“Who’s taking advantage of whom?” The bold question comes from our friend Jo, who’s just sauntered in, looking both fashionable and classy in a bright blue blouse. “Tell me everything.”
“If you’re going to arrive late, you’re not going to get all the details,” Emerson says, chiding her playfully before she points my way. “Gavin Clements just asked Savannah to be his fake date for his sister’s engagement party, and I don’t want him to take advantage of her soft, gooey side.”
I roll my eyes again. “We’re just friends. I’m going with him as just a friend. Don’t you understand that I can actually just be friends with him without it turning into anything more? There is nothing soft and gooey going on. Also, gross.”
Jo smirks then holds up her fingers. She counts off on three of them. “Three times. You just said you’re just friends three times.”
“Because we are friends,” I insist.
Emerson winks at me. “Sure. We get it.”
Jo whispers, “Romances do start that way.”
I wave the stick at the two of them, poking Jo’s arm then Emerson’s hip. “In books! Not in life. You two think everything is going to turn into something.” A poke in the thigh. “Sometimes things turn into nothing.” A poke on the wrist. “Only true, crazy romantics would actually believe that something like pretending to be his date—at his sister’s engagement party, no less—would turn into anything more. That just doesn’t happen.”
Jo smiles like she’s already seen my future. “I think that happens.”
“Here’s what’s more likely,” I say, then boom, “NOTHING! One: I may not have mentioned this, but we’re friends. Two: we’re coworkers. Three: he’s not ready for more. Four: let’s focus on something useful, like how to make this fake date believable. Because, five, here’s how stuff works in the real world: he meets some hot girl online who looks just like the other girl he dated, he rebounds with her, and I continue providing a shoulder to lean on. Meanwhile, I eventually get over my crush on him and move on to a sexy, music-loving lumberjack, maybe. That’s how it works.”
Emerson raises her hand. “I love the plan B. Lumberjacks are hot. But whether someone’s ready is a pointless argument. Love doesn’t come when anyone is ready. Love sneaks up and bites you on the ass at the most inconvenient times.”
I pretend to check out my ass. “No love bites. Now, why don’t you two help me figure out how to handle this fake date.”
Jo and Emerson slide into problem solving mode at the pool table, and I appreciate the change in focus.
Emerson raises one finger. “I’ll do your makeup so you look gorgeous. But here’s the first tip: don’t let on that you want to have sex and make babies with him.”
“I don’t!”
“Don’t be too touchy-feely,” Jo puts in.
“I wasn’t going to,” I insist.
“But do be just touchy-feely enough,” Emerson adds. “A hand here, a brush there.”
I set down my pool cue and cover my ears. “Stop. Just stop!” I uncover them. “You two are no help.”
My friends laugh, then Emerson turns serious. “All you really need is a good backstory.”
“That I can do.”
“And that doesn’t sound like a romance novel at all,” Jo singsongs.
I tap the felt. “Let’s play, so I can destroy you two.”
I beat them at pool, forcing thoughts of storybook endings from my head.
5
Gavin
I adjust my button-down in the mirror, run a hand through my dark hair, and give myself a thumbs-up.
“It’s a little shocking to see myself in something other than a T-shirt, but I do rock a dress shirt,” I announce to the crowd of one.
“Dude, you look like a billionaire!” Eddie calls out from the couch. “They wear buttons all the time.”
I arch a brow. “Buttons? That’s the hallmark of a rich dude?”
“Yes. Obviously.” He flubs his lips as he searches my Webflix queue on his laptop.
I laugh, shaking my head at him. “Remind me again why you’re on my couch? You don’t even live here.”
He pats the well-worn cushions. Well-worn from his ass parked on them all the time. “’Cause your place is awesome. You don’t mind if I crash here, do you?”
“No. But what if I did?” I ask rhetorically.
“Then we’d sit down and have a sesh, bro. We’d talk it out. Find some common ground.”
“Excellent. Just making sure you had a strategy.”
He taps his forehead. “I’m always thinking. And right now, I’m thinking you need to have some fucking fun tonight, man. You haven’t had much since you broke up with Denise.”
“Correction—since Denise broke up with me.”
He shakes his head vehemently. “I don’t see it that way. Sure, technically, it went down like that. But I like to think you broke up with her. Because that’s what you should have done months before. Like, right after you started up with her. She was no good for you.”