Earth Angel by Siri Caldwell

your dress.” She didn’t have much of an opinion either way. Pretty? Yes. Over-the-top? Also a yes. Lust-worthy? Not unless Abby was the one wearing it.
    Abby fanned the skirt of her gown and fingered the hem. “It took forever to sew, but I love this old-fashioned glamour.”
    “You made that yourself?” Gwynne didn’t sew, but it was obvious, even to her, that this was not a beginner’s project.
    “I spend all my money collecting harps. I don’t have any left over for costumes.”
    “I have to say the dress looks amazingly intricate.” It was the polite thing to say, and it was true too.
    “And sexy?”
    “Um…sure.”
    “I know I said you were welcome to lie, but…you don’t have to lie. I’m aware that this dress scares women off.” Abby let the fabric slip through her fingers. “No one ever says You look hot in that dress, can I ask you out? Because women who date women would rather date someone who doesn’t wear sequins.”
    “Then you haven’t found the right woman.” One who would be insane to care about her sequins when she could be looking at the way her hair fell across her face while she leaned over her harp, or the way she lit up when she smiled.
    “I want to date someone I can talk to, and most women are…I don’t want to say aliens, but…okay, aliens. I don’t get them. I know I’m supposed to understand how women think, but I don’t. I don’t get how they think.” She kicked at a pile of laundry beside the closet and brightened. “I knew I’d find it!” She fished out her missing bra and dangled it overhead like she was waiting for applause.
    Gwynne tried not to choke. Abby was so right—she did not understand how women think. A bra at Macy’s was an innocent item of clothing, but a bra in the hand of a woman you found attractive was a health hazard.
    “Good thing that’s a pile of clean laundry,” Abby said, directing her comment to her lingerie.
    Gwynne crawled onto the bed because, one, there wasn’t anywhere much else to be with all the clothes strewn across the floor, which was something she couldn’t get away with in a house full of nibbling rabbits, and, two, if Abby was going to act like she was straight and it was safe to wave her bra around, then Gwynne was going to remind her what she was dealing with. She leaned back on the daisy-patterned quilt and made herself comfortable, daring her to acknowledge that bringing her into her bedroom wasn’t one hundred percent safe.
    Abby hung her bra on the hook on the back of her closet door with her dress and ignored her. Gwynne stretched out her legs, letting her feet hang off the end of the bed so her shoes didn’t touch the quilt. What did they call this size bed? A full? Smaller than a queen-size, anyway. Whatever it was called, she didn’t understand how Abby could sleep with anyone in such a narrow bed. They’d have to lie on top of each other to fit.
    Maybe that was the idea.
    Her legs heated and abruptly she swung up to a seated position, her feet connecting with the floor. “You’ll find someone.” Maybe sooner than she thought, if they were both lucky. “Somewhere out there, there’s got to be a non-alien life- form who gets you.”
    Abby shook her head and smiled. “When you put it that way…”
    “It sounds too good to be true, right?”
    “It sounds like an alien plot, is what it sounds like.”
    “Are you suggesting I …”
    Abby positioned her hands on either side of her head and pointed her fingers like dancing antennae. Gwynne mirrored her, adding beeping space creature sounds.
    “Another alien! I should have known.” Abby crooked her antennae fingers in excited but unintelligible alien sign language.
    “Plan B—you try kissing a space alien to see if she’ll turn into a princess,” Gwynne joked.
    Abby’s antennae fingers slowed, one awkward pointing move at a time, then stopped. “I believe that’s supposed to be a frog.”
    Oh, crap. She’d gone too far. “How about—”