[sinclairfan]

Sabrina worked up her courage to go to pizza parlor when they opened for lunch.  She figured the noontime hour would prevent her from feeling pressured to order beer or wine as her beverage choice [alcohol made Sabrina drowsy, so she had long since given up day-drinking], and a single-woman-at-a-bar would look less....well, candidly, less lonely.  (The second suckiest thing about being lonely, after the hole in your chest, was other people noticing your loneliness.)

She worked up her courage again....this time to strike up a conversation with one of the pizza parlor girls.  She was somewhat dark-toned....either Latina or Mediterranean, possibly both.  That another way the world of Sabrina's middle age was jarringly different than the world she grew up in the 1990s.....it seemed like EVERYONE was mixed race.  And not just 2 races....everyone seemed like a 30/20/20/15/5 blend of 5 different races.  Maybe she was mis-remembering, but things seemed simpler in the 1990s Atlanta suburbs.  If you were Irish, you you Irish.  There was a pretty Guatamalan girl in Sabrina's school...Maria.  But Maria was JUST that....JUST Guatamalan.  No one was ever just one race anymore.

Sabrina found out the pizza parlor girl's name was Celene.  Sabrina like Celene right away.  Her smile said "Nice on the outside."  Her tattoo and forearms said "Tough on the inside."

Sabrina like that.  It seemed like Celene knew how to fight.  Or at least wouldn't back down from one.

Lunch went way too fast.  Sabrina didn't know ehat to say to Celene.  Or maybe this was just a building-trust conversation.  Maybe Sabrina wasn't SUPPOSED TO say anything this conversation.

Maybe she was just supposed to go home and masturbate to the of Celene.

Celene fucking.

Or Celene fighting.

And that exactly what Sabrina did.  All afternoon.

To be continued....

[sinclairfan]

Two days later, again at lunchtime, Sabrina went back to the pizza parlor.  She didn't see Celene.  Another sexy younger woman, also very tattoo'd, with the name tag 'Sarah' helped Sabrina.  Sarah attempted to engage Sabrina, but Sabrina was on a mission....she wanted to progress matters with Celene.  Or not progress them.  But either way, to move things along.

> Does Celene still work here?  [Shit....does that sound desperate?]
> Celene.. .Celene.... I don't think I know her.
> I could have sworn I talked to her 2 days ago.
> Celene?....by chance, do you mean Chantal?!?!?
> [Shit....I've been obsessing over this girl for 48 hours....did I actually forget her name???] .... O.....O this is embarrassing.... I think you're right.... O this is embarrassing....my Catholic grandmother would be so ashamed of me....her name WAS Chantal.  Shit.  I'm so sorry.  So.... anyways... Chantal....she's not working today?
> Chantal doesn't work here much.....did, she.... say something to you??
> [Something is definitely up with this place--they talk so....suspiciously.]  Chantal, ....  ummm .... Sarah, I don't want to say too much.... she, ummm, . .  she helped me out to my car.  [Sabrina is winging it.  She's talking how, in her imagination, if you will, she imagines how fronts for prostitution rings must work ..... and act .... and talk.  But mostly, she saying what she thinks Sarah must be wanting to hear.]
> Ohhhhh..... umm, I see ....  and....  you wanted to talk to her again.... oh, correction.... you wanted her to .... help you to your car again???  Ma'am?
> [The "Ma'am" is a nice touch.]  Ummmm [blushing] yes.... is that.... possible?
> Do you have .... like, a phone number, Chantal can maybe reach u at?
> [Sabrina, against her better judgment, writes her phone number on a piece of paper.  In her 1990s dating days, she mastered the fine art of writing a fake one.  The one she writes now is real.  She hands it to Sarah.]  SSSSSsssssooo, Sarah.  One last question.
> Oh?
> Who would win a fight....between you and Chantal?
> Wouldn't you like to know?
> Good answer.

Sabrina goes home and masturbates to the thought of Sarah fighting Chantal.

