I grew out of my ugly duckling stage right around the end of high school, thank God. Dad called me a late bloomer, I called it one of God's jokes.

"Calum wants to meet up with me before we leave," Nicole said, while she typed away on her phone.

Zoey started grumbling, "I'm tired of walking around in these shoes, Nik."

"No one told you to wear them," she replied, pointing at the 4-inch rhinestone, red platforms Zoey was teetering on. Her shoes probably weighed half as much as she did.

"You know it's part of my job," Zoey mumbled, as she squeezed through a small group of people walking in the opposite direction. A couple of men turned around to look at her curiously, probably recognizing her short mess of inky hair.

"To look like a stripper?" I teased her.

She just scowled at me in return. "You're buying me a steak when we're done then, Nikki."

"Deal."

The three of us weaved our way through the people. Nicole led the way since she was the one on a mission and we were her meager minions. It seemed crazy to me just how many people there were at the convention center; there was so much diversity it was overwhelming. I passed by a couple dressed in clothing I'd seen at a Renaissance festival, which Zoey explained that they were the owners of some sort of business. A man wearing only short pleather shorts and a ball gag in his mouth walked by me, as he trailed behind a pretty blonde in a pleather strapless dress. I was more into the people watching than looking at what was in each booth, until I saw it.

I think my mouth fell open, and I stopped so abruptly that Zoey ran into me.

"Oh Mylanta," she gasped, staring at the same thing I was.

The booth specialized in blow up dolls. Life-sized male blow up dolls. I didn't think that they even existed.

"We have to get one for Josh," I said to Zoey, scanning the different dolls tacked to the curtains that separated each booth. She nodded at me in response as she took a step closer to the booth.

I turned to look for Nikki only to see that she was already making her way down the row, completely oblivious to having left us. I stepped toward Zoey to check out the different dolls available. There was a policeman, an American Indian chief, a sailor, a cowboy, a construction worker, and a biker. All men. Josh's birthday was coming up next weekend, and neither one of us had bought the picky bitch anything yet. This was perfect.

"Which one should we get him?" she asked me at the same time our eyes landed on the same blowup doll.

"That one," I said, pointing at the policeman. Josh had always said the police officer was his favorite member of the group. As long as I could remember, he'd always had a thing for men in uniform. There was even a time when he'd sped on purpose to get pulled over by a cop on a motorcycle that he said had a cute butt. I wouldn't even get started on how he jogged past the fire station on a regular basis to try and catch some poor fireman's attention. He denied those claims with a sly smile.

"Yes!" she squealed.

A guy with a long ponytail appeared in front of us with eager eyes. "Can I help you, ladies?"

"We want to buy the 5-0," I told him, pointing at the blowup doll we wanted.

He turned to look at where I was pointing and nodded. "Officer Spanksalot is one of our best sellers. Let me get him for you."

Zoey turned to look at me with an amused expression. She mouthed "Officer Spanksalot?" I smirked, but just shrugged.

The guy appeared with a big white box that had 'Spanksalot' written across the side and held it up at us. "Who's the lucky one taking him home?"

"It's for our friend," Zoey answered. "How much is it? I mean, how much is he?"