For those first few months after Gemma and Andrew had broken up, Ethan was always making comments, in her absence, about how she shouldn’t get involved with anyone yet because it was too soon. “She needs to have a grieving period.” I assumed he was just voicing his wife’s opinion, because Ethan tends not to have opinions on anything beyond architecture and music. I never saw much evidence of grieving on Gem’s part, and I didn’t ask her many questions because I’ve always given her space where Andrew was concerned. I never voiced my concerns about him when they were together. He was there first. She’d known him her whole life. Family friend, blah blah blah. I didn’t even say “I KNEW IT” when I found out that he’d been cheating for years, because what if they got back together?

I didn’t think she would be dumb enough to get back with him, and I would have tried to keep it from happening, but you never know.  Still, I couldn’t help but reminisce about those simpler times—when Gemma was spoken for and I never had to wonder what her single status would mean for our marriage and impending divorce…That was a weird sentence.

Regardless, I hadn’t been inviting any of my LA buddies around since she’d become single, especially the ones who’d always asked me what her deal is. Last thing I needed was for one of my friends to start hitting on her, especially after that little moment we had the night I brought her home from the airport. Which was why I didn’t invite any of them to our little party for Ethan and Chloe. Even though it had been a year, I was still skeptical about her being ready to deal with a bunch of horny twentysomething L.A. guys. She still seemed so raw and on edge.

Ever since that night of the almost-kiss, she’d been in a bad mood every time I was home, complaining about everything I did. If I hadn’t found it so adorable and amusing it would have been pretty annoying. “Put your shirt on—you’ll catch a cold.” “Oh my God you’re a freaking millionaire now—can’t you afford a shirt?”   “Stop laughing at me this is serious—the fact that you refuse to wear a shirt is just insulting to people who can’t afford shirts!” She was obsessed, and it certainly didn’t help that I steadfastly refuse to wear a shirt if I don’t have to. Ask any runner who’s experienced nipple chafing—when the opportunity to free your nips arises, you just take it. She used to be fine with my rampant at-home-shirtlessness before the break-up. I figured she was just uptight because she hadn’t gotten laid in a while. 

It wasn’t going to be easy for me to stay chipper all night either, seeing her all dolled-up, knowing she must have been doing hundreds of squats and lunges and plank poses in my absence—who was she getting in shape for? When did she get the ass of a Brazilian supermodel? Was she getting spray tans now? When did her hair get so long and was she using a new product to make it all bedhead-y?

I mean, I’d seen Gemma in a bra before. I had her beta-test the high tech sports bras for my new line about nine months earlier (because she’s my go-to non-athlete beta-tester). The bras are equipped with sensors that transmit data about heart rate and energy output to an app. She looked great back then, but she definitely wasn’t working out. She complained that the first design gave her uni-boob and the material smelled like a high school gym shower. She complained that the second design let her boobs bounce around too much. I made her run in place to demonstrate. I was in work-mode, so there was nothing sexy about it, especially because she was so grouchy. She loved the third design, praised the lack of scent from the moisture-wicking material, and said that the comfortable flattering style was “almost enough” to get her to start exercising more—“but not quite.”

Something or someone was enough to get her to start exercising more. Nobody starts to work out for no reason. And I knew I wasn’t the reason. I had tried endlessly to get her into running and she just hated it.  It’s not that she needed to lose any weight, it’s just that now she was all toned up and her posture was better and she looked more confident and it was just the way she was carrying herself. She seemed different. She was blossoming, and I wasn’t the one who had forced the bloom.

I didn’t even know why I cared about this so much.

As her best friend, I should have been happy that she was finally ready to move on from Andrew.

Still…So much about her had changed physically since I last saw her, I couldn’t help but wonder what else had changed for her. And how it would affect us.

Had I thought about making some sort of move to take things to another level with Gemma lately?...I think about everything. All the time. From many different perspectives. Of course I thought about it.

