Friends With All the Benefits

8 Ethan

W e packed up, showered, then made the half-hour drive east to Ellie’s old apartment, all to drop off a bridesmaids dress that Ellie had apparently bought and wasn’t being reimbursed for. Ellie was being very tolerant of Nat’s terrible treatment of her, and I made sure to point it out during the drive.

“She never used to be like that, you know? She’s gotten…crankier since she started dating Andy.” Ellie made excuses for her friend. I figured over twenty years of friendship did buy Nat some grace. But privately, I thought that Nat was in danger of straining that grace. Fortunately for her, Ellie had plenty more than I did.

“Andy may be the reason why she’s gotten bitchier—” I used the word Ellie was too kind to use, “—but she’s still the one making all the choices,” I pointed out.

“I know. I’m sorry to drag you into this.”

“Don’t worry about it. That’s what friends are for, right?”

“You’re a good friend, Ethan,” Ellie murmured gratefully as she looked out the window of the passenger seat. I had insisted on driving her there. I didn’t want to risk Ellie being too overwrought to drive if Andy made things difficult for her.

Finally, we arrived. Ellie was quiet the entire time we walked up the stairs to the apartment unit.

Andy answered the doorbell. Ellie stiffened as he opened the door. I put a hand on her back to reassure her that she wasn’t alone. Andy looked like he was about to say something nasty to Ellie, then he saw me and his jaw clamped shut. Right then, I was extremely glad Ellie asked me to come along. I wouldn’t have put it past him to try something if she had come on her own. He was built weedy and lithe, but I was taller and larger. I dared him to try anything with me here, but if I got his measure correctly, he was a coward who would only throw his weight around people he perceived as weaker than he was. He didn’t even bother to greet Ellie. Instead, he just stood there with a thunderous look on his face. To Ellie’s credit, she didn’t even flinch.

“I’ve got the dress Nat asked for.” Ellie held up a shopping bag to him.

He rudely swiped it from her hand and sneered, “Thought you could steal it from Nat, did you?”

Ellie didn’t miss a beat. “Excuse me. I bought and paid for the dress myself. I’m gifting it to Nat now.”

Good girl. She didn’t back down. She didn’t yield an inch.

A voice called out from inside the apartment. A female voice. “Who is it?”

Andy turned to the source of the voice and answered, “It’s your dress.”

“Oh good.” A woman I’d never seen before walked up to Andy and took the bag from him. She was our age, attractive and not dressed in much more than a sweater with definitely no bra on underneath and too-short shorts.

I noticed Ellie’s eyes widen in recognition. I noticed Andy noticed the same look on her face, and his expression turned smug.

“This is Hayleigh, Nat’s new maid of honour ,” Andy introduced the woman. “Your replacement and Nat’s good friend . Now get out of my home.”

The door slammed shut in Ellie’s face.

Now Ellie’s face was a storm cloud, and something was about to burst.

I thought she was going to yell out. Instead, her next words came out even, but suffused with barely contained fury, “That son of a bitch. The fucking cheek on him. His home my fucking ass.”

That got my attention. Those words coming out of Ellie’s mouth were jarring, and I just realised that the entire time I’ve known Ellie, I had never heard her say anything more explicit than the word “shit.” Right now, Ellie was really angry, in a scary, calm sort of way. There was so much fury bubbling under her too-composed surface, and it was threatening to spill out in the most violent of ways.

I gently took her by the arm and led her back to my car. Right now, I was glad I insisted on driving. I had never seen Ellie this angry before. She was always so chilled, even when I put too much oil in the pan last week and nearly burnt the kitchen down. Ellie just calmly grabbed spare towels from the linen cupboard, wet them then tossed them over the burning pan and doused the fire without as much as breaking a sweat. Then the next day, she came home with new towels to replace the burnt ones we ended up throwing out.

Right now, she looked ready to commit murder. There was so much rage, so much fury exuding from every pore. She walked to my car with eerie calm, but I could see the fire in her eyes. Knowing Ellie, she was probably planning the most efficient way to murder Andy and get away with it. I thought back to our earlier interaction with Andy and wondered what had set Ellie off. Something didn’t add up to me. There had to be something more to it.

We barely pulled out of the parking lot when Ellie elaborated, “That’s the woman I saw him cheating on Nat with.”

The car jerked as the steering wheel slipped, but I got control of it right away.

“No way. Are you sure?”

“Very sure.” Out of the corner of my eye, I saw Ellie reach for her phone and text someone.

“Are you telling Nat?” That was just like Ellie, to see something wrong and spring into action right away.

“I am. She deserves to know.”

Ellie’s phone buzzed. Nat had replied right away.

“She doesn’t believe me,” Ellie reported. “She accused me of lying to sabotage her relationship. Annnd she’s blocked my number again.”

“You did your best, Ellie. You told her. Now it’s up to her to do what she will with the information.”

“The cheek on the guy,” Ellie’s voice was calm, but every word dripped with anger. “Introducing his mistress to his fiancé. Making his mistress her maid of honour. He’s got Nat wrapped around his little finger so well, she can’t see past it. Seriously, no dick can be that good.”

I shouldn’t have laughed out loud, but hearing Ellie say it tickled me so much I couldn’t help myself. When I looked at Ellie, she was glaring at me.

