Hangovers aren’t fun.

Getting drunk and acting like a depressed mess is kinda liberating for awhile, I guess, but the world doesn’t stop turning because you’re feeling sorry for yourself. Which means that, the first thing I did after waking up in the morning, was take a cold shower and get dressed for work. After all, Lust Muscle isn’t going to run itself.

Even though Renee tucked me into bed, promising me that she’d allow me to call Liam in the morning, I quickly realized that I couldn’t do it sober. She left my phone in my bed stand and, despite looking at Liam’s number for an eternity, I eventually gave up on it.

It’s 10 am now, and I haven’t picked up my phone since I left the apartment. I’m trying to focus on going through the mountain of paperwork that has piled up on my desk, but it’s almost impossible to do so. I’m hungover and, more than just that, I’m feeling embarrassed.

Liam is probably still mad with me, and I can’t just call him out of the blue. After all, I said some harsh things. Can I blame him if he’s pissed at me? I guess I can’t, especially because I’m pissed at myself for acting like such a bitch. And the worst thing is, I can’t stop thinking of that. It’s like these thoughts are a scratched recorded, repeating themselves over and over again.

“Cara, there’s someone here for you,” I hear my assistant’s voice coming from the intercom, derailing my train of thought.

“Whoever it is, I’m not seeing any clients today,” I reply, pressing the blinking red button on my old fashioned intercom. I get back to my paperwork, fairly confident that I won’t get any more interruptions, but two seconds later the door to my office swings open with a loud noise.

I raise my head and look toward the noise, blinking as I try to figure out who’d break in here like that. Ah, what am I saying? The answer to that couldn’t be any more self-evident.

The one and only, Misty Lane.

She has her hair tied up in a bun, and there’s a smile on her face; instead of looking like an alcoholic mess, this time she just looks… well, she just looks like a mess. From inside her pink purse, Cupcake is looking at me with his kind but lazy eyes.

“Cara,” Misty greets me with a nod, walking toward my desk and sitting in front of me. Surprisingly, she isn’t walking erratically and her speech isn’t slurred. I think this is the first time in my life that I’m meeting Sober Misty. Which, now that I think about it, is kinda weird.

“What are you doing here, Misty?” I ask her, my headache growing tenfold with her presence. Despite knowing that she was just playing a role, Misty really turned out to be a major pain in the ass. To be honest, I wasn’t expecting to see her ever again. But now here she is, as sober as a judge.

“I came here for this,” she says with a smile, taking a folded envelope from inside her purse. She places it face down on my desk and slides it toward me. Never taking my eyes off hers, I pick the envelope up and open it.

Inside, there’s a check.

“It’s your payment,” she continues, “you deserve it.”

I raise my eyes from the check and look at her, having no idea on what I should say. Is she for serious?

“And I want to apologize. I know that sometimes I can be quite intense, and I guess I overdid it this time. I just lost myself in the role, you know? Being an actress isn’t easy, Cara,” she tells me gravely, almost as if she believes she’s offering me one of life's secrets.

“You were in a reality TV show, Misty…” I tell her, my brain overheating as I try to crack her thought process.

“Yeah, that really helped me hone my acting skills,” she giggles, patting Cupcake’s head with one hand. “But, anyway. I’m really sorry for all the stress I might have caused - but it was all in the name of love, right?”

“Maybe,” I sigh, leaning back against my chair. Even though Misty might be a complete lunatic, I can’t hold a grudge against someone like her. She’s a lunatic, yeah, but a lovable one. And I guess that, in a twisted way, she really believed she was doing the right thing. I just wish she hadn’t, ahem, lost herself in the role she was playing.

“Maybe?” She asks me, placing both her elbows on the desk and leaning forward.

“Yeah. Things aren’t that great right now, and I haven’t heard from Liam.”

“Oh, Cara, Cara… You really need to step up your game,” she nods sagely, looking at me as if she were my mentor, ready to make me see my true potential. “Do you know what you need to do?”

“What, Misty?” I ask her, genuinely curious about what a troubled mind like hers will come up with.

“Easy. Very, very easy - just put on something sexy and go find him. Nobody can stay mad at their true love… Especially if she’s dressed in nothing but a trench coat and lingerie.”

“Are you… serious?” Does she really want me to go after Liam with a trench coat? I want to make things right, not to have a restraining order slapped on me.

“Of course I’m serious! Trust me, I’ve done that a lot, and it worked every single time!”

“Alright, Misty…” I chuckle, wondering if a trenchcoat and a lingerie is all of Misty’s arsenal when it comes to seducing a man. “I’ll skip the trench coat, but I think you’re right… I have to find him.”

“Of course you do!” She giggles happily, jumping up to her feet. She walks around the desk and, now standing in front of me, she grabs me by the hand and forces me up. “And you have to do it right now!”

“Right now…?”

“True love can’t wait, Cara!” She cries out, working herself into a frenzy as she pushes me out of my own office. Ah, screw it - she’s right.

I need to stop feeling sorry for myself and do something about it.

True love can’t wait.