Here’s a good example of how I saw it: With some things, you just don’t know if they’re going to convert successfully from one form to another and it’s just not worth it for me to risk being disappointed by a potentially life-altering event by experiencing it in the wrong way. Like, Avengers: Infinity War. The big question was—should I experience it in 3D and IMAX? You’d think it’s a no-brainer, because it’s a big event movie, so you should see it in the biggest, boldest manner possible, right? But—Avengers: Infinity War was not filmed using a 3D camera. It was shot with the most advanced IMAX camera. So I knew it would look amazing in IMAX, and there was a good chance that it would have converted well to 3D—but I didn’t want to risk it. I saw it in IMAX 2D. Will I always wonder if it would have been more astounding in 3D? Maybe. But at least I wasn’t disappointed by the lack of extra dimension.

My friendship with Gemma was, in my life, a thousand times more important than a Marvel movie event of a lifetime, so I didn’t want to risk feeling disappointed and nauseated by a poor conversion. I didn’t want to mess up a great thing. I just wanted more of the great thing that we already had.

Half a year earlier I’d started spending a lot of time in Palo Alto and Portland, then traveling around the country, talking to trainers and athletes, because my company was gearing up for the launch of our first line of wearable sports technology. Meanwhile, Gemma had been on set a lot, so we’d only really spent time together a few days a month.  Our last year of marriage had flown by and I was feeling ripped off.  But now we had launched. That crucial first week had passed and we were hesitantly optimistic, so I’d planned to stay home for the next week to grab some down time, and hopefully some much-needed Gemma time. But it looked like the only Gemma time I’d have was that weekend.

When she emerged from her room, she had changed—into a tight black tank top—and even though there was no exposed cleavage or navel, she somehow looked even sexier because…Shit. The curves and the tight little waist on this woman. What is happening?

“What?” she snapped, when she saw me staring. “Too tight?”

I shook my head and started to say something, but apparently I no longer possessed a voice.

She looked at me funny, then shook her own head because she didn’t have time to contemplate me and the look on my face—she had to ensure that every throw pillow was in exactly the right place at exactly the right angle before people started arriving and sitting on them or moving them out of the way.

I cleared my throat. “Dude, you need to relax.”

“I will later.”

“No, you seriously need to relax now.” I grabbed two beers from the fridge, twisted one open and placed it in her hand. “Drink.”

She held the bottle like she had no idea what to do with it.

I twisted off my cap, clinked the bottom of my bottle with hers, and then raised it up in front of her tense little face. “To Chloe and Ethan. May we calmly remember that this laid-back but entertaining party is for them.”

I watched as her shoulders lowered several inches and she started breathing again. “Right. To Chloe and Ethan.” She took a swig of pale ale, licked her upper lip. “Where are they?”

“Downstairs, I’d imagine. They’ll come up when they’re ready. I’m not gonna tell you to chill because I know you hate that. But, you know. Chill.”

She inhaled deeply and shook off her jitters. “Yeah. Chill. I seriously don’t know what’s wrong with me.” She chugged about half the bottle.

“Whoa there, Nelly!” I reached out to touch her beer-guzzling arm and she flinched.

“What?”

“There’s a fine line between chill hostess and shit-faced tense as fuck hostess.”

“There’s a fine line between thoughtful friend and judgmental ass.”

“Noted.”

She sighed and daintily sipped her beer while keeping her eyes on me. “Would it be rude if we put up a sign by the door telling people that they’ll have to leave at ten?”

“A little. Maybe I’ll just shut off the music and turn on all the overhead lights.”

“Ugh. I don’t think we’ve ever had all the overhead lights on.” She shuddered. She cares a lot about the lighting in a room.

Now I was starting to wonder if I was ready to see her in a new light.

There was so much I knew about this girl and apparently there was just as much or more to her that I didn’t know. For instance—I knew that The Departed was one of our favorite movies (because I made her watch it the first time), and that when she watched it she got inexplicably horny. I knew this because after the first time we watched it on movie night, she pretended to be super tired when it was over, retreated to her room, Facetimed her boyfriend and (somewhat quietly) got off. It happened both times when we watched it after that. I didn’t know if it was Leonardo DiCaprio that did it for her, or maybe it was just that it’s such a testosterone-fueled movie. Maybe it was the Boston accents that turned her on? It was not the kind of thing I asked her about, because that’s a sex thing. We didn’t talk about sex.

