Friends With Benefits

I woke up early Saturday morning to the sound of laughter. I was horrified for a moment, wondering where I was and what was going on. I looked up to find Will, completely sober, sitting on one of the old benches in the treehouse and laughing at me. I glowered up at him, wondering what was so funny when I rolled over. Fletch not only had his arm around me tightly, as if he was cuddling a teddy bear, but he was also sucking his thumb in his sleep. I was surprised Will’s riotous laughter didn’t wake him.

“Ew! Murphy germs!” I squeaked, pushing Fletch away from me and standing up in the treehouse, nearly bumping my head. Will fell out of his chair laughing hard at that, especially since I had startled Fletch awake. Fletch was now sitting upright, trying to figure out exactly where he was.

“What the hell happened?” Fletch muttered.

“You were using Ailee as your own personal pillow,” Will giggled. “And sucking your thumb!”

“I was dreaming about sucking on a lollipop,” Fletch frowned.

“This is disgusting. I’m going home,” I grimaced, pushing past Fletch and shimmying down the rope ladder. I walked in through the back door of my house to find my entire family assembled together at the breakfast table, waiting for me.

“Didya have a good sleep over with the boys?” Matt smirked at me, emphasizing the word “boys.” My parents glared at Matt and I swallowed, hoping I wasn’t in trouble.

“What happened last night?” Dad asked.

“Um… Will and Fletch and I came back from the party and Will wanted to check out the old treehouse because we hadn’t been up it in a while…” I lied easily. “We got to talking and since it was late and all… well… we all fell asleep.”

“Together?” Dad frowned.

“Fletch and Will were cuddling,” I lied.

“Are they still up there? Do you think I could get a picture?” Matt asked hopefully.

“They’ve woken up… I think Will’s driving Fletch home…” I shrugged.

“Dammit,” Matt grimaced.

“Language,” my mother warned him as I sat down, popping a piece of French toast in my mouth.

“Yes, no cussing until after noon,” Dad nodded, causing my mother to roll her eyes.

I didn’t go over to see Will the following morning not only because I knew he was grounded but also because I was a little mad at him for ditching me in order to hook up with some random chick whose name he didn’t even know. I would never tell him, but I was secretly glad his Dad had interrupted before Will and Whats-Her-Face went too far. The fact that I was a virgin and Will wasn’t had never particularly bothered me, but what did disturb me is when I had to see him in particularly sexual situations with other girls. Then again, I doubted Will would react positively if he saw me rolling around with Fletch in some of the rather physical situations we got into, particularly the one the night before.

There was really nothing for me to do the majority of Saturday. Sara and Eric were celebrating their two year anniversary with a picnic in the park. Sara was bringing the picnic part since she didn’t trust Eric with the food, but Eric was supposed to bring some romantic stuff for them to do. Will was probably confined to his room and I would let Kelly Montauk slowly pull off all my finger and toenails one by one before I spent an afternoon with Chuck Fink of my own free will. Fletch had work scheduled for that day and I figured that if I got really bored and was really ready to put what had happened the night before behind me, we might be able to hang out later. Of course, my brother being my brother had to ruin that.

“Hey, Lenny, wanna go the grocery store with me?” Matt asked.

“Why do you wanna hang out at the grocery store?” I snorted.

“Because there’s this really cute cashier working there… from my senior class… she didn’t get into college, but she’s pretty hot,” Matt shrugged.

“Why do you want me along if you’re just going to flirt with some girl?” I replied.

“Because Mom and Dad are all about me ‘spending quality time with the family’ now that I’m home. I figured if I went with you, they wouldn’t pester me about it,” Matt shrugged. “I figured I could flirt and peace and you could hang out with that Murphy kid.”

“First of all, Fletch and I aren’t even really friends and I don’t really like hanging out with him,” I snorted. “Secondly, he’ll be working, so it’s not like we could hang out with each other even if we actually wanted to…”

“Fine,” Matt conceded, “I’ll buy you one of those really big, completely sugar infused smoothies from the smoothie store in the grocery store complex if you come with me.”

