Friends With Benefits

Will drove me home that afternoon, but he couldn’t hang out since he had to race back to school for football practice. Eric was grounded for some sort of prank he had pulled on his younger brother over the weekend, so he couldn’t take us anywhere. Chuck was busying calling up Laurel to flirt with her. Once I was home, I chatted with Sara over the phone while we each did our homework and then went downstairs to eat supper with my family. Matt was coming home from school to do laundry and visit with us that weekend, so my parents warned me not to try to fill up all of my time with my friends. I rolled my eyes but agreed since I had been missing Matt over the past few weeks.

After dinner, Will and I hung out via our video game systems. I went into Matt’s room and placed on his headset so Will and I could team up and play Call of Duty together online with a few Japanese guys, a German guy, some chick from Los Angeles, a Canadian, and then a whole colony of guys from somewhere in the Midwest who were terrible shots. The game was going pretty well until one of those Midwest guys had to go and tell Will how lucky he was that his girlfriend was willing to play with him, to which Will quickly replied that we were just friend. After that, I feigned being tired and said I wanted to get ready for bed.

Instead of changing into my pajamas, I got distracted with a book I had been reading. My parents had gone to bed early since Dad had to get up early to go to a meeting and my mother had taken up going to yoga on Monday, Wednesday, and Thursday mornings for whatever reason. Since Matt had gone off to college, my mother had been getting a major case of empty nest syndrome. She was trying to fill up her time with cooking classes, yoga, knitting, gardening club, and a variety of other activities that I couldn’t possibly keep track of. I sighed and decided to put my book aside so I could get ready for bed when I heard a clinking sound against my window. I ventured over to find Fletch throwing rocks up against my window again. Annoyed, I threw open the window and glared down at him.

“I’ll meet you around back,” Fletch called up at me.

I glowered, but before I could respond, he disappeared, heading into the backyard and I knew up into the treehouse. I muttered under my breath as I reluctantly went out to meet him. I knew no good would ever come of Will introducing Fletch to our treehouse, a sacred spot for Will and I. It was where our friendship had really begun. Besides, it was technically in my backyard and my father had built it, so I should be able to keep Fletch out of it if I wanted to. As I headed out the backdoor, I could see Fletch’s legs dangling from the threshold of the treehouse. I climbed up slowly, taking my damn sweet time so he would be reminded of just how angry I still was at him. When I arrived at the top, he wasn’t acting like he had been waiting for me at all, his face turned upwards and staring into the night sky.

“What the hell did you drag me all the way out here for?” I grumbled as I took a seat on the hard wooden boards beside him. “You know, if my parents found out we were out here, we’d both be in a huge heap of trouble. And I’m still pretty pissed at you after what you did Saturday. And what you said to Chuck today was completely out of…”

I was interrupted when Fletch just leaned over and kissed me. It wasn’t particularly passionate, though it was rather forceful, as if he was using his lips to push my entire head backwards. I didn’t have any warning or enough time to process what was going on, so I hadn’t even closed my eyes. I was staring at him, my eyes open as wide as they possibly could in confusion, when he pulled back of me. He let out a frustrated groan and looked away from.

“God, Lenny, you never shut up!” Fletch exclaimed. My confusion instantly turned to fury.

“So, what? You think that’s the way to shut me up?” I glowered back at him.

“You know, Lenny, you’re awfully full of yourself,” Fletch snorted.

“I’m awfully full of myself?” I snorted. “You’re the most self-absorbed asshole I’ve ever met!” I was quite surprised when Fletch didn’t instantly defend his own ego, instead turning his head upward and resuming his stargazing. I sighed. “What are you doing here anyway? What did you come over here for?”

“I just got off work,” Fletch replied with a shrug.

“That didn’t answer my question,” I pointed out. “And that’s not even a reason.” There was a long awkward pause with Fletch still staring up at the sky. I was about to climb down and go back in the house when Fletch finally spoke up.

“I’m sorry,” Fletch said.

“What are you sorry for?” I asked him with a frown.

“I’m just sorry, okay?” Fletch replied. Before I could press him any further, he was climbing down out of the treehouse. I scrambled down to confront him, but he managed to make it out to his car and peel down the road before I could reach him.

I was a little surprised that Fletch didn’t show up to pick me up the next day. In Fletch’s world, the fact that he said he was sorry instantly made everything better and so he would be completely confused and blame me if I didn’t immediately start acting buddy-buddy with him now. However, I wasn’t disappointed when Will rang the doorbell to drive me to school. I didn’t mention Fletch’s late night visit to Will, especially since I was trying to push it from my own mind.

