Hopefully when I do see her again, this gnawing need to be somehow important to her goes away. Throughout my adult life, I’ve only been important to people if I’m making them money. In some cases, that wasn’t enough. They wanted more. As much as they could squeeze out of me, even if it came at the cost of a friendship. Because at the end of the day, no one really wants to be my friend, do they? They don’t like me, they like what I can do for them.
Sexually.
Financially.
This girl, this Elise, is the first person in a long time whose opinion made me give a shit.
“Right. We have the ID badge. That gives us her last name.” I lean back in my chair, oh so casual, though I’m feeling anything but. “Do any of us still use Facebook? We can probably find Elise there, send her a message.”
“There are two problems with that,” says the coach, immediately.
He’s the smart one.
Gabe is the muscle.
I’m the sexual riptide.
“One,” Banks continues, “who is going to message her? One of us? Or all three? Because it seems like three messages might overwhelm her and none of us will hear shit back.”
“Or she might only message back one of us,” Gabe points out.
“That’s a pretty sizeable risk,” I tell Gabe with a serious expression, completely taking advantage of his naivete, but listen, I am the Least Favorite of this pack and I’ll use every tool at my disposal. “You know how indecisive girls can be. Too many choices and they shut down.”
That’s all bullshit, but again. Least Favorite. I can’t risk her choosing before I have another chance to make an impression. Though I have zero guarantee I’ll do better next time.
Still…
“Probably for the best if we elect a representative to message her on behalf of all three of us,” I say. “Make a plan for all of us to see her again.”
Banks clears his throat. “That brings us to the second problem.”
“Enlighten the group,” I sigh, refusing to let him know I’m interested.
“Do we trust the elected representative?” Banks sips his beer. “I’ll be honest, I’m not sure either of you should trust me not to ask her out. Alone.”
“Same,” Gabe says, his expression saying he holds the winning lottery ticket in his giant mitts. “I’d cook a pot roast for her.”
“And if she’s vegan?” I ask, popping my green olive into my mouth.
Gabe pales.
“Bottom line…” Banks doesn’t look happy about what’s he’s going to say. “Social media leaves too much up to chance. I think it has to be in person.”
I pause mid-chew. “You’re saying we should simply show up at the Gotham Times?”
“She’s going to hate that,” Gabe and Banks say in unison.
“Yeah, she will,” Banks continues, turning his beer in circles on the table. “But I genuinely think we’ve seen the last of her otherwise.”
“He’s right,” I find myself saying. For the life of me, I can’t see Elise answering a Facebook message and agreeing to meet with us. “So we go to the newspaper and…ask her to choose. Is that your shite plan? Because I fancy keeping my balls.”
Banks is silent for long moments. “I don’t know. Should we ask her to choose?”
Gabe leans forward, head tilted like he’s trying to hear a song playing on the radio at low volume. “What’s the other option?”
A muscle jumps in Banks’s cheek. “We don’t.”
“We don’t see her again at all?” Gabe sputters.
“My God, man, you’re thick,” I groan, massaging the bridge of my nose.
“No, Gabe. We don’t ask her to choose.” Banks is visibly surprised he said it out loud, the bronze of his neck darkening slightly. “Look, I coach a team. We have two players I consider all-stars, but they can’t win the game alone. The team behind them—that’s what makes them great. When they try to be heroes and score without that supporting cast, that’s when they fail, right?” He pauses. “What if…there was something about us as a whole that appealed to Elise? Not only as…individuals.”
We’re all silent for a moment and I know what they’re thinking about. They’re replaying how she turned to putty as soon as we were all surrounding her. Touching her. When the four of us connected, a tangible change took place in her. In her energy. In the air. “She enjoyed having triple the attention and fuck, she deserves it,” I say without thinking.