Maddy put the final touches on her lipstick, a bright confectionary pink that popped against her pale skin. A knock at her door made her jump, the lipstick jerking in her hand, smudging her cheek. With a sigh, she wiped off the smear of pink and went to get the door, her bitch-face at the ready.

“What do you want?” she demanded, not even waiting for a hello as she opened the door.

Her landlord, Larry smiled slickly, his tongue darting between his teeth at her rude greeting. Larry was thirty or so, and he’d never grown up—which was compounded by the fact that his Mommy had given him this apartment building to run, clearly hoping it would prod him into some sense of responsibility. Instead, it provided him the opportunity to hit on every female tenant in the building and make them uncomfortable as hell. He was a Grade A Creep.

Unfortunately, rent was cheap, and Maddy was in no position to move—especially now, when she was out of a job.

“I heard your stove wasn’t working,” Larry said, the pretense so see-through she barely resisted rolling her eyes.

“Must be another tenant,” she said smoothly, grabbing her purse and cat-eye sunglasses and pushing past him. She knew better than to let him in—or get trapped in a doorway by him. Her momma hadn’t raised a fool. “My stove is perfectly fine. Now if you’ll excuse me, I have somewhere to be.”

“Hot date?’ Larry asked, following her down the stairs as she made her way to the apartment’s fading courtyard. The bricks that laid the path were old and crumbling, the ancient fountain had once glittered with indigo blue tiles, but they’d faded almost to a sky blue with time.

Maddy ignored him, walking briskly toward the gate that led to the street. “I hope you find whoever’s stove isn’t working,” she said, keying her code into the gate and grabbing the handle.

Without another word, she strode out onto the sidewalk, losing herself in the bustle of the city that was coming alive now that night had fallen.

Maddy took a Lyft to the bar. Harvey’s was a cozy little place she and Nat used to go to in college. It made her smile to remember as she paid her driver and got out of the car, staring up at the small brick building and flickering Neon sign, tucked away between a Thai grocery story and an empty storefront.

When she walked inside and scanned the dimly lit room, she caught sight of the familiar mess of jet black hair in the back. “Nat!” she called.

Nat’s head whipped around, her extraordinary hair bouncing at the movement. “Maddy!”

Maddy crossed the bar at a skip, throwing her arms around her best friend. “I’ve missed you so much!”

“Not as much as I’ve missed you,” Nat declared, hugging her tight.

When they graduated, Maddy had stayed in Portland, but Nat had been offered an opportunity at what had been a start-up back then. It was an amazing opportunity, with just one catch: She’d have to move to New York.

So Maddy had lost her best friend to the East Coast. It had been hard, because the two had been best friends since first grade. But they’d visited and skyped and texted at all hours.

When she got the call from Nat a few months ago, telling her that the company she worked for was moving their offices to Portland, she was overjoyed. She’d missed Nat so much—especially in the last few months.

Going through a break-up without your best friend at your side was the pits.

“I’m so sorry I wasn’t able to pick you up at the airport,” Maddy said as they sat down in the back booth of the bar. Nat had already ordered her a martini with a twist, and she took a sip. Dry as a bone. Just the way she liked it.

“No worries at all—my parents would’ve tried to fight you for the right, anyway,” Nat said with a laugh.

“They must be so happy to have you home.”

“Mom’s ecstatic. She’s been planning my coming-home party for weeks. Dad’s still asking, ‘Are you sure you want to keep working at that company, Natalie?’” She lowered her voice in an imitation of her father’s low, concerned rumble, making Maddy giggle.

“He’s still hung up on the whole “you work for a company that makes sex toys” thing?”

“He’s a lot better than he was before,” Nat said. “But it embarrasses him. He still tells people I’m the CFO of a manufacturing company.”

“Do you have a problem with that?” Maddy asked.

Nat shrugged. “Not really,” she said. “He has his boundaries. As long as he’s not slut-shaming anyone for their choices, he can be vague about what we actually manufacture.”

“CFO in five years,” Maddy said, feeling a burst of pride just thinking about it. Nat had accomplished so much since college. “You’re amazing, Nat.”

“Oh, God, don’t, or I’ll start crying,” Nat said. “Tell me about you! How’s work? How’s David?”

Anyone else, Maddy might have been able to keep the mask on, keep her game face going. But this was Nat. Nat had held her hair back when she puked from drinking too much schnapps in college, and hugged her tight when her grandmother died. Nat had once instigated a water balloon fight in their dorm, and when they ran out of balloons, they started using condoms. She knew every silly little secret, every embarrassing story, every heartbreak.