When we got to school, I went to hang out with Sara and Eric in the quad before classes started since we had gotten there particularly early that morning. Will had apparently completely bombed a test last week but, since he was on the football team, coach had talked the teacher into letting him retake it if he was willing to show up before school and do so. Will had studied extra hard and even had me quiz him on the drive to school to make sure he was completely prepared. Fletch was nowhere to be found that morning though Chuck was hanging out with Laurel, who seemed to be particularly taken with even the most annoying aspects of his personality.

Since Eric and Sara were cuddling together on one end of the picnic table, I had taken to reading a book on the other one. Albeit, Fletch had basically ruined the ending for me, I still checked out The Sorrows of Young Werther secretly after he had returned it to the library. I was doing my best not to read him around it because he would most likely bug me for wanting to read a book he had initially picked out or reading it despite the fact that he had given away the ending. A shadow suddenly interrupted the sunlight I had been using to read by and I felt as though someone was towering over me. I looked up to find Heath Birnbaum, one of the senior boys. He was on the football team with Will, but he had been cut to second string after getting into a fight during a game with another player then twisting his ankle the previous year.

“Hey,” Heath said to me, his hands shoved nervously in his pockets once he knew he had my attention.

“Hi,” I replied, gazing up at him curiously.

Heath wasn’t the type of guy to be nervous. Like Will, he could get almost any girl he wanted. Unlike Will, Heath was known for falling instantly for girls and then being utterly crushed when they didn’t return his feelings or didn’t think the relationship was serious and slept with some other guy while he was downstairs holding their purses. Heath wasn’t exactly knowledgeable when it came to women, but then again, he wasn’t exactly a genius about anything either. He was repeating junior English since he had failed out of it the first time. I tried to shake off Fletch’s words when he first heard that: “How do you fail a class on the language you speak?”

“So… it’s like Lee’s birthday…” Heath began.

“Lee Hollander?” I frowned.

“Yeah,” Heath said. “He’s turning eighteen and we’re having a party for him up at Spenser Lake… a whole bunch of us rented a cabin for the night and we’re going to do sort of a camp out party thing as late as people want to stay…”

“Well, that’s nice,” I nodded before halfheartedly returning to my book. I had lost my place when I went to find out who was staring at me.

“And… um… the thing is…” Heath said nervously. “Just about all of our friends are in a couple… You know… I mean, Lee has Heather, Keith has Jean, and Jason has Kelly and Lucas Garretson is bringing Maddie Schemer for whatever reason… and well, I’m sure Will has some girl lined up… I mean, we just invited him yesterday afternoon or whatever but…”

“What is your point?” I asked Heath with a snort. Out of the corner of my eye, I saw Fletch coming over to the picnic table we were sitting at. I noticed that Sara and Eric had given me a bit of space so I could talk to Heath for some reason as well. I arched my eyebrow, waiting for Heath to finish what he was saying.

“Well… I was wondering if… you know… if…” Heath said awkwardly.

“Spit it out,” I commanded.

“Iwaswonderingifyouwouldliketogowithme,” He said hurriedly. I opened my mouth, but he cut me off. “I mean, it doesn’t have to be a date or anything. We can just go as friends. Or something. I mean, I’m just sick of being all alone since my last girlfriend – you wouldn’t know her. She went to Westmoreland – left me for some college guy who deals weed. I mean, I don’t want to show up alone again because people are starting to tease me and you’re a nice girl and Will’s friend and I know I’m awful at doing this but would you just consider…”

I thought for a moment. Sure, I would have loved if Will had asked me to go with him. The odds were he would probably only ask me as friends and invite Fletch along for the optimal ruination of my evening, but at least I would be with Will. Then again, I had been complaining about how no one ever asked me, so he probably would rag on me for turning down a guy who had enough guts. Well, Heath didn’t exactly seem to have guts, but he was interested.

“I’d love to go with you,” I replied. “When is it?”

“Friday,” Heath breathed.

“I’d have to ask my parents since my brother is coming home from college for the weekend, but I’m sure they’d be okay with it,” I replied. I looked over at Fletch who was eyeing me suspiciously. He was now leaning up against a post and trying to pull of some sort of James Dean with glasses look.

“I can write your parents a letter,” Heath replied.

“Why would you do that?” I frowned.

“So they’d know my intentions were good…” Heath blushed.

“You don’t have to go that,” I replied.

“Okay, well thanks,” Heath smiled. He turned around and rushed off, like he had to the bathroom and throw up or something.

“Well, that was darling,” Fletch’s voice echoed from behind me. I whirled around to glare at him.