So far.

But when I popped my Departed disc into the Blu-ray player for the shy folk (I always have a movie playing at parties for shy people to focus on), she immediately insisted that I put on “literally anything else.”

“Why?”

“I don’t know—it’s just not the right vibe.”

“Since when? It’s perfect.”

“Oh my God just do this one thing for me please?”

Did she not want to get turned on because she was anticipating being turned on by someone else at the party and didn’t want to get inappropriately aroused at a respectable gathering? I needed to know. And that’s when our honored guests knocked on the sliding door to the back deck, so I couldn’t keep asking her “why not?”

I put on When Harry Met Sally instead. I didn’t put any thought into it. I just like the part when Meg Ryan pretends to have an orgasm in the deli. Everyone on earth likes that part.

Gemma raised her arms up in the air and rushed over to give Chloe a hug and Chloe exclaimed: “Oh shit you look hot—he’s going to get a boner as soon as he lays eyes on you.” Gemma shushed her and Chloe covered her mouth.

I refrained from asking who “he” was.

Because I was not some jealous little pussy.

But seriously. Who the fuck is “he” and why was my best friend letting his eyes lay on her?!

“Hey, Walker,” Ethan wagged his eyebrows at me. “You look nice too. I’ve got a boner just from looking at you.”

“The place looks great—wow look at all this food!” Chloe wandered around, alternately smiling and pouting. “Crap. I’m going to miss this house.”

“I miss you already,” Gemma whined.

“Shall we put on some music?” Ethan asked. “What movie is this? Is this Harry and Sally?” He cocked his head to the side. “Interesting.”

“Why?”

“Nothing. Let’s put on that Alabama Shakes album I gave you.”

“I was going to put on Sinatra.”

“That’s more of an end of the night thing.”

“Whatever you say.”

He lowered his voice. “Hey, did you invite a date for tonight?”

“Course not.” I never invited a date when Gemma was around. He knew that. “Why?”

“Just asking.”

“Well, I know you’re asking. I’m asking why.”

“Because I’m asking.”

“I am not going to miss having you around. At all.”

“Yeah you are.”

Yeah. I was.

My guests all arrived at the same time—a gay couple who were “YouTube’s Queer Eye For the Tech-Averse Guy,” as well as my coolest former T.A. and her husband. Yeah, so there was zero chance that any of them would hit on Gemma or make her feel uncomfortable by hitting on me—but they also happened to be the people I wanted to hang out with that night.

While chatting with my former T.A. and her husband, I clocked an attractive redhead who was across the room talking to Ethan and Chloe. She glanced over at me. She grinned and looked back to Ethan, ran her fingers through her hair, then glanced back over at me. She seemed interesting enough. I probably would have gone over to talk to her, if circumstances had been different.

I nodded and encouraged my former T.A. to go on with her story, all the while, stealing glances over at Gemma. I always knew where she was, even without looking. But that night I couldn’t seem to stop looking. Neither could the guy she was talking to, apparently.  I had seen him make a beeline for her when he walked in. A coworker, I was certain of that. He had the look of a film crew guy. Baseball cap, untucked short sleeve button-down shirt and cargo pants. He was average height and pretty good-looking in an unintimidating sort of way, much like Andrew. Guess that’s her type. 

I halfheartedly laughed at whatever my former T.A. had just said because her husband had chuckled enthusiastically. I asked them if I could make them a margarita. They declined, saying they were cutting back on sugar. I then introduced them to Ethan, once the redhead had disappeared, because they had just bought property in Santa Clarita and were looking for an architect.  Then I was able to make a graceful exit.

It was definitely time for me to meet this dude who was doing a terrible job of not letting his eyes wander all over Gemma’s body while she talked to him. Meanwhile, her eyes were on me for my entire approach over to where they were standing. I could tell she was trying to telepathically plead with me to stay away, but that just wasn’t going to happen.

“Hey guys, I’m about to make some margaritas, you both look like you could use one.” I turned to face this guy, full-on. He was several inches shorter than me, but I noticed him straighten up when he finally looked up at me. “Hi, I’m Theo. Welcome to our home.”

