Say You Love Me(8)

“You’re braver than me,” she started and gave me a huge grin. “And, plus, this idea isn’t crazy, I promise.”

“Do I need to gulp my glass of wine down before you talk?” I glanced at her. “Hmm?”

“No.” She grinned. “But if you think it will help, yes.”

“Okay, fine,” I said and sipped on it slowly. “Hit me. What is it?”

“What is it? Just the most brilliant plan I’ve ever had.”

“Hmmm,” I said and pursed my lips, not fully convinced. ‘Let me hear it, then.”

“You know how they say that you should date your best friend—?”

“Hold up.” I put my hand up. “I’m not interested in dating you, Mila.” I fake glared at her and she burst out laughing.

“No, silly, not me.”

“I’m not getting into any girl-on-girl action either. I’m not interested in that.” I glared at her again, wondering if she had lost her head. “That is not a good idea. I’m not going to be one of those girls who tries to titillate a guy by pretending to be interested in girls. That’s worse than the lap-dance idea.

“Sally, I didn’t say anything about girls.” Mila’s face was bemused. “And you’re the one who brought up lap dancing. Not me. Just listen to me.”

“I’m listening.” I gave her a small eye roll.

“I want you to listen and not interrupt me. You can talk at the end. Okay?”

“Fine.” I sighed. “Go ahead.”

“Okay, so here’s the deal.” She sat back, sipped her wine slowly and I stared at the huge diamond engagement ring on her finger. It sparkled and I felt my heart swelling in happiness for my best friend. She’d been in love with TJ for so long and it had seemed like such a long shot that he would be interested in her. Even I had doubted that he had any real interest in her. Yet, it had all worked out. Maybe Mila really did know something about love, or maybe she had just gotten lucky. Either way, she was my best bet at figuring out how to get Cody to show some real attention to me. And not just the innocent idle flirtation, either.

“I’m listening,” I said, my heart starting to race nervously.

“So, like I said, I think you should date and marry your best friend.”

“Yeah.” I nodded. “I heard that part. So exactly what is the plan? You haven’t said anything past that.”

“So, Cody needs to become your best friend.” She leaned forward expectantly, waiting for me to respond. I stared back at her, waiting for her to say something else. Only she didn’t continue talking.

“Cody needs to become my best friend?” I repeated after her, confused. “Just exactly how does that happen?”

“That’s where the plan comes into place.” She grinned at him. “Essentially, you’re going to worm your way into his life. Get closer and closer to him as friends. You’re going to friend-zone him.”

“Eh, why would I friend-zone him, if I actually want him?”

“Because guys always want someone that they can’t have.” She nodded, her mind obviously working overtime. “And, well, guys don’t respect friend zones. He’s not going to be like ‘oh I’m in the friend zone, I will never try and hit on her’. He’s going to be like, ‘shit, this girl is hot, I want her, who cares about the friend zone?’”

“Um, I don’t know about that. Aren’t I already in the friend zone? Isn’t it pretty obvious that I’ve been interested in him for a long time? And he certainly hasn’t disrespected any of my boundaries yet.”

“Yeah, he probably knows you’ve been interested in him for some amount of time, or were interested at one time, but guess what, it’s easy to get out of that. Guys don’t overanalyze like we do. All you need is to have another guy around, someone else interested in you, throw it in his face, not overtly, but maybe you can ask him for guy advice, relationship advice sort of stuff. That way you show him you’re over him and into other guys and he’s the one who’s now friend-zoned.”

“But that’s not true.” I frowned. “And where am I getting these other guys from? It’s not like they’re swarming around me.”

“You join some online dating sites, plus we’ll go to bars.”

“TJ will be cool with that?” I asked her with a raised eyebrow. TJ was a confident, cocky man, but he was always jealous when Mila was around other men. I couldn’t see that he would be happy with her going out with me to pick up other men. “Also, are you going to tell TJ that this is a game for me, meeting these other guys? That I’m trying to make Cody jealous? What if TJ told Cody? How embarrassing would that be?”

“I’m not going to tell TJ.” She shook her head. “At least not now. I don’t think he would tell Cody, though.” Mila looked thoughtful. “I’ll just tell him that you want to meet some new guys and need a friend with you.”

“Yeah, he might not tell him on purpose, but what if something slipped out, like, ‘Damn, that Sally is really into you, she’s playing all these games to get to you.’”

“TJ would not just let something like that slip.” Mila shook her head and laughed. “That wouldn’t be an innocent slip. And I’m not going to tell him it’s all a game. Not at first, anyway. But I will eventually, since TJ is my fiancé and I don’t want to lie to him. Plus, he’s a good guy. You can trust him.”