There was another beat of silence before the three of them burst out laughing. Now that the dam had broken, Samiah couldn’t hold it in. She rolled over on the sofa, cackling until she caught a stitch in her side.

“Oh, my God.” She took another moment to catch her breath. “I needed that.”

“We all needed that,” Taylor said, wiping tears of mirth from her eyes. Silence fell over them again, then Taylor added, “Well, I should probably get going. I’ve got a bunch of meal plans to put together for my clients.” She reached for her ankle-high boots and slipped them on.

London slapped her hands on her knee and stood. “I should go too. It’s been forever since I drank like this. I need to sleep off the rest of those Moscow Mules before my shift tomorrow.” She braced her hands against her lower back and stretched. “Thank God I pushed those hernia surgeries to the middle of the week.”

Samiah looked from one woman to the other as something akin to panic stole over her.

“So is this it?” she asked. “This is how this ends?”

London hunched her shoulders in a cautious shrug. “Are we supposed to hug or something?”

“Yeah. No.” Samiah shook her head. “I mean…maybe?”

She didn’t know what she meant, but she knew it didn’t feel right to just walk away from one another after everything they’d been through over the past twelve hours.

“This just feels…I don’t know…anticlimactic. We should share phone numbers. Or, at the very least, connect on social media.”

“I guess you’re right,” Taylor said. She reached into her black clutch and drew out a couple of business cards. “I like you two. You get to have my real number,” she said with a wink. “Give me a call sometime and let me know how you’re both doing.”

“I’ll go you one better,” London said, slipping the business card in her back pocket. “Why don’t we meet for drinks next week? Just to check in on each other. I have a feeling things will get a little crazy following this viral video.” She shot Taylor a good-natured grin. “I’ll even bring the kombucha.”

“I prefer the ones with ginger, thank you very much.”

Relief flooded Samiah’s veins. She would explore just why it was so important not to lose touch with these two later. For now, she was just happy they were going to connect again.

“It’s a date,” she said. “Shoot me a text with whatever time works best for the two of you and I’ll come up with a place to meet.”

“Aww, now I do want a hug,” Taylor said. She stretched her arms wide and gathered London and Samiah in an embrace.