How to Get Rid of Your Ex Girlfriend

“Are you coming or not?” Tyler’s voice was impatient. I pictured him in my mind, arms folded, leaning against a wall, maybe a little grin on his face despite how long I was taking to come out of my room.

I sifted through a stack of t-shirts on my bedside table, trying to find something that looked and smelled presentable. Not that I cared too much about what Tyler thought of my appearance…pfft. It was school, one was expected to look as though they took regular showers.

“Are you?”

“Give me a moment!” I yelled back, pulling a white tee over my head and dashing into the hallway to meet him.

He raised his eyebrows. They disappeared into his meticulously combed black bangs. I had an irresistible urge to mess them up. “It’s still technically winter…don’t you want at least a sweater?”

“Nah, I’m a dude,” I reminded him. “I’m tough.”

He smirked at me. “You hate the cold.”

Huh. Well, that was true…

I grabbed my bright orange sweatshirt from the floor and followed Tyler outside, shrugging it on quickly and brushing away the hair that had been swept over my eyes.

It had been a month since Tyler and I had resolved all our shit, a month since we’d started…dating. Applying that word to two male best friends still felt a little strange, but it was true. We were technically “dating”. Although I wasn’t really sure what counted as a date anymore, considering the amount of time we spend together and alone. But we’d gone out to movies and dinner a couple of times, so I supposed that counted if nothing else did.

Right now, life was pretty damn near perfect. Sure, I was fifty dollars short and my grades were as bad as ever, but the angsty teenage girl shit had gone out the window with the drama, leaving me my old manly self. Well, maybe not that manly, considering I didn’t have the courage to let anyone outside of my close friends know I’d been dating another guy. But manly enough for a gay guy.

Sophie was back, too. She’d forgiven Tyler for pretending to date me to get rid of her, considering the feelings had actually been real, and she’d apologized for being such a bitch about their breakup. Now, as was custom with Sophie, she was scoping out guys one by one, trying to find someone worthy to date. Being top five for many of the guys our age, she could be selective and find someone who had both personality and looks. According to her, that was apparently very difficult.

Speaking of people forgiving Tyler, Nerd Boy never did, after Tyler had insensitively used him and I’d even more insensitively thrown him into the lockers. He’d lost about half of his nerd friends after that, but he claimed it didn’t upset him because he wasn’t good enough at videogames to keep up with them anyway. Personally, I find them more amusing now that he’s not friends with them. Every time any of them passes by they give me these piercing death glares, which would be unnerving if not for the fact that they’re nerds. What are they going to do to a jock like me? Beat me in a math test?

So really…life is good. I have my five close friends. I have my best friend, who also happens to be my boyfriend. Thankfully, his parents are cool with it by now. The only reason he was at my house this morning was…well, I’d said he needed to stay over so we could finish a history project, but all we really did was…um...have fun? No, that came out wrong. I meant fun like procrastinating, not fun like sex.

Okay, fine. Maybe we did make out a little.

It actually does count as procrastination, considering we got nothing done.

Tyler held out his hand.

He smiled.

I smiled.

I took it.

And we walked away together, just like every other morning.