“Oh hey.” His eyes darted over to Gemma, then back to me. “Hi, thanks. I’m Ben.”

Ben. Of course you are. I shook his hand. “Ben. Good to meet you.”

Gemma was blushing. I couldn’t remember if I’d ever seen her blush before. Was I embarrassing her? Was she embarrassed about Ben?

“Um. Ben and I are working together on this film.”

“Great!”

“Yeah. It is,” she said with a fake smile, widening her eyes as she tried to will me to go away. “We’re both still working on our margaritas too, actually.”

I decided to just stand there and stare at Ben until he felt really uncomfortable.

“Theo,” he said. “Cool. I’ve never met a Theo before—short for Theodore, right?”

“It’s short for Gemma’s husband Theo.”

She almost did a full-on spit-take.

“Wait—what? You’re married?”

Gemma was looking at me like I was out of my mind, and maybe I was.

“It’s—it’s just a dumb joke we have, because we act like we’ve been married for forty years. He calls me Grandma. I call him my old man. It’s not funny.” She glared at me. “At all.”

“Oh.” He looked over to me for confirmation.

I shrugged. “Ya had to be there.”

“No, I get it, I get it. It’s like I call my dog Betsy my wife.”

“Exactly! That’s so cute.”

“She’s really cute, you’ll love her. You guys have lived together a long time, right?”

“An eternity,” Gemma and I said at the same time.

“Okay. Cool. Well, I’m gonna…go talk to Julia and Jason.”

“Yeah, I’ll join you guys in a minute.” Gemma placed her hand on his shoulder as he turned to walk away.

“What the fuck?” she whispered.

“Nobody else heard.”

“Oh my God!” She slapped her forehead.

“Oh calm down. I want to talk to you about something. Let’s go in my room.”

“Why?”

“Because I want to talk to you. About something.”

She flapped her arms and made an exasperated sound, but followed me to my room anyway.

I shut the door behind her, and she eyed me suspiciously, stepping away from me.

“Something really important I forgot to show you.”

I pulled out my phone and showed her a video that a Facebook user from Hong Kong had posted of a daddy cat laying in a big box, hugging his lady cat and their little newborn kittens. Three seconds in, I knew she had forgotten that she was annoyed with me.

“Oh my God that is the sweetest thing I’ve ever seen!” She couldn’t tear her eyes away from the video, but I had used this tactic so many times, she knew what was coming next. “What? You don’t like Ben.”

“It’s not that I don’t like him,” I said carefully, “I just don’t see why you like him so much.”

“Why is it necessary for you to see that?”

“So you do like him.”

She rolled her eyeballs at me. I put the phone away.

“Send me that link.”

“I will.”

“Okay. Good talk.”

“Wait.”

“What?”

Yes—what? “His teeth are too small for his mouth—that doesn’t bother you?” Interesting choice.

“What are you talking about? You sound insane.”

“His teeth are objectively too small in proportion to the size of his mouth. It’s creepy.”

“You’re creepy.”

“I’m just saying you should aim higher. You’re a catch. You’ve been out of commission for so much of your life, you should hold out for someone who’s worthy of you.”

“Like who? Bugs Bunny?”

It took me a second to realize she was making a joke, because she looked so mad at me. Bugs Bunny—big teeth. Hilarious. But I didn’t laugh, because this wasn’t funny. This was her love life we were talking about. “I’m not kidding about his teeth. I’ll bet you anything it’s stunted his growth in some subtle but significant way.”

“Oh my God. Stop talking.”

“And I’m not talking about dick size—I’m talking about a character flaw. Did you see how quickly he backed off when I showed up?”

“You’re really going to turn that into his character flaw?”

“I’m just saying he doesn’t have a lot of stamina.”

“Okay, we’re done here.”

“My point is that he didn’t ask any more questions about our situation. I would have.”

“That’s because you’re an annoying question-asker.”

“You really think that?”

“You see what I’m saying?”

“Where are you going?”

“Back out there, to the party, where there are people. People who aren’t you. People we invited to come here for fun times. People who will be wondering what we’re up to in here.”

“Let them wonder.” I was grinning. I didn’t mean to be grinning, but I couldn’t stop grinning at her.

