In six months, Gwen Johnston turns thirty, and when she does, she vows she'll have her life together. She'll no longer be jumping from one job to another, from one relationship to the next. A new, more mature, Gwen will have emerged. She's giving he...
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Being around Gwen's friends has been easy. They're a lot like her—ask them questions and it feels like you're participating in the conversation, even when you're really not. Gwen doesn't let me away with that anymore, and she's shot me a few knowing looks when I've used my technique for too long without reciprocating some information.
It's unnerving, sometimes, how well she's come to know me in ways I'd never have anticipated. Whether it's the sheer amount of time we've spent together or something to do with her artistic sensitivity, but she's incredible at reading me. She seems to sense a change in my mood, sometimes before I've even realized it's happened.
"Anyone want another?" Jeremy asks from the fridge where he's searching through the beers for his new favorite.
"I'll take one," Izzy says, who seems to have drinking copious amounts of alcohol as her long weekend goal. They rode with us in the truck earlier to the river side restaurant where we ate, and Izzy was slathering on the kind comments to Jeremy. Rang a bit false to me, and I slid a few looks in Gwen's direction.
"I'm good," Gwen says, and she raises her glass of Malbec that she's hardly touched with one hand while examining her playing cards with the other. "I pass."
Jeremy comes back to the table and plops down his bottle before passing one to Izzy. He scoops his cards off the table and checks them. "Pass."
"I pass." Izzy twists off the top of the bottle.
"Hearts are trump," I say, picking up the Jack of Hearts from the top of the pile in front of me. Gwen winks at me.
"We're fucked, Izz," Jeremy says. "I swear these two are cheating. You been playing euchre every night?"
"Two person euchre?" Gwen asks as she trumps the hand circulating. "Is that even a thing?"
"They definitely have better luck than us," Izzy says, eyeing the score of nine to one. This will be the third game they've lost by a wide margin. "Might have to play strip poker next and see whose luck holds."
Playing any game that required Gwen to strip would be the end of me. It's bad enough that her sex sketches haunt me, and she struts around in red negligees that are just a little too tight across the bust, but if I caught even a glimpse of the real deal, I might be forced to concede that my feelings for Gwen are no longer even remotely platonic.
For a while, I thought I might be able to hold onto the last threads of my sanity, but even my willpower is fraying. Would it really be so bad to indulge in an affair for a few weeks?
"We're not playing strip poker," Gwen says, and she glares at Izzy as though this is something they've discussed before.
"Seems like something you'd enjoy," I say to Gwen.
"Just looking out for my buddy," Gwen says. "Wouldn't want to put you in an awkward position. Naked in front of my friends and all."
"I'm a pretty good poker player," I say, and I meet her gaze across the table as Jeremy sweeps up the cards to shuffle.
