Page 16 of Friend Zone to End Zone

“I’m sure I did.”

I decided it was probably better to just move on than tell him that Cole had enjoyed the enchiladas enough to have a third helping of them, so I sat on one of the chairs in front of us and gestured for him to take the seat next to me.

Chad slid his palms along his tan golf pants. “So, what are we talking about tonight?” He shot me one of his signature half-smiles that lit up his blue eyes. “I know you always have some sort of fun angle for these things.”

“Actually,” I said, unable to keep a smile from my face as I looked at him. “I was thinking it would be fun to play a game.”

“A game?” He raised an eyebrow.

I nodded. “Yeah, it’s sort of like the game they played on that oldNewlywedGameshow.”

“A newlywed game?” He gave me a skeptical look.

“It’s just similar to it,” I hurried to say before he could think I was getting ahead of myself again in thinking that we were on the short road to matrimony. “Basically, we ask the viewers to give us questions that we should know about each other. Then, we each answer what we think each other would say and see if we guessed right.”

“So I say what I think your answer would be, and you say what you think my answer would be.”

“Yes.” I nodded, hoping he thought it sounded at least mildly fun. He didn’t really get into party games—he was more of the stand-on-the-sides-and-watch-everyone-else-make-a-fool-of-themselves kind of guy. But I hoped this game didn’t seem too dorky.

I held my breath as I waited for him to tell me what he thought of my idea. When he shrugged and said, “I guess that sounds like it could be fun,” I breathed a sigh of relief.

I never knew which way Chad would go sometimes, so it was nice that I’d come up with a plan he could go along with this time.

“Kiss for good luck?” I leaned closer and pursed my lips for the tradition we did every time before we went live.

He looked down at me for a second before leaning closer and pressing a quick peck to my lips.

He must have noticed my disappointment at having such a short “good luck” kiss because he said, “I don’t want to get any of your lipstick on me right before we start.”

“It’s a lip stain, so it’s fine.”

He wiped his thumb along his lips anyway, as if he didn’t really believe me. And when he didn’t say anything else, I decided to just move on and pulled up the Instagram app on my phone, navigating to the live feature.

“Ready?” I asked, my finger hovering in front of the button that would broadcast our faces to my followers.

“Sure.” He shrugged, his shoulders rubbing against mine with the movement.

So I tapped the round button, and a moment later, our faces were reflected on the screen. The notification came on saying that we were live to my fifty-thousand viewers.

My heart raced immediately, as it did every time I did one of these videos.

I had done several, so it shouldn’t make me as nervous as it did, but I was breathless as I started talking to the few people who were already jumping on the livestream with us.

“Hello, everyone,” I said, lifting my hands in a wave. “Welcome to our live video tonight. I’m so excited for what we have planned for you this evening. And I’m so happy to have Chad on here with me again.”

I turned to Chad who was still sitting back in his chair, as relaxed as ever.

“Happy to be here.” Chad gave the camera one of his charming smiles and draped his arm over my shoulder. “I’m excited to play this game you’ve got planned for us tonight.”

While I couldn’t help but be a little on edge when I had random strangers watching me, Chad couldn’t be more at ease. But I guess for someone who flew around the country almost every week to give presentations in front of CEOs of big companies, this really was a low-stress thing.

I looked back to my phone and smiled even bigger before saying, “Well, if Chad’s excited, then I hope that means it’s going to be entertaining for you all.”

“From what you tell me, though—” Chad squeezed me closer to him and gave me one of his most charming smiles. “—it sounds like a good portion of tonight’s entertainment value depends on them, am I right?”

I smiled, loving this playful side of Chad. “I guess that is true.” And when I saw that we had two hundred viewers who had already joined us, I went on to explain our game.

“So without further ado, let’s get on with this show.” I leaned forward and squinted so I could see the various comments populating my screen. Lots of people were saying hi. Others were commenting on how cute Chad and I were together.

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