“Sorry, sorry,” I apologised while trying to settle myself and keep an eye on the road at the same time. “But you are absolutely right. He is an absolute bastard. No dick is that good.” Just saying that out loud made me laugh again. I got a hold of myself and added, “I don’t get what she sees in him. I mean, he failed to charm you, and I certainly can’t see you being stupid over any guy.”

That got a bitter laugh out of Ellie. “I don’t get what she sees in him either, but then again, what would I know?”

Ellie had told me that Nat had used her lack of relationships as a reason not to listen to her, and I thought that highly unfair. Ellie was a woman who knew what she was about, man or no man. If I saw a helicopter in a tree, I didn’t need to be a helicopter pilot to know that the pilot fucked up.

“Given you aren’t currently sharing your home with a fiancé and his side piece, I’d say you know plenty.”

“I’d like to think I have higher standards than that,” Ellie huffed.

Secretly, I preened. It was a compliment to me, even if her crush on me was the perpetual unacknowledged elephant in the room.

“…but you’re right, there’s something else going on. He’s got some other hold on her, and I have no idea what it is. I just wish I could help her break free.” Ellie sighed and slumped further into the passenger seat.

“You can’t help someone who doesn’t want to be helped,” I pointed out. “You’ve given her the facts. Hell, you wrote it out on a bullet-point list for her. She needs to make her own choices.”

That just got an unintelligible grunt out of Ellie.

I smiled and took the next turnoff on the freeway.

Ellie sat straight back up. “That’s not the way home.”

“I know. I’m taking you somewhere you need to go.”

“Ikea?” There was a hopeful note in Ellie’s voice.

“What? No. Do you need to go to Ikea?”

“Yeah. I know the place came with furniture, but I’d really like to grab a few more bits and pieces to cosy up my room.”

That made sense.

“Sorry, Ellie, not today. But we can go next weekend.”

“Where are you taking me then?”

~

A few minutes later, I handed a wide-eyed Ellie an ice cream cone stacked with two scoops of freshly made gelato.

“Ice cream?” She breathed as she took the cone from me.

Our hands brushed and she stiffened. If I didn’t know she liked me, I would have barely noticed her reaction. But I did notice, and the touch felt electric. Both of us pretended as if nothing had just happened. It was better that way.

“Technically, gelato. It’s supposed to be lighter than ice cream. This place just opened, and I thought you might like to have some.”

The way Ellie attacked the dripping sides of her gelato now told me I had been right. Her fury at Andy was still there, but most of the edge had bled off. My parents always got Joyce ice cream when she was upset as a kid. Nowadays, Joyce got herself ice cream. I figured that if it worked on my sister, it would work on Ellie too.

“This is so good,” Ellie mumbled between licks. “Thank you.”

“I figured it’ll help you cool down before we get home and back to digging. You looked like you’ll brain someone with the shovel given half the chance, and I’ll be the poor sod in your line of sight.”

Ellie snorted and choked on a half-swallowed bite of gelato.

“Oh my God oh my God,” she said in choking gasps as she flailed around, wiping her mouth while balancing the melting treat all at the same time.

I handed her my napkin, but Ellie’s hands were full. A huge dab of ice cream was dripping down the side of her mouth. Without thinking, I reached for it, wiping it off her face. Ellie froze. Colour flooded her cheeks. All of a sudden, I realised how close I had gotten to her. Her eyes widened at the sudden intimacy of it all, and she looked at me like I was the centre of her universe. I found that I didn’t quite mind it at all.

All of a sudden, Ellie looked vulnerable. Adorable. Delectable.

“I can’t take you anywhere.” I teased her in a bid to cut through the sudden tension between us.

Ellie relaxed, then quipped, “If I brained you, you totally had it coming.” She had been caught out giving me the starry eyes she always tried so hard to hide, and now she was trying to distract me from it by feigning annoyance.

“Do I need to get you another gelato, Ellie?” I played along and gave her my sternest look. “They’ve got a Snickers flavour.”

“When we get back later, make sure you dig a hole wide enough for yourself,” Ellie glared back. “You’ll make do as rose fertiliser.”

That just made me burst out laughing. Ellie was adorable, especially so when she was irritated at me. I didn’t like her the same way she liked me, but she made no demands of me, had no expectations of me, and it was easy to be around her. She seemed to have gotten out of the funk from going back to her old place, and I was glad. I didn’t like the Andy guy, and I was angry at how Ellie’s supposed best friend had treated her. Even if Ellie played a part in the friendship breakdown, and I didn’t think she did, Nat had no right to be that cruel.

We grabbed a small lunch on the way home and then continued our work in the garden. By the end of the day, the roses were planted, watered and mulched. I thought that was the end of it, but Ellie informed me that a sprinkler system still needed to go in.

“It’s retic, Ellie. We call it reticulation on this side of Australia. You live here now,” I pointed out. Ellie might hail from the east, but we were going to make a proper sandgroper out of her yet.

“Fine. Retic needs to go in, but it can wait till spring.”

“Do you know how to install it, because I don’t,” I admitted.

“Oh yes. I’ll draw up the diagram and do the measurements over the next few weeks, then I’ll show you.” Of course, Ellie would. Why did I expect anything less than proper planning from Ellie? She had everything all in hand. All I had to do was pay for it, even if she didn’t know I was doing so.