Angel

10 - Noreen

"Save our seats and watch my stuff."

Inda smiled and shrugged while mouthing, "What?"

Sighing, I leaned closer. "Bathroom." I pointed towards the other side of the bar. "Watch my stuff." I pointed to my coat and purse.

She gave me a thumbs up.

I was seriously considering grabbing some toilet paper to ball up and put in my ears. Most karaoke nights are full of people who are more enthusiastic than talented. Some nights you get those people who have drunk too much to remember that they should never, ever sing in public. On the very worst nights, they all seem to find each other and show up at the same place, at the same time.

Welcome to Hell.

It was fine. I owed Inda and wanted to get out, so I was getting my drink on and trying to appreciate how impassioned the singers were. Yes, I could be a snob. I owned it. My saving grace was that I kept my opinions to myself, smiled, and applauded where appropriate.

Someone was ruining "Crazy Train" as I made my way to the bathroom, which probably had Ozzy spinning in his grave. That had to freak out Sharon, as he wasn't dead yet. By the time I got back to the table, Inda had a guy standing at our table. She looked up at me and gave a slight shake of her head.

If she wanted to get with someone, I would have given them some space. Instead, I sat down.

"Hi, I'm Noreen. Would it be horrible of me to ask you to give us a few minutes? We're going to do a couple of songs and I wanted to work out our set. We'll find you as soon as we're done."

He smiled a little sadly and was totally cool about it. "Sure."

"He was cute."

Inda looked up at me, an eyebrow raised. "Him? Sure. Not exactly some hot-cowboy-construction worker-super-dad type, but yeah, cute."

I had no idea what she was talking about. "What?"

She lifted her hand and I saw my phone, a picture of Ethan smiling ear to ear with Jeremy as they stood next to a horse. If you looked carefully, you could see Jeremy leaning away from the horse with a cautious look in his eye.

Jim must have sent one of the pictures he'd finished editing. She slid her thumb across the screen and another photo popped up of Ethan, Spike and Jeremy enjoying an MLT. Okay, Jim had sent more than one.

"Inda, you..." How could I say this gently? "There are privacy issues. Only employees, the photographer and the clients can see the pictures."

Putting the phone down, she slid it towards me. "Sure, I get it. Cute kid, though. That's his dad?"

"I... Seriously, I can't be talking about this."

"Understood. I totally respect where you're coming from. He looks like he could model for outdoor clothes stuff. Like, wearing jeans while swinging an axe. With no shirt. Rustic J. Crew meets Chippendales."

"Inda, I wasn't kidding. I can't talk about this."

She'd known me forever, she knew my type and she could read me like a book. Yes, Jeremy was cute, yes, he was my type and yes, I'd be interested if my life wasn't a mess and he wasn't a client. But he was a client. I was messed up. And he wasn't interested, so it was all moot.

"So, who's asking you to talk? I'm the one doing the talking. I didn't see a mom in the picture. Maybe he's into curvy Indian girls who like karaoke."

I laughed. "Yeah, maybe."

"Or maybe dark haired horseback riding girls who like karaoke?"

Rolling my eyes, I shook my head. "You're relentless. He's not my type." I looked to the stage, hoping she wouldn't call me out on my lie. "How far down the list are we?"