“I’m still here, aren’t I?” I go up on my toes and kiss him on the lips with a little nip on his lower lip, giving a hint of more to come later.

“Funny that you think I would let you leave.” He pulls me into his side as he wraps his arm around my shoulders, and we join the others.

* * *

Dinner was so beautiful. French food is one of my favorites, and now we are all in the nightclub Les Caves du Roy, continuing with the party. This celebrating me is something I could get used to.

“Come on, this is my favorite song.” Tori grabs my hand and pulls me up off the chair where I was snuggled in nicely next to Forrest. She then grabs all the girls, and we head for the dance floor. We move to the beat of Ed Sheeran’s new song “Azizam,” which has us all waving our hands and dancing together in a circle.

I may have had a few drinks tonight and am feeling a little bit tipsy, but I’m looking around, and it washes over me that these girls are my tribe. The ones who know things about me most people don’t, yet they don’t judge, they just take me as I am and love me anyway. It actually feels so nice to have a bigger circle than just Felisha and me. I have been really missing her since Flynn came onto the scene, but now, I understand that I have Tori, Elouise, and Cherie too. I can spend time with other women and not be worried if Felisha is with Flynn. Or when we are together in this big group, it’s way more fun than I ever expected to have with the men out with us. For so long I have pushed them away, but this weekend has shown me I might have made a mistake on that hard stance of mine. I mean, Flynn has become like a brother to me, as much as he pretends to annoy me, as I do to him, but he was the first man I let get close to me since my father left. To be honest, I didn’t have much choice since he pushed his way into my life, and in the end, I gave up.

Come to think of it, Forrest has done exactly the same, which is not a bad thing.

Actually, it’s been a very sexually satisfying time, and I’m all for that.

Who am I kidding, it’s been more than that.

Tori crashes into Elouise, losing her balance a bit, but we all catch her and continue singing at the top of our voices.

There is one thing that is always a surety when most of us have alcohol in our body, and that’s that we will say things we normally wouldn’t.