Friends With Benefits

It was the week before school was due to start. While everyone else was enjoying their last frolic at Spenser Lake or hanging around the Grange Valley Mall trying to purchase their perfect back-to-school outfit, I was laying on my back on the sofa in the Murphy family’s TV room with my shirt off while Fletcher Murphy kissed my neck and nervously brushed his hand across the lacey fabric at the bottom of my bra.

You would think that since Fletcher and I have been making out three to four times a week since Chuck Fink’s terrible disaster of a birthday party the first week of June, we would be official or out in the open or something, but that was not the case. In fact, my friend Sara is the only person who knows that Fletcher and I have been hooking up. The worst part wasn’t even that I was secretly hooking up with a guy I hated most of the time. The worst part was that while Fletcher was running his hands up and down my body, all I could do was stare up at the ceiling and wish it was my best friend Will rather than Fletch doing all of these things to me.

Of course, Fletch knows I would totally ditch him for Will any day of the week. Half the girls in school would give their right arms to hook up with Will while the other half already have. I’ve been in love with Will the longest though, and he doesn’t even know. Will and I have lived next door to each other our entire lives and I first fell in love with him my tree house when we were five years old. We were having a camp out that night and I was scared of a particularly nasty rain storm. Will put his arms around me and told me funny stories until the rain ended. Ever since then, I’ve been hopelessly in love with him.

Will and I were pretty inseparable until fifth grade, when Fletcher Murphy moved to town and ruined everything. He and Will instantly hit it off over their love of video games, tart candies, and clogging up the school toilets with paper towels. Will always insisted we include Fletch in things and, even though I hated Fletch, I went along because I wanted Will to be happy. Fletcher and I have always constantly bickered over everything and Will found himself often playing the peacemaker role in our odd triangle.

Things changed in eighth grade when Will started dating Kelly Montauk, the most popular girl in school. He suddenly ditched both Fletch and me to go roller-skating with her or so one of their moms could drive them to a supervised date at the movie theater. Fletch and I no longer had a buffer and we were constantly at each other’s throats since Will wasn’t around. I branched out and made friends with Sara Farrell, though Fletch seemed incapable of doing the same. He just followed me around and did whatever I did when Will wasn’t there, like he actually thought we stood a decent shot of being friends.

Things changed the first week of June when the most annoying guy in the world, Chuck Fink, had his seventeenth birthday party. Honestly, no one likes Chuck, except maybe his friend Eric, who coincidentally happens to be Sara’s boyfriend. Sara bribed me into going to Chuck’s party. Eric was afraid no one would come and Chuck would be miserable, so he got Sara to help him bribe people to come. They told me Will would be there, so of course, I went. He had just broken up with Maddie Schemer so I thought now would be the perfect time to confess my feelings for him. Unfortunately, Will showed up with the dipshit sophomore Natalie on his arm and the whole night went downhill from there.

I followed Fletch away from the beer and the smoke to Chuck’s family’s basement. Because I was so upset, I confessed to him that the guy I was in love with would never love me back, without naming names. Fletch informed me he was dealing with a similar situation, that the girl he’s always been in love with wouldn’t even give him the time of day. Somewhere in the midst of our mutual bitchfest, we started hardcore making out.

It’s been that way pretty much ever since. Whenever no one is around, Fletch and I just start going at it inexplicably. Sure, Fletch is an okay guy, just as long as he doesn’t open his mouth. He’s not drop-dead gorgeous or anything, but he’s decent. And as long as he doesn’t start talking, he’s great to be around. The only problem is that he’s not Will, the love of my life, and that whenever Fletch and I do try to have a decent conversation, it always ends up in some pointless argument about politics or religion or the Smurfs.

I was brought back to reality by the sensation of Fletch slowly trying to maneuver his hands underneath my back to unclasp my bra. Sure, Fletch and I had intense make out sessions most of the time, but we never let things go too awfully far. Just about everything below the waist was completely off limits, though that never stopped Fletch from trying to push things further. I looked up at the clock, realizing we had about fifteen minutes before we were supposed to meet the rest of the gang at the mall in preparation for our last week of summer freedom. Fletch and I probably should have stopped a while before so we wouldn’t arrive all flushed, looking like we had been doing the nasty or something. Of course, being the sadist Fletch’s presence often turns me into, I couldn’t just shove him off. As he did his best to fit his hand in the narrow space between my back and the couch cushions, I slowly rolled my hips against his own.

“Oh, God, Lenny,” Fletch moaned against the side of my neck.

“Fletch,” I whispered to him, still moving my body in sync with his.

“Yeah?” he asked before going back to sucking my neck.

“We’re going to be late to meet everyone at the mall,” I whispered.

