If she had been in a calmer state of mind, Audrey might have appreciated the irony in the fact that a night which was supposed to be fun was stressing her out. Of course, she was not in a calmer state of mind, and so the irony was lost on her.
It had started out innocently enough. Audrey had kept in touch with several of her friends from college after graduation via the internet. One of those friends was one Natalie "Nat" Greenway, who had headed off to business school as soon as she'd gotten her Bachelor's Degree. Nat had often mentioned her dream of running a restaurant of her very own, a dream which Audrey had thought her capable of achieving. Nat had always been a rather shrewd woman, and one with a good culinary sense. She wasn't solely responsible for the extra weight that Audrey had put on during her college years, but she was definitely a contributing factor. Not that Audrey had held it against her; food was food, and when you're a broke college student you don't turn a meal away.
At any rate, Nat had gotten herself a Master's in Business Administration, as well as some loans and help from her family. Those combined resources were enough for her to buy a failing bar for a good price, with enough capital left to renovate the location into a club which would (hopefully) become one of the hottest nightlife spots in the city. It was a momentous achievement, especially for someone as young as Nat, and she'd invited Audrey out to dinner to celebrate with her. In fact, she'd been so elated that she'd accidentally let slip the fact that she'd had a massive crush on Audrey since their shared freshman year, and then hadn't walked back the admission.
Natalie's confession had floored the eldest Durant sister. She hadn't really dated anyone during her high school or college years. People were attracted to bombshells like Reagan and Phoebe. Who would want to be seen with someone like boring, chubby, dumpy Audrey Durant? But hard as it was for Audrey to believe, Nat had sounded entirely sincere during that fateful phone call when she'd extended the dinner invitation. And while Nat could be a tease, she was never someone who outright lied (at least, as long as Audrey had known her). Audrey decided to take Nat at her word, accepted the invite, and then had spent the week leading up to the date more tightly wound than she usually was.
Naturally, the fact that she didn't have much experience on the dating scene was a major source of Audrey's woes. It felt like there was no one she could ask for advice one what to do. Reagan and Uma would likely just mock her for her inexperience, Phoebe was an airhead, and Ixchel had gone on about as many dates as Audrey had. It looked like she'd just have to muddle through, as she always did, and hope that she didn't make too big a fool of herself. It didn't help that her first few attempts at putting together a cute outfit had been stymied by the fact that much of her wardrobe didn't fit quite right anymore. The sky blue blouse showed too much cleavage for Audrey's liking, her favorite pair of pants wouldn't button unless she sucked in her gut (and were uncomfortable once she had done so), and so on and so forth. It was a rather disheartening reminder of just how much weight she'd been putting on in recent days.
Finally, though, Audrey found a combination of a yellow top and flowing green skirt which fit well enough while looking presentable. Thankfully, she still had enough time to apply some makeup and put up her blonde hair in a simple-yet-stylish ponytail, while leaving enough travel time to drive to the place where she'd be meeting Nat for their date. When she got out of her car, Audrey looked upon the place where she might well be starting a deeper relationship with one of her closest friends.
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