Olivia dropped two cups of coffee on Ellie’s desk, one for each of them. This was probably at least Ellie’s fourth cup of coffee. Ellie always got to work at the crack of dawn so she could hang out with her kid after work; Olivia was happy to check email from bed, roll into the office closer to ten, and stay late. It made them a good pair, especially since neither of them judged the other for her schedule.

“I saw the email while I was on the bus and responded, that’s not what this is about.” She dropped down into the chair on the other side of Ellie’s desk. “Finish what you’re doing; I need your full attention for this.”

Ellie looked at Olivia for the first time since she’d walked into the room. That mischievous look of glee Olivia remembered from law school came over her face.

“Ooooh, I like the sound of that. Okay, hold on just one second.”

Olivia had thought about Max’s bombshell all weekend as she tried to get work done while she sat on the same couch where she’d almost pulled off his clothes. Finally, she’d given up and left the house to go for a walk. She was so turned upside down by their conversation and the thoughts swirling around in her brain that when she’d walked by a gym, she wandered inside and joined it. It was probably just the glittery pink sign outside that got her.

It was more like two minutes than one second, but finally, Ellie hit save and turned around.

“Okay.” She took a sip of coffee and opened her eyes wide. “What story do you have for me?”

Olivia took a deep breath.

“I went out with . . . Max again this weekend.”

Ellie put down her coffee.

“And then what? What’s wrong? What did that man do to you? Do I have to go kill a member of Congress?”

Ellie might actually do it, too, all while in her string of pearls and perfect blowout.

Olivia laughed and shook her head.

“No, no, nothing like that. It’s just that . . . Ellie, he wants to date me.”

Ellie looked at her quizzically.

“Um, yeah, I sort of assumed so, since this was your second date and all.”

Olivia shook her head.

“I just thought he wanted to sleep with me! I thought he just wanted a fun little fling and then we could both go on our own merry ways, but no. He doesn’t want a fling! He wants a girlfriend! More specifically, he wants me to be his girlfriend! Maybe not immediately, but, like . . . at some point.”

A broad grin spread across Ellie’s face.

“And?”

Olivia threw up her hands.

“And??? Ellie, I don’t know what to do with this! I am not senator girlfriend material; you have to be all poised and blond—no offense to present company, obviously—and smiling and characterless for that. Hell, I’m not even Max Powell girlfriend material, forget the senator part! I’m not thin enough, my butt is far too big, hell, my hair is far too big for men like him! Plus, I don’t have time to be dating someone right now! I just moved here, I need to devote myself to making this firm a success, and . . . I don’t know, buying a car, and learning L.A. geography, and whatever else. I don’t want to be a girlfriend!”

Ellie nodded, a little too forcefully.

“Sounds like someone is protesting a little too much, don’t you think? What’s wrong with being a girlfriend?”

Olivia ignored Ellie’s first question and stopped to think about the second.

“I was in too many relationships in my late twenties and early thirties with men who got mad at me for how much I was working, or required so much of my time to sympathize with them about their mean lady boss or tuck them into bed when they had a man cold or whatever. And worse, they never really cared about me, even though I didn’t want to admit that to myself. I just couldn’t do it anymore, especially not when I was trying to make partner. And even after I made partner, I still had to prove myself at the firm, so I just never wanted to have to choose.”

Ellie folded her hands together.

“And now, you don’t have to prove yourself to anyone anymore. And despite what you said about how you don’t have time, I know just as well as you do that you do indeed have time. Date the man, unless he’s totally unattractive or a pompous asshole. And I’ve seen pictures, I know he’s not the former; and if he was the latter, we wouldn’t even be having this conversation.”

Good point, Ellie, but . . .

“He isn’t a pompous asshole YET, you mean. So far he’s smart and funny and hot and listens to me, but that all seems far too good to be true. Max seems far too good to be true, Ellie! Men like him always have this vision in their head of who they think I am and what they want me to be and why they want to date me, and then they get to know me better and decide I’m too loud, or too intimidating, or too ambitious. They don’t want the real Olivia. He must be bullshitting me about all of this. He’s a politician, after all; they’re good at that. I know his whole sunny, positive, golden-retriever-fighting-for-justice thing can’t last! And what if he really is thinking about running for president like people are saying? In that case, he’s definitely not to be trusted: there’s no way a candidate for president would want a Black woman with natural hair and big hips on his arm!”

She’d been perfectly happy about the idea of a fun little fling, and Max had to ruin it all.

Ellie nodded.

“Mmmhmm, sure. Then why are we having this conversation again?”

Another good point for Ellie, damn her.

“Because I was so stunned when he said he wanted to date me that I said I’d think about it! He said he’d hold Saturday night for me, and I said I’d let him know by then. And now I have to figure out what I’m going to let him know!”

Ellie’s smile widened.

“So you’re thinking about it. You wouldn’t be thinking about if you didn’t like him.”

She was thinking about it. She was thinking about it too much, as a matter of fact.

“Yeah, I’m thinking about it. I shouldn’t be, I should have just said no right away. But . . . he was a very good kisser. And he’s a lot more interesting and smart than I expected him to be. Fine, yes, I like him. And, I don’t know, he seems to really like me.”

It was more than that, but she wasn’t sure if she could explain it to Ellie. Somehow, she felt connected to him, which seemed ridiculous. But even from that first interaction at the bar, they’d been on the same wavelength. She’d thought it was just attraction, the same kind she felt with plenty of other guys she’d had flings with. Now she didn’t know anymore.

Plus, no man had done this kind of full-court press on her in a long time. She had to admit she really enjoyed it.

Ellie just sat there and looked at her silently as Olivia thought through all of this. Finally, she put down her coffee.

“Olivia. You know the only reason you walked in here was because you wanted me to tell you to go out with him, so go out with him! What do you have to lose?”

What did she have to lose? So much: her control over her own life, her freedom, her focused concentration on her work, her ability to do whatever she wanted whenever she wanted without consulting someone else or worrying about anyone else’s work calendar or schedule or finances or desire to pick up and go to Portugal for a weekend. That’s what she had to lose.