Sleepover

“A sleepover!” I exclaim to my buddy, Susan.

Her air conditioner has died in the middle of a Tucson summer so she’s asked to spend a couple of nights with me until it is fixed.

Susan’s hubby is in Oregon readying their vacation home so it is just the two of us.

“We can do whatever we want!” she says.

“Girls gone wild!” I exclaim.

“Just don’t put my bra in the freezer overnight,” she laughs.

The first evening we have takeout salads and Susan sips on her Stella Artois beer as I pretend to sip wine.  We’ve been friends and colleagues for 30 years so she knows I don’t really sip.

We were asleep by 8:30.

“What wine are you drinking?” Susan asks as I microwave baked potatoes for our second wild night alone.

“Chardonnay,” I reply.

“Oh, I love chardonnay!  I’ll have that tonight instead.”

We pile our potatoes with cheese and butter and salt and settle into the living room to talk about old friends and writing and our latest doctor visits.

I scoop some ice cream and add a decadent chocolate caramel sauce.

“This is heaven!” Susan exclaims. 

We both spoon the chocolate sauce out of the jar and straight into our mouths.  “This is almost better than sex!” Susan says.

“Remember when all we talked about at sleepovers was boys?” I ask.

“Firefighters!” she says.  “Yum!”

“Thor!” I say.  “And Harrison Ford is still a fine piece of horseflesh!”

“Whoa!” Susan puts her hand to her forehead.  “I am not used to drinking wine.”

“I consider myself a professional,” I laugh.

The jar of chocolate sauce is almost empty and so are our wine glasses.  We are drunk on sugar and alcohol. 

We hug and retire to our respective bedrooms by 8:30.

As I drift off to sleep, I hope the repairman can’t fix her air conditioner tomorrow.