Page 56 of The Bartender Special

His gaze dropped to Benny’s lips.

Benny, however, waved the concern off.

Maybe he wasn’t as observant has Jack had originally thought.

“Plan or no plan, some things I’m going to panic through and we won’t be able to stop me from blurting something out or doing something I probably shouldn’t,” he said. “You’re just going to have to try and help manage me when and if that happens. Everything else we can talk about after Roger’s.”

Benny was clearly done discussing strategy.

He walked into the other room, already yapping about what favor Never Uses His Boat Roger might ask in return from them.

Which was good.

If he had looked back, for even a second, Benny would have seen that his fake boyfriend?

Well, he was having a very real reaction.

TEN

Benny knew he had gone viral after a Google search had showed him several articles telling him exactly that.

#TheOneWhoSaidNothing was trending on social media with thoughts, quotes, and relatable me-toos from the blog. Though most people seemed to have been focused on the whole Guy aspect more than the rest. Hundreds of comments had users admitting that they too had someone like Guy in their lives. Someone they liked or loved but never said a word to or about.

When some of those hundreds started to slide into his DMs with encouraging words and stories, a few others started to slide in with their own form of trying to connect.

Benny had stopped checking his inboxes after the tenth dick pic.

Then it was the people from his real life, suddenly risen from obscurity, who tried to become close all at once. From Raphael at the catering company to Nancy, the neighbor down the hall who sometimes had her mail sent to Benny's mailbox on accident, to a customer at the florist shop who had been alerted to Benny's sudden internet fame by his granddaughter. Everyone in his Nashville circle had suddenly become interested.

When the listicles started—his least favorite had been “Ten Times I Truly Wouldn’t Have Said Anything”—Benny had decided to stay off of the internet altogether.

The phone calls and texts had come next.

And when his ex-boyfriend, Lyle, had shown up at his door wanting to know why he was barely mentioned in the blog?

That's when Benny had left the city.

It was either lose himself on purpose, back in his hometown, or lose his damn mind.

He'd told Mrs. Baker and Raphael that he would be back in time to work the Saunders' wedding but, if they needed him before that?

Well, maybe try not to?

Because Benny now had a dislike-hate relationship with his phone.

It buzzed, chirped, or lit up, and he automatically worried the internet had somehow gotten a hold of his porn search history.

It was gut-twisting anxiety at the worst of times, eyes-wide panic during the rest.

So, when his phone vibrated in his pocket between Jack’s truck and the curb outside of Roger Norman’s front porch, Benny’s already-high anxiety nearly made him throw it instead of check it.

Instead, he took a breath and tried to be momentarily brave.

He had already survived Jack the Beanstalk and his little washcloth.

Surely nothing else could topple him today.

Benny slowed his steps until he read the caller ID.