“Fuck them,” Fletch replied.

“Fletch…” I said again as he finally got his hands behind me.

“Yeah?” he moaned again, feeling his fingers along the fabric for the clasp.

“I’ve got to pee so bad I think I’m going to burst,” I said, annoyed.

Completely grossed out, Fletch shot up and looked at me oddly. I laughed, threw on my shirt and headed to the bathroom with my shoulder bag to touch up my make up before we left. We I returned a few minutes later, Fletch was still shirtless, though his glasses were pretty steamed up from our heated activity. He was sitting on the sofa like a toddler who had just been put in time out. I rolled my eyes, knowing he hated whenever our make out sessions had to end. For some reason, he’d been pretty annoyed about hanging out with Will recently as well, though that was probably because Will kept bringing his idiot girlfriend around.

“Are you gonna drive me to the mall or am I gonna have to call Sara and Eric to pick me up?” I snorted.

“You’d really ride in a car with that douche Chuck Fink?” Fletch snorted.

“No,” I rolled my eyes, “but if you aren’t taking me…”

“How are you gonna explain to everyone what you’re doing at my house?” Fletch asked.

“I’ll just call Will,” I grumbled. “I’m sure he’ll come and get me, no matter how much Natalie whines about it…”

“Just let me get my keys,” Fletcher muttered, tossing on his shirt and heading to his room.

Within a matter of minutes, we were in Fletcher’s halfback, slowly cruising toward the mall. When Fletch had first gotten the car after his birthday in January, he had immediately filled up the back with fast food bags and other garbage. Earlier in the summer, he had cleared it all out and I suspected that was to give us more room to make out on the odd occasion when we would wind up together in the back of Fletcher’s car. I fought with Fletch over what radio station to listen to the entire ride to the mall and then we started bickering about music as we walked through the parking lot. Fletch has this weird prejudice against all female bands and it seriously got on my nerves.

We arrived to the appointed meeting place, the fountain in the center of the mall. Fletch and I were the first ones there, naturally, and so I decided I wanted to get a smoothie and some cookies while we waited. Fletch wanted to just hang around and wait for everyone else, and complained about why I wanted something to eat. I told him that I was getting something to eat no matter hat and, even though he couldn’t stop complaining about it, he followed me all the way to the food court and back. He even got his own smoothie. When we returned, Sara was there, cuddling with Eric, who was arguing with Chuck Fink about video games.

“Hey!” Sara said to me brightly, jumping up from the edge of the fountain where she had been sitting. “When’d you guys get here?”

“A while ago,” Fletch said before sipping his soda. “Whiny here made us get food.”

“Whiny?” I scoffed at him. “You were whining about walking the thirty feet to the food court the entire way and then you spent five minutes deciding what flavor smoothie you wanted after you finished whining about how stupid they were!”

“So… is Will here yet?” Sara interjected.

“No,” I shrugged. “At least, I haven’t seen him.”

“He isn’t bringing Natalie is he?” Chuck asked.

“Probably,” I shrugged. Everyone else groaned. Even Chuck Fink, the most annoying person on earth hates Natalie. That should count for something.

“Why haven’t they broken up yet?” Eric asked. “I mean, he only dates girls for three months tops. And it’s getting close to four now. You’d think he’d be moving on.”

“Maybe he really likes her,” Fletch shrugged. I scoffed and Fletch rolled his eyes at me.

“Maybe she’s really good in bed,” Chuck suggested.

“That’s probably more likely,” Eric nodded before getting hit upside the head by Sara.

“We should at least try to be nice to her if Will sees something in her,” Sara said.

“She’s as dumb as a brick and spends most of her time trying to pop her cleavage out of her top,” Chuck pointed out.

“Yeah, babe,” Eric agreed. “Remember when we were talking about college applications and Natalie said she didn’t need to go to college because she was too pretty?”

“Or when we had to explain to her that cows made hamburgers,” Fletcher nodded.

“And remember how she said she refused to read To Kill A Mockingbird because it supported animal cruelty?” I snorted.

“Okay, she might not be the brightest bulb…” Sara shrugged, “but, we should still try to be nice to her…”

“She spit in my soda once,” Eric pointed out.

“And she dumped nacho cheese down my shirt,” Chuck agreed.

“You deserved that,” Fletch shrugged.

“Fine. Let’s just tolerate her until Will moves on, okay?” Sara sighed.

“Who are you guys talking about?” Will asked, Natalie clutching to his arm like it was a life preserver.

“We were talking about how late your lame ass is,” Fletch said smoothly.

“Sorry about that,” Will shrugged. “Natalie had to change her outfit.”

