"Joe, it's time you met my other best friend Matilda."

"You have another best friend? Without me? How could you?" Joe polishes his purple midnight nails on his vibrantly colored track suit. "Where did you even meet them?"

Lucinda glares at Joe mulishly. "We got coffee after Pilates, which you refused to join me at."

Joe slumps onto the fainting couch he helped Lucinda move into her studio apartment for just this purpose. "That's it because I'm not bendy, you're replacing me."

"Don't be melodramatic," Lucinda throws a crumpled up ball of paper that was a failed plan for drilling a volcano in the middle of Central Park. "No one can replace what we have. Who else would laugh at my dead puppy jokes?"

Joe perks up at that and smiles at Lucinda. "The rest of the world are plebians."

Lucinda swirls her hand in a yadda-yadda motion. "Try to be nice."

"I'm never nice. Its not in my DNA, I had it deconstructed and printed."

Lucinda rolls her eyes. "Ok try not to threaten death in front of her. Mathilda is sensitive to death threats."

"Why must we be friends with her?"

"Because you have no other friends."

"I have minions."

"They won't tell you, you have broccoli stuck in your teeth."

Joe sticks his tongue out at Lucinda but reluctantly agrees to the meeting.

***

"I'm honored you are introducing me to your friend." Mathilda says lifting the crate of donations Lucinda meant to bring to the Central Museum auction with one hand without breaking a sweat.

Lucinda holds the door open for her new friend. "Trust me, meeting Joe is not an honor, it's a necessary evil."

Mathilda snorts through her nose. "My sister has a chihuahua like that."

Lucinda laughs in a loud bellow that makes Mathilda smile. Donations deposited, the two return to the street for their intended destination: the juice stand in front of the University. "I just figured that if we were hanging out so much, you should know my other half."

Mathilda covers her heart with her hand sincerely, "I would never ask you to change your life just to be my friend." Mathilda pauses in the middle of the street, cheeks puffed out with pleasure. "I've never met anyone who wasn't intimidated by me, who I could just be real with."

Since the cars blocked by Mathilda's incredible bulk begin to honk, Lucinda tucks her hand into her elbow and tows her to the other side of the street. "You'll see why when you meet Joe."

***

"What are you wearing, Joe?" Lucinda asks observing his low slung black jeans complete with hanging silver wallet chain, Nickelback T-shirt, black eyeliner and clashing gold necklace. "You look like a goth white rapper."

"I'm incognito." Joe sniffs.

Mathilda scratches her head. "Do I know you?" She's wearing a large NYU sweatshirt and yoga pants, also looking inconginto. "You look familiar."

Lucinda frowns at his fake lime green mohawk. "Considering this is not what he usually looks like. I doubt it."

Joe extends his fingers daintily. "Mathilda, I presume?"

Baffled Mathilda hesitantly takes his outstretched fingertips. Did he mean for her to kiss them? Mathilda jostles them before releasing his hand and wiping her hand on her sweatshirt. "Good to meet you Joe. Lucinda can't say enough about you."

Joe looks at Lucindia who gives an encouraging nod. He rolls his eyes. "Yes we are all happy to finally meet each other. Thank you for taking her for the exercise portion of our friendship." Joe's gaze travels up and down Mathilda's bulky shoulders and ripped quadriceps barely contained by the yoga pants. "I'm not nearly up to that kind of outing."

Mathilda shrugs cheerfully. "We all have our strengths."

Lucinda claps her hands together startling the two from their barely civil conversation. "There now. Lets get smoothies."

"I just came into a bit of a windfall, so I'm buying today ladies." Joe offers magnanimously.

As they line up in front of the vendor, Mathilda asks politely, "Oh what do you do?"

"World domination."

Lucinda guffaws loudly and uncomfortably.

Mathilda shuffles her feet, assuming he's kidding. "Sounds stressful. I'll get next time."

"Darling, you have no idea."

***

Lucinda is face down on the table in the tiki bar they inevitably end up at. Mathilda shakes her shoulder, but she doesn't stir. "Humans can't hold their liquor." Joe shrugs.

"Will she be alright?" Mathilda asks concerned.

"Lucy recovers remarkably fast and perky after her little naps." Joe explains. "This one time after we were kicked out of a frat house haunted house..." Joe proceeds to launch into a story of shenanigans Mathilda would never in a million years have been invited to. She is starting to feel extreme FOMO. "And then she passed out hugging my flesh eating houseplant. By the time I woke up the next day, she was fighting it for the last strip of bacon in my fridge."

Mathilda nods. "I had a plant once. It died."

Joe sips his rainbow umbrella'd drink. "So, is that your tragic back story?"

"A plant? No. I couldn't water it because I had been captured by aliens from Cginatory -9. Spent about 2 weeks in their holding cell before I managed to break loose, and my sister flaked on caretaking."

"Ah the Cgnators, they do like their zoos. I once stole a Snarfab from them, but I had to give it back because I couldn't figure out what it ate. The poor thing just kept moping about the terrarium." Joe shrugged. "Your sister a supe too?"

"Whole family was made in a car accident with some goo."

"At least you had company. I was made in a lab. The only non-failed experiment." Joe said.

Mathilda drained her matching drink. "My dad had me training round the clock, pit me against my sister. I wish I had been lonely." She showed off her hand scars. "Super healing, but not without scars."

Joe admires the puckered skin. "Did you kill him?"

"That would make family Thanksgiving incredibly awkward."

"That's what I like best about it being just me and Luce for family holidays. She's pretty good in awkward situations."

"I might need to borrow her."

"Just don't break her. The return policy is a bitch."

"Will you be ok if she spends time with me too?"

Joe nonchalantly examines his nails for the thousandth time. "She says I have to, and I would do anything for her." He laughs shrilly. "Of course I can always come up with something to do to keep myself occupied."

"That sounds menacing."

"It's supposed to."