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January

Alicia

Grover begins yipping belowturns into frantic barking I swear this dog, it’s a Darwin survival thing he’s so freaking cute A tiny chihuahua, he has black eyes that are ridiculously big against his white fur I’m up and open theto the fire escape, where he dashes up the back of the chair placed there for hiet outside He pees on the s for a walk and dealing with cement and cold temperatures

Seconds later he’s back inside, shaking his little body to get the cold off He looks up atthe e, I bend down to open the little chest that holds his sweaters and toys The sweaters are courtesy of Bethany’s knitting skills Bethany is my little sister and the person to blame for Grover’s presence in my life It’s been five years since I came hoeyes I didn’t stand a chance It went fro into my heart, and we never did find his previous owners

Carefully, I put hih as I rub his head His needs seen to, he goes back to his little bed underhe hates walks As I atteood thing It’s ridiculous so as minor as a slip on a small patch of ice still hurts almost nine years later What’s even ets cold like it is now, it feels like it did

As I sit back down at roan as I turnI proo I would fund the plane ticket for Bethany’s first real vacation she’s taken in years, to Disneyland for spring break And I will, only I won’t be able to put s this month No matter how many sites I check the cost of a plane ticket to California is alht it would be There’s also the fact that I’ to sink almost five hundred dollars into o Which happened right after I broke down and bought the insanely expensive phone Bethany hinted at wanting for Christmas

When s, it startles et many calls “Hello,” I answer as I check the display Huh, I wonder whyme Maybe she has another order for a quilt

“Hey, Alicia It’s Jeanine I’ for Zack?” Um, talk about a loaded question It’s totally a Jeanine kind of question though, straight to the point, blunt enough some people called her rude She’s just like her brother “Sorry, I could have asked the question better For the record, I talked to Zack before this call tofor o onback to work You knoork for Dante Sabatini, right? He’s a great guy, but he’s got his issues I mean he’s a billionaire, he and his brother worked their asses off tonice You’ve heard of theht?”

My pal Of course, I’ve heard of theo There are three of theether as heads of a real estate firht, sold, and owned soo “Of theo”

“Dante prefers residential real estate and Cesare mainly handles the commercial side Dante is the nicer and sweeter of the two of theest Sabatini Cesare is the oldest, and he started it all; he’s the tougher of the two but he isn’t so bad once he war h I’

“The plan, in the beginning, was to take off the three months of paidanother threethirty-two hours at my full pay Except thethe idea has grown ofto St Louis His parents are excited and want to be around to help That and we could actually afford a house with a backyard in St Louis Dante is a sweetheart about the whole thing, all he wants is for me to be the one to hire my replacement What do you think?”

Even though I saw it co from a mile away, it’s a shock for Jeanine to say it “I, um I’m not even sure how to answer”