“Pink is so over,” she informed us. “Anyway, there are about five shops I have to hit up and then I have to get to the shoe store before that sale on boots ends…”

“You aren’t the only one here to shop, you know,” Fletch pointed out. “We aren’t here to follow you around.” Natalie stuck out her bottom lip in a pout and looked at Will.

“Be nice, Fletch,” Will sighed.

“Sara and I have a few stores we want to go to,” I mentioned.

“Which ones?” Natalie asked. Sara rattled off the list and Natalie scrunched up her nose.

“Those are loser stores. You guys are going to look like tramps if you buy from there,” Natalie said.

“I suppose you would be the expert on looking like a tramp,” Eric muttered, causing everyone to laugh.

“I’ll take Nat to her stores and we can meet up with you guys later, okay?” Will suggested.

“I thought the purpose of today was to hang out as friends,” I frowned. “I mean, we haven’t seen you all summer Will.”

“I said I’d meet you guys later,” Will shrugged.

“But Will,” Natalie whined, “you promised me you would go to Sasha’s birthday party with me tonight!”

“I’ll have plenty of time to do both,” Will assured her.

“Someone is whipped,” Chuck snorted.

“Am not,” Will glared as Fletch and Eric proceeded to make whipping noises.

“And you aren’t whipped?” I pointed out to Eric.

“Hey, I am secure in my masculinity enough to admit Sara has me totally and completely under her thumb,” Eric scoffed. He received an “aw” and a big kiss from Sara before he grinned at the guys, as if he was proving some kind of point.

“Whatever,” Fletch rolled his eyes. “Can we get moving before the mall closes?”

“What do you have to buy, Fletch?” Will asked him curiously.

“Shoes,” he shrugged. Will raised his eyebrows and said nothing before heading off with Natalie in the opposite direction from us.

I was in a bad mood throughout the first couple of stores we went to. Sara and I told the guys to go check out the electronics store since they were getting pretty bored of the two of us looking at sweaters and making fun of the latest fashions. Since we were finally alone, Sara used it as a chance to confront me about the whole Fletcher thing, yet again. I had been promising her since she found out the month before that I would break things off with Fletch soon so I wouldn’t give him any ideas or lead him around or anything. However, every time I was able to muster up the courage to tell Fletch that things between us were getting out of hand, we just ended up making out.

“So… have you talked to him?” Sara asked.

“Talked to who?” I said, trying to play dumb.

“Fletch!” Sara rolled her eyes. “You know what I’m talking about!”

“I was going to do it today…” I frowned.

“But?” Sara said.

“But I needed a ride here. One that wouldn’t stuff me alone in the backseat with Chuck’s creepy sexual advances or make me the third wheel to Will and Natalie’s love fest,” I grimaced.

“You have seriously got to get over him,” Sara sighed. Other than Fletch, Sara is the only person who knows about my super top secret crush on Will. Whereas I told Fletch, Sara sort of figured it out for herself in seventh grade.

“I know… I just…” I sighed. “I can’t. It’s not that easy. If Eric broke up with you this afternoon, you wouldn’t be over him tomorrow, would you?”

“Has Eric been talking about breaking up with me?” Sara shrieked.

“No, it was an example scenario,” I rolled my eyes. “Actually, if Eric falls in more in love with you, I’d consider a restraining order.”

“Seriously, you need to talk to Fletch about the whole… deal,” Sara said. “If you guys keep this up, someone is going to get hurt.”

“It’s no strings attached,” I reminded her. “There are always strings.”

“I guess I’ll talk to him on the ride home this afternoon,” I shrugged.

“You guess?” Sara said with a raised eyebrow.

“Okay, I will definitely talk to him about it on the ride home,” I said. “Happy?”

“I guess,” Sara frowned.

“Besides, I’m sure Will and Natalie are going to break up soon,” I said. “And I think this time, he’ll definitely start to realize that we’d be better as more than friends.”

“Every time he breaks up with a girlfriend, you insist it will be the time he finally ‘notices’ you,” Sara grimaced. “Seriously, Lenny, you need to get a new obsession or something. You shouldn’t measure your self-worth by whether or not Will Swain finds you do-able.”

“I don’t measure my self-worth based on what he thinks of me,” I scoffed. “I just think he’s…”

“Dreamy?” Sara offered.

“I guess. That doesn’t entirely cover it though,” I sighed. “I’m head over heels in unrequited love with him and there’s nothing I can do about it.”

“Well,” Sara pointed out, “you aren’t going to figure things out by intermittently sticking your tongue down Fletcher Murphy’s throat.”

“I’ll talk to him, I swear,” I told her with a groan.

Of course, things weren’t always as easy as Sara made them seem.