side, leaned forward, and whispered triumphantly, "I came to tell you something."

Cecelia's fingers started up again. She willed them not to move but the pressure of the effort raced up her arms to stiffen her entire body. "Oh, no," Cecelia said. "This is my engagement party."

"Engagement! Excellent!" Amy put her knuckles on her hips and licked her lips. "Then I'm not too late!"

Ah, Amy's tell-the lips! The tingling in Cecelia's fingertips drained away, and all the pressure with it. Amy hadn't known about the engagement. Cecelia began to breathe again. "Don't try to stop this," Cecelia said.

"Why would I try to stop anything?" Amy rummaged in her bag and pulled out a tiny crystal giraffe covered with crumbs of bread. She presented it to Cecelia. "Happy engagement! So, are there gonna be strippers?"

"No!" Cecelia grabbed the giraffe. How did Amy recover so fast? Her ability to think on her feet was legendary in certain circles-circles that Cecelia wanted nothing to do with ever again. Cecelia watched her closely. "Strippers come to the bachelorette, not the engagement party. You stole this giraffe from my foyer." They were drawing curious stares, but there was a two-foot, invisible moat around them, growing larger and deeper every second, that no one dared cross.

"Hey, it's the thought that counts. So when's the bachelorette?" Amy wiggled her hips. The music of Amy's jangling jewelry made Cecelia aware how quiet her guests were growing around her.

"I'm not having a bachelorette." Cecelia crossed her long arms. They looked naked next to Amy's, which were adorned with silver bangles, a yin-yang tattoo, and a gold snake curled around her bicep.

"What about the strippers?"

"There aren't going to be strippers."

"But you said they're coming to the-"

"There's no bachelorette! No strippers!"

Betty Wagner, the wife of the head of cardiac surgery, stopped ladling punch to gape openly. Cecelia had the urge to wink at her and say, Unless you want some beefcake, Betty. My God, she was thinking like her old self. That was bad. Well, at least she wasn't acting like her old self. Yet. She smiled at Betty sweetly and tried to force that awful pressure in her hands into oblivion.

"No real friends, huh?" Amy said. "Still the same old Cel. Don't worry, hon. I'll throw you a party. The maid of honor needs a job."

Maid of honor? Mistress of destruction was more like it. Cecelia grabbed Amy's arm and said loudly and cheerfully, "I want to show you my home!"

The eyes of the crowd followed them as they moved through the vaulted living room. Cecelia was used to admiring stares, approving of her lean, elegant grace. Now, the stares were amused, curious. She had to get Amy to the bedroom, slam the door, and strangle the truth out of her.

"Hey! A gypsy!" A young surgeon, Lance Crane, stepped into their path. "Read my fortune!"

Cecelia moaned. Lance was a consummate cardiac surgeon and womanizer. She prayed he wouldn't notice that her and Amy's eyes were an identical shade of espresso brown, or that their hairlines framed their faces into matching storybook hearts.

She didn't have to worry. Lance was staring at Amy's cleavage.

"No. Absolutely no fortunes!" Cecelia said.

"Yes. Absolutely fortunes!" Amy put her hand on Lance's shoulder and winked.

Cecelia swatted Amy's hand away in terror, but Amy's lightning reflexes caused Cecelia to miss, and the blow landed on Lance, whose eyes grew wide with amazement.

The pleasure of smacking him thrilled through Cecelia, and her terror at Amy's appearance was replaced by a new terror. How many times on the ward had she wanted to backhand Sir Lance-a-lot (Lance had a nasty habit of performing what might be interpreted as unnecessary surgery, hence his nickname)? But she was a doctor. She did not hit colleagues. And if she did, inadvertently, by mistake, bump an esteemed fellow, it certainly shouldn't please her. She turned to Amy, who flashed her a discreet thumbs-up.

"No fortunes," Cecelia said.

"Oh, come on, Dr. Burns, let's have a little fun!" Lance spoke the last words with enough venom to halt every conversation that her sucker-punch hadn't already stopped. That Lance hated Cecelia was a given. After all, she was a cardiologist, three months off her boards and already swamped with patients she could treat with the new miracle drugs and no-operation stents. Lance had to fight for few-and-far-between surgery cases like a jackal.

"I don't exactly tell fortunes," Amy said loud enough to reach the far corners of the room. The crowd, which was rapidly forming around Lance, Amy, and Cecelia, leaned in. "My power is limited. I can only tell you one thing."

"I sure as hell hope it's about the stock market." Lance laughed.

Amy shot him a withering look. He shut up.

"I can tell you a name. The Name."

Copyright © 2006 by Diana Holquist