Astrid
“Excuse me,” Loretta Blackburn flags down the bartender as he finishes wiping down the counter. She offers him an apologetic look when he stands in front of her. “Could I possibly trade this for a pina colada? I’m not really feeling beer tonight.” She peers up at the gentleman and puts on her brightest smile. She’s lying, of course. The second that beer swashed inside her mouth, her face twisted into a grimace, and she spit the liquid back into the mug.
His brow creases as he looks down at the beer and then back at her suspiciously. He doesn’t know it’s her first-time trying alcohol. Or that she’s wanted those bright pink shoes on her feet for a while and had finally received them as a gift from my mother on her sixteenth birthday. I remember my mother’s smile as she found the o