> I hope Chantal calls soon.

To be continued....

[sinclairfan]

After two more days, Sabrina wishes she had gotten Chantal's number, instead of just giving Chantal's here.

Or Sarah's.  One or the another.  Now she wasn't hearing from either of them. 

Sabrina knew she could go the pizza parlor any time it was open.  But she was leery about being seen there too often alone.

The loneliness 'thing' again.  Still clinging to her after 7 years.  Like some kind of acne breakout that won't clear up.

Of all the things that pissed off Sabtina most about her 2018 divorce, this was it.  The 'alone' stigma the rival for her husband had pinned on Sabrina.  Before 2018, she had never been alone.

Is that why Sarah or Chantal weren't calling her?  Did she seem alone? 

In 2025, when young people didn't call, it was called "ghosting".  The 1995 description was "bring rude".  But young people gave it a patina of hipness by calling it "ghosting".

Sabrina remembered in 1995 Georgia, senior year of high school, that improper phone etiquette was reason enough for 2 girls to fight.  Sabrina remembered watching a girlfight in the parking lot outside the Homecoming dance.  Maria the Guatamalan girl fought a junior, over an argument the 2 had gotten into over phone.

It was a good fight.

The first time Sabrina had gotten turned on watching 2 girls fight.

She really wanted to watch Chantal and Sarah fight.

Read bad.

She wished they would call her.

To be continued....

[sinclairfan]

Back in 2018, when Sabrina had noticed her ex-husband was being pursued by his work colleague, she assumed the inevitable wife-mistress confrontation would occur via phone.

Sabrina assumed the mistress was going behind Sabrina's back.  When Sabrina confronted the mistress face to face in 2018, Sabrina assumed the outcome of the standoff would be an exchange of cell phone numbers.  After which the two rivals would engage in text bickering, escalating until the mistress understood Sabrina's earnestness and retreated from Sabrina's husband, to find a more available target.

Sort of the way an ADT sign outside a house doesn't have to be real to be effective--it simply encourages the burglar to move on to a different house.

One without an ADT sign.  (Or....now in 2025....an Amazon Ring camera.)

But, no.  That wasn't what happened in 2018.  Instead, on the spot, unscripted....the mistress answered Sabrina's ambush by laying down the hand-to-hand gauntlet.  The mistress was able and willing to dispense with preliminaries, dispense with pre-fight buildup....and proceed straight to a physical fight.

Sabrina must not have presented a sufficiently tough persona to the mistress.

The mistress must have thought she could actually beat Sabrina in a fight.  What had Sabrina's husband told the mistress to make the mistress feel that way?

Or....did the husband think NEITHER woman would ACTUALLY fight?

Does Sarah think Chantal won't actually fight?  Is that why she didn't blink at talk of a fight?

That's what makes a REALLY GOOD girlfight so rare, Sabrina thinks to herself.  EACH woman has to think they will win.

Even tho, by definition, one of them is wrong.

To be continued.....

[sinclairfan]

Sabrina can feel her depression .....no, not, depression ....worse--loneliness ....returning, as neither Sarah nor Chantal return her phone call. 

Or even give her the courtesy of a phone call.  Or a text.

Did Sarah and Chantal "ask around" with the swinger couples?  And find out that Sabrina "is not one of them"?

Will they shun her if she sits at the bar at the pizza parlor?

Sabrina decides to call her new friend Paula.  "Thank goodness I at least have my Fight Club to fall back on."

Paula answers.  Thank goodness.

> Hey, friend. 

> Hey, girl.  How goes it?

> I'm sad.

> Oh why?

> I thought I had 2 new Fight Club recruits.  Or prospects. 

> But....?

> But they flaked on me.  I think.

> Women in the masters division will do that a lot, I think.

> They....ummm....weren't masters division.

> Oh?  Two feisty upstarts?  Maybe they don't want to fight each other.  But maybe....

> What, Paula?

> Would one fight my daughter?

To be continued....