Lori and Parker are tight, and even though Parker and I aren’t a thing, there’s no way Lori would be giving me all sorts of blatant hints if she knew that I was about to see her best friend naked in, oh, eight hours and ten minutes.
Not that I’m counting or anything.
“Yo, Olsen. Where’d you go?”
I glance over at Jason, who’s giving me an impatient look.
“Sorry, what?”
“I was just saying that the four of us should go try this karaoke place my cousin told me about on Friday. Lori’s free, and I’m sure you can talk Parker into it. You in?”
He gives me a look that informs me bro code demands I say yes, and I have to bite my tongue to keep from asking which girl’s going to be the object of his slobbery affection on Friday night.
Still, I’ll confess that I do love a good round of tipsy karaoke, and he’s right—I can definitely talk Parker into it, because she also loves karaoke. Give her a glass or two of champagne, and you’ll be fighting her for the microphone.
“Sure, why not?” I say.
Lori’s smile turns into an all-out beam, and I have the first stab of awareness that my arrangement with Parker has the potential to get a tad more complicated than we thought.
Chapter 11
Parker
I keep waiting for things to turn weird with Ben and me.
I was braced for it this morning when we bickered over whether or not he used my towel again.
(He did. I totally know he did.)
I waited for it while he gamely sang along to my Taylor Swift album with me on the way to work.
I waited for it on the way home while I listened to him rant and rave about how his most recent work project had been put on hold because the funding had been applied to a higher priority project that he thought was “complete and utter bullshit.”
But by the time he helps himself to the chicken Parmesan I made for dinner, deliberately ignoring the salad, my fear has all but subsided.
Maybe we really can do this. Because, so far, the looming naked time hasn’t done crap to rattle our friendship.
Now, granted, we haven’t exactly seen each other’s nether bits yet. That will be the true test.
I sneak a peek at the clock. Seven fifteen.
Forty-five minutes.
I wait for nervousness or second thoughts to settle in.
Waiting…
Waiting…
Nope. I’m pretty damn excited for this. My lady parts are in need.
“Hey, you wanna go to karaoke on Friday?” he asks.
“Oh, right,” I say, using my fingers to pick up a long string of mozzarella cheese and plop it into my mouth as I settle at the kitchen table. “Lori mentioned it. Some new place that Jason found?”
“I don’t know that it’ll be any Cody’s,” Ben says, referring to our favorite karaoke bar from college. “
But I’m game if you are.”