The Friend Zone(19)

“And she didn’t.”

He shook his head. “Nope. She was fucking pissed at me for breaking things off too. That’s why I gave her everything. It wasn’t her fault. I was the one who changed the rules. I just couldn’t stay in a relationship that was a dead end like that.”

“I see.” A dead end. “And are you going to make your wife give you all these kids you want, or are you going to adopt some of them?”

“Nah, I want them the old-fashioned way.”

A disappointment I had no right feeling dropped into my stomach.

He looked at me with those deep-brown eyes. “How about you? Big family?”

I shook my head, looking away from him. “I’m an only child.”

“But do you like kids? Wanna have them?”

I handed him back his photo, hoping he couldn’t see the crack in my heart through my eyes. “Yeah. I do.”

It wasn’t a lie.

It also wasn’t ever going to happen.





NINE





Josh




She hadn’t been kidding—her futon really did suck. Hard as a rock. When we got back to Kristen’s, I changed into pajama bottoms and a T-shirt. I was standing over the brick of a bed, debating whether the couch was a better option, when she knocked on the door.

She stood in the hall in her curlers, wringing her hands, with Stuntman Mike at her feet looking up at me. I thought for a second she’d seen someone in the yard and had come to tell me.

“Josh? Can you come to my room?”

My wolfish grin broke some of the tension on her face.

“Oh, stop. There’s a spider. I need you to kill it. Please. Before it disappears and I have to burn my whole house down.”

I laughed. “Should I get my gun or…?”

She bounced nervously. “Josh, I’m serious. I hate them. Please help me.”

I pulled a few tissues from the box on my nightstand. “You know, you seem too fearless to be afraid of spiders.”

“A black widow killed my schnauzer when I was a kid. Embracing a lifelong debilitating fear of spiders is cheaper than therapy.” She stopped in the doorway of her room like there was an invisible force field, and I almost bumped into her back.

“Well? Where is it?”

She pointed to the wall on the other side of her bed. It was a decent-size spider. I could see why she was distressed.

Her room was surprisingly girly. I don’t know what I was expecting. She had tons of throw pillows and a soft-looking blanket draped off the footboard. It smelled like the perfume she’d had on the day she wore my shirt—green apples.

Stuntman Mike climbed a mahogany staircase that matched her bed frame and plopped down on the pink floral bedspread with his tongue out.

The brown spider scurried a few inches and Kristen spun and did a little jumpy thing, burying her face in my chest.

I’d never liked spiders more in my life.

I put my hands on her shoulders and delicately moved her out of my way. “What would you have done if I wasn’t here?” I asked, as I pressed the tissues to the wall firmly, ending the siege.

“I would have gone to Sloan and Brandon’s.” She squeezed herself against the door frame as far as she could go while I walked the dead spider to the toilet in her guest bathroom.

I flushed the tissues and turned to her. “Let me get this straight. You’ll pack up and leave for a spider, but you have a prowler in the backyard and that you just ride out?”

“My priorities feel straight.” She looked around me at the toilet like she wanted to make sure it actually went down.

“That spider looked pregnant, by the way. Thank God you called me when you did.”

She flapped her hands and squeaked a little and I laughed at her. I crossed my arms and leaned in the bathroom doorway. “We got a call for a spider last week. Believe it or not, it was one of the least stupid calls we went on.”

“I actually get that. I was close to calling 911 myself.”

I chuckled at her.

“Well, thank you,” she said. “If I can ever return the favor, let me know. Like, if you ever need a porch plant killed, I’m your girl.”

I smiled and we both just stood there. Neither one of us made a move to go, even though it was late.

A mischievous grin crept across her face. “Are you tired?”

I liked the glint in her eye and I had no intention of ending this night if she didn’t want to, no matter how tired I was. “No.”

“Do you want to go TP Sloan and Brandon’s house?”

My laugh made her eyes dance.

“I know it’s a little tenth-grade retro,” she said. “But I’ve always wanted to do it. And you can’t TP a house alone—it’s a rule.”

“We’ll have to show up there tomorrow and help them clean it up. Pretend it’s just a lucky coincidence,” I said.

“Can you borrow a tool from Brandon? I can text Sloan in the morning to tell her we’re going to pick it up. She’ll cook if she knows we’re coming. Then we’ll get breakfast and atone for our sins.” She grinned.

A half an hour later I was crouched behind my truck two houses down from Brandon’s, game-planning with Kristen. She still hadn’t taken out her curlers.