She shook her head and waved a hand, dismissively. “Stop this.”

“Stop encouraging you to aim higher? You should be dating a rock star. Or a senator.”

“Okay. I promise to date a rock star or a senator. Can I go now?”

“Are we good?”

She exhaled loudly and crossed her arms. She was so exasperated with me, but it was more than that.

I finally asked her the thing that I didn’t want to know. “You really like that guy?”

She looked down at her feet before looking over at me. “Maybe. I don’t know yet. I don’t not like him because of his tooth size. He’s nice to me. And he’s really good at his job.”

I clenched my jaw.

“And he makes me laugh.”

She may as well have punched me in the gut. I was the guy who made her laugh.

“I mean. Not the way you do. I really think you’d like him if you gave him half a chance.”

I blinked twice and re-crossed my arms in front of my chest. “Okay. I’ll give him half a chance.”

“Really?”

“You want me to explain our situation to him?”

“That won’t be necessary.”

“I think I should. I mean, if this guy’s so important to you, I should at least explain to him that we’re strictly platonic.”

“Oh, that.” Her expression changed. “Yeah. Make it clear to him that you aren’t interested me in that way.” She was frowning at me.

“I’m not gonna say that. I just don’t want you to accidentally tell him about the green card thing.”

“Are you kidding? You’re the one who told him.”

“I mean really tell him. You’re already a tad tipsy.”

“You’re apparently very tipsy. And I wouldn’t do that. Ever. Anyway, you have your naturalization ceremony on Tuesday.”

“I can still be deported within five years of the day we were married, you know that.”

“Wow. Okay. I won’t speak to him again for two more years then, even though we’re working together.”

I didn’t say anything, because that sounded about right to me.

“What is wrong with you tonight?”

I still didn’t say anything. I was dying to talk to her about the green card thing, but this was not the right time. I took a step towards her. She looked down at my feet and stayed where she was. I took another step towards her. She held my gaze and took a step back, towards the door.

“It just doesn’t look to me like he can fuck you the way you deserve to be fucked,” I mumbled, as I raised my glass to my lips and poured the last of the margarita down my throat.

She made a tiny little gasping sound. “What did you say?”

I took another step and I was a foot away from her, she took another step and her back was against the door. She didn’t ever look away from me. I was impressed.

“I said it doesn’t look to me like he’s going to get lucky with you tonight.”

“And how would you know that?”

I took another step, closing the gap between us, and looked down at her, whispering: “I don’t think you’re as into him as you think you are.”

She sucked in her breath, glaring up at me. “Why’s that?”

“Because you’ve spent twice as much time talking to me about him as you’ve spent actually talking to him.”

Finally, she gave me a little shove. “I don’t know what is up with you tonight but I don’t like it.”

“You sure about that?”

She was usually so cute when she frowned at me, but right now she looked…hot. I ran my finger along her jawline. She didn’t move away, she held very still, glaring up at me. Then I held my fingertip up to show her the guacamole that was on her chin.

“I’ve had guacamole on my face this entire time and you didn’t tell me?” she asked, calmly.

I licked the avocado off the tip of my finger. “I didn’t want anyone else to have it.” I winked at her.

She put her free hand on the center of my chest and pushed me away, then wiped her chin with the back of her hand. “Asshat.” She crossed over to my en suite bathroom to check her face in the mirror. She would find that her face was perfect, though a little tense.

When she walked back out, she said: “Promise me you won’t say anything else to mess things up with Ben.”

I put one hand over my heart: “I pledge allegiance to the flag of the United States of America…Let’s go get another margarita.”

“I think you’ve had enough tequila for tonight, Señor Crazypants.”

“Okay, good talk.”

“Weird talk.”

“Good weird.”

“Just weird.”

I did feel weird. I knew I was acting differently with her than I usually did. I wasn’t trying to. I liked how I usually was with Gemma. I was a leader and a bit of a control freak nerd with my employees. A charmer with the press and on social media. Cool guy with my friends. I’d grown into a bit of an alpha with the women I dated. But I liked myself most when I was with her. Being a best friend to her made me feel like a better person. Or maybe it’s just that Gemma made me feel better. The thought of her making another guy feel the way I felt around her was…not sitting right with me. At all.

