Page 45 of The Boyfriend Experience

“It is,” she says, opening up her bagel and taking a bite. She looks around for a few moments as she chews. “I’ll bring you up here at night if we have time.”

“We can make time,” I say. And it comes out slightly…seductive. Like I’m planning to fuck her up here. Which I’m not. I’m pretty sure what we did last night was a mistake. This whole arrangement, from top to bottom, is a business deal. And I should’ve stopped myself last night. Should’ve kept it professional. Because now she’s probably thinking I’m a giant douchebag for taking advantage of her while she was drunk.

That’s how I’d feel if I were her.

“You know,” I say, unwrapping my bagel too, “you’re not as crazy as I thought you were.”

She winks at me. And that wink says, You don’t know me yet.

“Seriously,” I say. “When I got home this morning I looked you up online.”

“Why?” She laughs, almost spitting out her food.

“Because I had this vision of you as some hot-headed wild woman, and for the life of me, I couldn’t figure out where I got that impression.”

“Hmmm. So what did you find online?”

“Well,” I say. “You’ve pulled a lot of stunts over the years. I’m surprised the only one I ever caught wind of was that whole ‘save the mansions’ campaign.”

“Got examples?” she asks. Winking again.

“Lots.”

“Was it the wet jeans contest I threw? That was up here. I was on the news that night.”

“Found that one, yes.” I laugh. “And a bunch more of those. But the best one was when you made pot beer for an April Fool’s joke.”

She almost snorts. “Oh, my God. That was awesome. My dad laughed for days. We filmed a commercial showing people getting high on a pot stout beer called Rocky Mountain High and it went viral. Three million views on YouTube in two days! And it was so real the Denver cops came and arrested us!”

I can’t help, I laugh too. Because I read that online. Her and her father got arrested for illegally selling pot and had to stay in jail over the entire weekend. Monday morning there was a protest outside the capitol building with thousands of people holding signs saying ‘Free Oaklee!’

“How did I never meet you before this?” I ask.

She shrugs and chews her bagel. “You’re a boring guy, I guess.”

“And you truly are wild.”

“Guilty.”

“But you’re taking all this Hanna Harlow stuff pretty well if you ask me. Because you haven’t pulled anything crazy on her yet. I mean, all morning I’ve been asking myself why that is. So… why is that?”

She frowns now, then shakes her head. “It’s not fun anymore. Not since my dad died. He’s the one who made me wild. He’s the one who was always pulling pranks and being crazy when I was growing up. He’s the one I was always trying to make smile with my antics. Not anyone else. Just him. And now that he’s gone… I just don’t feel the same. I don’t think about fun stuff like that anymore. I haven’t pulled an April Fool’s joke since the year he died.”

“But you have a plan for Hanna Harlow, right?”

“Not really.” She shrugs. “I just thought… I dunno. I could bait her into stealing my boyfriend and that would prove something. But it’s a dumb idea, isn’t it?”

Part of me hopes she thinks it’s a dumb idea because she likes me. Wants to date me for real. Wants to give this a try. Because I kinda like this woman.

But there’s another part of me that hopes she comes up with something really cool to get back at that chick. Because while this boyfriend experience stuff might be fake—Hanna Harlow really did steal her beer recipe and pass it off as her own. And she should pay for that.

So I say, “No. It’s not dumb. I don’t know if it’ll work. But it’s not dumb to want people to pay when they’ve wronged you.”

“Exactly,” she says. “That’s what I really want. I want her to pay. I want her to know I know and I want everyone else to know too. I want her to feel shame. Because she’s a lying, cheating, backstabbing bitch. And it’s not fair.”

“No. It’s not,” I say. “So how about we go over to Shrike Bikes and turn me into your boyfriend.”

We walk over because Five Points really is just a few blocks away and the Shrike Bikes store is in a building right across the road from Coors Field. It’s actually quite a big building. I’ve seen this place plenty of times. There’s a diner down the road called Cookies that has the best burgers in town. I go there every once in a while. But I’ve never stopped into this showroom. Other ones, yeah. They have them all over Colorado. And when I was a kid—back in my wild days—I had a Shrike Bike once. It was payment for some fight money a guy owed me and the jacket Oaklee took home last night came with it. I wrecked the bike pretty quick because… well, I was sixteen. It wasn’t even legal for me to ride that bike so I had no clue what I was doing.