“You’re acting really stalkerish all of a sudden,” I informed him. “First, sneaking over to my house and luring me out of it then appearing all creeper like and eavesdropping on my conversations…”

“I think it’s sweet you’re going out with Heath,” Fletch replied with a snort. “You know, I heard he only has one nut.”

“What the hell are you talking about?” I snorted.

“He’s got an undescended testis. You know, one of his balls never showed up,” Fletch replied. “Will said the guys give him hell for it in the locker room. He has to get this hormone shots every so often so it’ll drop.”

“That is disgusting,” I glowered at him.

“I mean, you imagine being a freak like that? Only having one nut?” Fletch shook his head.

“I can’t imagine having any nuts,” I snorted.

“What are you guys talking about?” Sara asked, coming over to us with Eric still curled around her like one of those baby monkeys on the Discovery Channel.

“Squirrels,” Fletch replied before turning on his heel, walking through the crowd, and disappearing off to his homeroom.

“There is something wrong with him,” Eric pronounced. Sara and I only nodded in agreement.

“So… Heath just asked me out,” I said. “For Friday…”

“That’s so great! He’s really sweet,” Sara said.

“He’s as emotional as a chick though,” Eric said, before Sara elbowed him in the gut. “What? It’s true. And he’s pretty sick. He has to go to the doctor a lot…”

“Fletch said something to that affect,” I frowned.

“Yeah, well he’s a sweet guy,” Sara snorted. “And you should be nice to him since he’s interested in Lenny.”

“Fine,” Eric pouted, “but seriously, if he starts growing man boobs or crying all over you like that fat guy in Fight Club, I’d run Aileen.”

“Dually noted,” I replied before Sara and I decided to head to homeroom.

I thought the subject of Heath asking me out had been laid to rest until Will brought it up again in chemistry. Secretly, I had been hoping that the thought of me going out with some other guy would get under Will’s skin a little bit and maybe encourage him to fight for my honor or whatever guys are supposed to do when the girl of their dreams is out with someone else. We were sitting at our lab table, mixing various acids, when Will made probably one of the worst segues of all time.

“Can you pass the hydrochloric acid?” I asked him.

“Sure,” he said. “You know, this stuff is supposed to burn your skin. Speaking of things with skin, I heard Heath Birnbaum asked you out.”

“How did you find out about that?” I asked, glaring straight at Fletch, who was suddenly terribly engrossed in his lab report.

“A little bird told me,” Will shrugged.

“You mean a nasty little gnat?” I snorted in Fletch’s direction. “You’re not going to give me some speech about the fact he only has one ball, are you?”

“What? Where did you hear that?” Will frowned.

“Fletch told me that you told him…” I began.

“I never said anything like that,” Will frowned.

“Well, Eric said he was sick too…” I began.

“Yeah. He recently got diagnosed with Celiac disease, so he’s been going around to doctors a lot lately,” Will nodded. “Seriously, Ailee? One ball? You freaked me out there for a moment.”

“What? You thought I’d seen his balls or something?” I snorted.

“Well, Heath does have a habit of losing his pants when there is alcohol involved,” Will shrugged. “Actually, the alcohol is one of the reasons they discovered the Celiac disease…”

“So, you think he’s a good guy?” I asked Will.

“Ailee, you don’t need my approval to go out with a guy who like,” Will rolled his eyes.

“I don’t particularly like him. He just asked me out and he seemed really desperate and pathetic and I sort of felt sorry for him,” I shrugged. “Besides… he is kind of cute and he’s not an emotional wastoid like some people…” I glanced out of the corner of my eye to see Fletch was still seemingly enthralled by filling out his lab sheet.

“Dude… you’ve been writing the same sentence over and over again,” Eric whispered to him, as if no one could hear. Fletch muttered something, but I couldn’t hear what.

“Well, I’m sure you’ll have fun,” Will said confidently.

“You don’t think he’ll be one of those guys who tries to pull something when we’re alone, do you?” I asked curiously, hoping to get Will thinking about what he might do if some guy tried to feel me up or something. Will sat back thoughtfully.

“How about I come to the party,” Will said. “We can devise some sort of secret symbol or code word… you know… that way if the date is completely boring or if he grosses you out or tries to molest you or something, I can save you.”

“That sounds great,” I said. “But it should be a word. Something that doesn’t come up frequently in conversation…”

“How about flamingo?” Will asked. “I like the way that word just rolls off the tip of your tongue…flah-min-goooo….”

“Okay,” I laughed. “Flamingo it is.” Will and I both erupted in laughter, causing everyone else in our class to either look at us warily or shake their heads and return to their own experiments. Even Mr. Larson cracked a grin at how blissfully happy we seemed. In fact, the only person in the room who hadn’t even cracked a smile was Fletcher Murphy.