I just didn’t think Ben was right for her.

After seeing Ethan and Chloe chatting amicably with him, I pulled Ethan aside.

“You know Ben?”

“Yeah, do you?”

“I just met him. You guys seem to already know each other.”

“You jealous?”

“Why would I be jealous? I’m just looking out for her.”

“I meant are you jealous about me hanging out with him.”

“You hung out with him?”

“Not really. He’s a good guy.”

“He is?”

“Pretty good. He invited Gem to a Dodgers game last week. He had extra tickets so she invited us.”

“You guys all went to a Dodgers game? Together?”

“Yeah. You weren’t in town.”

“She didn’t mention that.”

“It wasn’t a big deal.”

“You guys all went on a double date and nobody told me?”

“Nah. It wasn’t a date. Definitely not. I don’t think.”

“You are impossible to talk to. I seriously can’t wait for you to move out.”

“I’m not gonna miss you either.”

I punched his shoulder, just as the attractive redhead that I had spotted earlier approached, smiling, and giving Ethan a look that I recognized. It was the “you’re supposed to introduce me to your friend” look. She had to give that look to Ethan a second time, because he was not exactly sharp at the moment.

“Theo!” he said, jerking to attention. “Have you met Andie? My colleague. From work? Andie—Theo. Theo—Andie.”

Her fingers glided through her hair as she smiled at me. This was the third time that night. She had a nice smile. She had very nice red hair. She had all the things that I liked in a lady. So why couldn’t I take my eyes off of Gemma and Ben, who were out on the back deck? “Hi Andie, good to meet you.” I shook her hand.

“Hey, thanks for having us. This is a really great house.”

“It’ll be slightly less great once this guy and his wife move out, unfortunately. Thanks for coming.” I started to angle away from her, ever so slightly, but her hand reached out for my arm.

“Actually I wanted to ask you…Ethan was telling me you developed a fitness app for runners?”

“Yeah, a few years ago.” I saw Gemma’s head tilt back and she was laughing—really laughing at something Ben had said. Shit.

“Well, I’ve just started running, you know, to lose weight.” She paused for me and Ethan to tell her that she didn’t need to lose weight—which we did. “Whatever. It sounds like something I need. What’s it called?”

Gemma’s hand reached out to touch Ben’s shoulder and he leaned in to say something in her ear, his hand lightly touching her waist. Fuck.

“It’s uh, it’s called Fitness Nerd. You input your current weight, age, measurements etc, your goal weight, size, fitness level, and the app will tell you exactly how much you should ideally consume in a day, how much activity you need to do, the ideal distance and pace if you’re running, and the best type and ratio of macronutrients and exercises to help you reach your goals.” I could give that pitch in my sleep, and also while never once looking at the person I was talking to, which was convenient because that meant that I was free to catch Gemma looking up at me—finally—she looked over and saw Andie.

“It lays it out in a very methodical, easy to understand way,” said Ethan. “In case you’re wondering how I got into such amazing shape…” He half-heartedly raised his arms up and spun around, not even enjoying his own dumb joke. Andie completely ignored him.

“Oh my God,” she pushed her hair behind her ear. “That’s literally exactly what I need. I mean, that’s what everyone needs. I’m gonna download it right now.”

Gemma looked back to me and held my gaze for a few seconds longer than usual. It wasn’t the Rescue Me From This Idiot/Asshole look. It wasn’t the Let’s Go Home I’m Tired look, because obviously we were at home. It was something new. The little smirk on her flushed face told me everything I needed to know, whether she knew it or not.

“Cool. Ethan can help you out if you need a tutorial. It only took him four months to figure it out. I like your dress, by the way.” I said that last thing just in case I decided to circle back and chat her up later, but I could feel her frowning at me and then at Ethan as I walked away to join Gemma and Ben out on the deck.

Gemma was right. I did like Ben. I liked him so much I decided to hang out with him for the rest of the night until he finally left to take his dog for a late night walk.

I still didn’t like him for Gemma, though.

Gemma definitely didn’t like me for hanging around Ben.

But she’d get over it soon enough.

She always did.