She saw right through Maddy’s fake smile. She set her glass of wine down, her green eyes growing serious. “Uh-oh, what happened?”

Maddy let out a breath. One of those, deep exhausted kinds that sort of fluttered your lips because you were just too damn tired to try to be elegant right then. “Philman Pharmaceuticals got raided by the FBI a month ago. Turns out Philman was neck deep in all sorts of fraud in order to pay for his affair, so I’m out of a job and no one will hire me. And two months before that, David dumped me. Because he said I liked sex too much.”

Nat’s eyes got so big they looked like they were going to swallow up her whole face. She raised her hand, signaling the waitress. “We’re going to need two more,” she said. “And keep ‘em coming.”

Nat always knew exactly what to say.

“You don’t have a job? Or a boyfriend? And you didn’t tell me?! And what is this about you liking sex too much? What does that even mean?”

Maddy downed the rest of her martini in two gulps. “No job.” She said, fishing the twist of lemon rind out of the bottom of her glass. “No boyfriend. And certainly no sex.” God, she missed sex. She didn’t even really miss David, which probably meant he was right about her. But she missed sex. Not really with David. Just… in general.

“Okay, back the heck up,” Nat said. “Were you and David having problems? You never said anything.”

“I was embarrassed,” Maddy admitted. She still was—her cheeks were getting red even thinking about it. About the things he’d said to her. About how she kept trying to make things work, instead of realizing he was treating her terribly and taking his own frustration out on her.

“Was he having, like, problems?” Nat asked. “Or did he just have a low libido?”

“I don’t even know,” Maddy said hopelessly. “Every time I tried to have a gentle, loving, open conversation about it, he’d just dissolve into anger. It got to the point where I wouldn’t bring it up and just took whatever affection he decided to give me. But then…” her cheeks got even redder as she thought back.

He’d stopped by unexpectedly. He had a key, so he just let himself in.

And found her in bed with her vibrator.

He’d exploded. She’d never seen him so angry. He’d always been touchy about toys when she even mentioned them, so she’d never even suggested incorporating them in their sex life. But when she was on her own, she liked to give herself some alone time. She’d been needing a lot of time with her vibrator in that last year of their relationship, as he seemed less and less interested in her.

The fight that had followed was the ugliest they’d ever had—and the last. He’d stormed off into the night and he hadn’t come back. Not that Maddy wanted him to.

Some things you just couldn’t unhear. Having being told she got too wet and that it was a turn-off that she wanted sex so much sent a chill down her spine. It made her wonder if that meant David was looking for someone who didn’t enjoy sex. Or if it was just his insecurities that was making him say it, making him blame her for all their problems, insisting that her libido was abnormal for a woman.

When she told this all to Nat, she watched as her friend’s green eyes began to glow hot with anger. “What a misogynistic pig!” she spat when Maddy finished. “Look, it’s one thing if you two had mismatched sex drives. A relationship like that can work, but it requires communication, like all relationships. He had every right to reject sex or to say no. But he didn’t have the right to shame you for your sexual feelings or needs. Especially when you repeatedly tried to approach him lovingly about this.”

“It’s just been such a sucky few months,” Maddy confessed as the waitress slid another martini in front of her. “I’ve been looking and looking for a new job, but with Philman as my last employer, I’m afraid I’m gonna get blacklisted. It was all over the papers.”

“Let me ask around,” Nat said. “I still have a lot of connections in Portland, and I need to start networking now that I’m in town, anyway.”

Maddy felt a rush of gratitude. Finding a job was so often about who you knew. And Nat was a big deal now. “That would be amazing,” she said.

“Not a problem,” Nat assured her. “It’s the least I could do, for all those nights I sexiled you in the dorms.”

Maddy laughed. “You weren’t as bad as Lucy’s roommate, remember? I don’t think she spent more than two days in a row in her own bed, poor thing.”

“Oh god, I’d forgotten about Lucy,” Nat said. “Did you know she opened her own line of organic baby food products in LA? Apparently she’s gone all hippie on us.”

“You’re kidding,” Maddy said.

As the two of them fell into their always-familiar rhythm, trading stories of old friends, sharing tales of new ones, Maddy felt a little bit of hope uncurl inside her.

Maybe things were looking brighter.