“A large strawberry smoothie and a big sugar cookie or no deal,” I replied.

“I’ll get you the biggest damn smoothie and cookie you want,” Matt rolled his eyes. “Now, can we get in the car?”

I didn’t really decide I had made a mistake in going with Matt until we were in the parking lot of the grocery store. Our town was pretty small and so was our grocery store, meaning there were pretty good odds that I would run into Fletch, no matter how much I wanted to avoid him. When we reached the door of the grocery store¸ Matt and I instantly split up. He spotted the girl he had been talking about working the customer service counter and went to flirt with her while I decided to peruse the store in case they were giving out any free samples. I was very disappointed to find that the three sample ladies were all on their smoke break all back and hoped that Matt would take enough time with his flirting that I could get some free Vienna sausages without running into Fletch. Of course, nothing ever seems to work out the way I wanted to.

I was aimlessly walking down the aisle with all of the home cleaning products like detergent, toilet paper, soaps, plungers, tissues, and other similar items. I was glancing over the creepy mascots on the paper towels when I looked up, only to catch a glimpse of Fletch restocking all of the air fresheners. I did my best to turn around and try to flee, but there was a giant display of a new dusting system that I nearly knocked over, slowing me down. The clatter of me knocking over a few boxes was enough to draw Fletch’s attention. I tried to pick them up and replace them, but I wasn’t quick enough to avoid Fletch. In a matter of seconds, he was over beside me, helping me stack them back properly.

“I spent thirty minutes on this thing, you know,” Fletch informed me.

“Sorry,” I grimaced, “but maybe you shouldn’t have placed it in the middle of an aisle.”

“That’s what I said, but the store manager wanted it here,” Fletch shrugged. “So, you shopping with your mom again?”

“Matt wanted to flirt with the girl at the customer service desk,” I replied.

“Mandy? Yeah… she gets around. Last I heard, she was screwing both the guy who stacks our beer and one of the guys at the pharmacy,” Fletch informed me. “I hope your brother’s gotten his shots, or at least intends to get them.”

“I don’t think he’ll get anywhere,” I shrugged. “I’m sure Matt has a few girls he’s going after back at school, too, so I don’t think he’ll be too upset if things don’t work out with her.”

“How long do you think you’ll be waiting on him?” Fletch asked curiously.

“Long enough for him to get rejected, so I’m guessing not too much longer,” I shrugged.

“Well, just let me finish stacking this cans of lemon breeze scented air freshener and I can go on break,” Fletch replied.

“You really don’t have to do that,” I replied as I followed Fletch over to the remaining stack of stock. He picked up the box and began stacking.

“So, you didn’t get in trouble for coming home late, did you?” Fletch asked.

“No, but if anyone asks, you and Will were cuddled together on one side of the treehouse and I was on the complete other side, completely away from the both of you,” I explained to him with a shrug. Fletch looked at me skeptically but continued stacking.

“Okay….” Fletch said, a little confused.

“So… how was Will this morning?” I asked. “I had to leave really fast… I was worried that my parents would…”

“Will was fine,” Fletch grimaced. “He finished making fun of me and then we both went to his house for breakfast. His parents grounded him for the weekend, so he doesn’t have his car keys. Of course, that’s not going to stop his many friends from picking him up and taking them to their parties so he can hook up with random kicks. Seriously, his parents couldn’t punish him if they tried.”

“What he did wasn’t that bad,” I shrugged.

“Coming home drunk and about to have sex with some random chick in the driveway isn’t bad?” Fletch snorted as he finished putting things away. “Jesus, Lenny. You’d cover for Will if he murdered someone, wouldn’t you? I bet you’d tell the judge it was an accident! You’d help him bury the body!”

“Shut up,” I glowered. Fletch sighed.

“Come on,” he said, grabbing hold of my arm. “I wanna show you something…”

“Not interested,” I snorted.

