“I wasn’t, but Alex wants me to come to Toronto this weekend if they go to game seven of the series, so I’m shuffling days around, just in case.” Violet only comes in to the office two or three times a week at most. The rest of the time she works from home. As awesome as it is for her, I miss having my best friend around every day. Jimmy and Dean can be fun, but they’re not Violet.

She digs around in the drawer, tossing items on my desk. “What is all this shit? Why don’t you have any good candy?”

“Probably because you ate it all the last time you were here.”

“It looks like I have to settle for this.” She sighs and unwraps a chocolate-coated granola bar. Taking a huge bite, she makes a face. “The oats totally ruin this. We should hit the Thai buffet for lunch.”

“Sure. Sounds good. I have a meeting from ten to eleven. Other than that I’m catching up on emails and reviewing accounts.” I click on an email from my mom. I assume it’s another picture from the sex convention.

Violet choke coughs at the image on the screen.

“Darren can never see this,” I say.

It’s an action shot of the masked dude administering the Heimlich maneuver when my mother auditioned for the reality show thing. It looks like he’s trying to hump me from behind. Darren would break the guy’s knees with his hockey stick for putting his hands on me. It’s worrying that the idea makes me a little excited in the pants.

“Yeah. You should tell your mom to delete that, and then you should delete it, too. Forever.”

“Yeah.” I move on to the next email, cringing as I open it. This time it’s a video of the dude giving me the Heimlich, but there’s no sound, so it really does look like he’s trying to hump me fully dressed. I rub my forehead. “I don’t know why she insists on sending these to my work email.”

Violet pats my shoulder. “Two days ago Skye told me she wore that fetish gear for Sidney. She also told me she slipped him a Viagra and his hard-on lasted so long they had to go to the emergency room. You’re welcome for that horrifying visual.”

“Is Sidney okay?”

“I think so? Skye was pretty proud of herself, so there must not be any lasting damage.”

We’re interrupted by a knock on the door. I quickly close my browser, expecting maybe Jimmy, Dean, or my boss, Mr. Stroker, but it’s none of them, and I can’t see the person on account of the huge bouquet of flowers.

“Delivery for Charlene . . . Hoar?”

“The H is silent,” Violet says with a grin.

The delivery guy lowers the bouquet enough so he can see us. “Sorry ’bout that. Where would you like these?”

“Oh, right here would be great.” I clear some papers from the corner of my desk, and he sets them on the edge.

I nearly choke on his cologne. It smells like he dumped the entire bottle on himself. My eyes are watering.

Violet coughs into her arm. “Fred?”

He adjusts his baseball cap, which sends another waft of cologne in our direction. “Violet?”

He seems familiar, but I can’t place him.

“Hey! How are you?” She coughs again.

“Good, good. Still delivering flowers. Still single.” He shoves his hands in his pockets and rocks back on his heels. “I, uh, saw in the news that you married Alex Waters a while ago, so, uh . . . congratulations, I guess.”

Well, this is awkward.

“Thanks.”

“That offer to take you to the movies doesn’t have an expiration date, so if you ever get divorced, you can always look me up.”

“I’m taking my wedding vows pretty seriously—the whole ’til death do us part thing. Besides, he’s got a huge dick, so you know, lots of incentive to stick around.” Violet cringes, likely because she’s gone too far with her sharing.

“Right. Yeah. The, uh, condom endorsements made that pretty obvious. I guess if you’re looking to downsize to something more average, I could be your man.” He takes a step back, toward the door.

“I’ll keep that in mind.”

Fred’s pager goes off, and he blows out a breath. “It was really nice to see you, Violet. Hopefully I’ll deliver flowers again here soon.” He continues to back out of the office, knocking his elbow against the doorjamb. He frees one of his hands from his pockets so he can wave and disappears down the hall.

Before I can say anything, he peeks his head in the office again. “Oh, those flowers should be in direct sunlight. They’ll last longer that way.”

“Thanks, Fred.”

“Okay. Well, bye.” He disappears again.

Violet waits a few seconds before she tiptoes across my office, but she’s wearing heels, so she’s not stealthy or coordinated about it. She almost trips and falls into the hallway. She manages to catch the doorjamb before she goes down and sticks her head into the hall.