“Too bad. You’re coming,” Fletch said. He pulled me down the aisle and into the backroom, through the “Employees Only” door. We walked past the break room and into the big warehouse space where they kept all the stock before it went on shelves.

“What are we doing back here?” I grimaced.

“What do you want?” Fletch asked with a shrug.

“What?” I said.

“Whatever food you want, just take it,” Fletch said.

“Isn’t that embezzlement?” I snorted.

“Technically, it’s stealing,” Fletch said. “Embezzlement is when you take something really expensive and charge it as the cheapest thing in the store. Apples are thirty-nine cents this week, but I could charge a steak as that and take it home and no one would know.”

“Why?” I grimaced.

“Because this place is a hell hole and the only way to get back at our dickhead store manager is to steal things,” Fletch shrugged. “So, whaddaya want?”

“I dunno…” I said, scanning the room. I finally found a bag of potato chips and pointed it to it. Fletch picked it up off of the stack and then the two of us sat on a bunch of cereal boxes being held together with plastic wrap and cardboard until they could be stacked. “So, you steal things all the time?”

“Not all the time,” Fletch shrugged. “Just when I’m pissed off at my boss. Everyone does it though, and I never take anything too big. I mean, I’ve seen the store manager come in here and pick out steaks, potatoes, and whole cases of beer to take home without paying for them some weekends, so it’s not like I can get in trouble when he’s doing that.”

“I guess,” I shrugged, continuing to munch on my chips. I looked over at Fletch, who was eying me in an odd way that made me feel rather uncomfortable.

“So…uh… sorry about this morning,” Fletch said.

“What happened this morning?” I asked.

“The general wake up thing…” Fletch grimaced.

“I think it’s funny you suck your thumb in your sleep,” I replied. “Will drools everywhere, you know. When we used to do treehouse sleepovers, I’d wake up and there would be a pool of water right below his mouth every time. I used to bug him about it constantly…”

“Oh… so you’re… not mad then?” Fletch asked. “About… you know… the arm thing?”

“Why do you think I’m mad?” I replied.

“Mainly because you rushed out of their like your head was on fire,” Fletch shrugged.

“No, it was just I realized that I might be in a shitstorm of trouble considering I technically slept with two guys last night,” I shrugged.

“You’re such a slut, Lenny,” Fletch rolled his eyes. I glowered at him and he laughed. “Seriously, though. I can’t believe Will put you up to that…”

“ Hey, I don’t remember being the only person in that treehouse,” I pointed out. “Will made you babysit him too.”

“I wasn’t trying to help Will,” Fletch replied. I looked at him, confused.

“What do you mean?” I asked. Fletch leaned over just and his lips gently grazed mine.

“What the hell was that?” I grimaced.

“Lenny…” Fletch began.

“Is that your tactic now to shut me up? Have I been talking too much for you Fletcher Murphy?” I grimaced.

“No, it’s just…” Fletch began.

“I can’t believe you,” I said. “The first time in maybe since the time we met we’re actually having a decent conversation with minimal arguing and you have to go and ruin it like that!”

“I didn’t mean…” Fletch tried again.

“Seriously, if you think I’m boring or stupid or you just don’t want to listen to me, I’d rather you tell me than try to shut me up like that,” I grimaced.

“Len…” Fletch sighed.

“My brother’s probably looking for me right now. Do you really think he would appreciate us making out on top of three hundred boxes of Fruit Loops?” I snorted. “He’d probably beat you up.”

“No, Matt would probably say ‘Oh, look, Fruit Loops.’ Face it, he isn’t that bright,” Fletch shrugged.

“Whatever. I’m leaving,” I hissed. With that, I thrust the bag of chips into Fletch’s hands and jumped off the cereal box bench. I headed through the doors and found my brother wandering the aisles, looking for me.

“Smoothie time?” Matt asked me.

“Anything to get me away from here,” I replied.