Page 19 of Friend Zone to End Zone

“Yes, please.” I sighed.

Preferably one that was less polarizing.

I searched the comment thread until I saw: @ariannasbiggestfan:This question is for Arianna only. How are you so amazing at everything?

I smiled, happy to see a familiar name in the sea of unfamiliar ones and said, “I see you, biggest fan, and I don’t know how exactly I got to be this awesome, but if someone has to be amazing it might as well be me.”

@ariannasbiggestfan replied:True, queen. True.

I wanted to say something about my best friend being super awesome as well, but since Chad was sitting next to me and probably wouldn’t like me gushing over another guy, I just looked for the next question to answer.

“It lookslike we’ve been on here for about forty minutes,” I said after we answered the question asking how we kept our relationship alive with Chad being out of town so much. “How about we just answer two more questions?” I looked at Chad. “Do you see any you’d like to answer?”

“Umm…” He read the comments for a few seconds then said, “How about we go with, ‘Who is the better cook? And do either of you have weird quirks we don’t know about?’”

Those sounded safe enough, so I shrugged and said, “Sure.” Then I looked straight at the phone. “I am the better cook. No contest.”

Chad grabbed my arm, and with a playful look in his eyes, he said, “I thought we were answering these questions honestly though, honey.”

“We are…” I started, wondering what he meant.

“Then why did you just say you’re a better cook than I am?”

I furrowed my brow, confused. “Probably because you don’t cook and I do.”

He chuckled. “That’s only because I’m busy. If I did cook though…” His voice drifted off as he looked back to my phone’s screen, addressing our online audience. “You guys have all seen those photos Arianna posts of the different recipes she comes up with, right?” he asked. “Well, I’m going to let you in on a little inside information.”

“Inside information?” I prodded. Was he going to pretend like I hadn’t actually cooked all those recipes or something? Because that would be a total lie. Being in a world where so many things were made pretty for social media, I had vowed to myself when I first began building my platform that everything I posted would be completely and one-hundred-percent authentic.

I wasn’t going to put on a show just because it looked or sounded nicer.

I narrowed my eyes at Chad and waited for him to continue.

“So here’s the inside scoop, guys.” He bit his lip, like he was fighting back a huge smile about whatever juicy secret he was about to reveal. “I know those recipes look delicious online, and I’m sure they would be if they were cooked in someone else’s kitchen…but even though they look completely edible and amazing, there’s a reason why I always suggest we go out to eat when Arianna wants a dinner date.”

I frowned. “You don’t like my cooking?”

He patted my knee. “I didn’t want to burst your bubble since I know how much you love it. But yeah, I may have declined your invitation to eat your enchiladas tonight because frankly, your cooking sucks.”

What?

My cooking sucks?

I knew I didn’t get the perfect balance of seasonings right every time…but I didn’t think they all turned out bad.

I mean, Cole always ate what I cooked—usually taking second or third helpings, in fact. Had he simply suffered through every bite tonight so he wouldn’t make me feel bad? He had said it was a bit spicy.

“My cooking really sucks?” I asked, still not believing it could be true when no one had ever complained before.

He scrunched up his nose. “You have many talents. Cooking just isn’t going to ever be one of them.”

I frowned. But then I remembered that I had a couple thousand followers currently watching me process this new information, so I forced a smile and said, “I guess you going out of your way to not tell me that I was a terrible cook for three years is kind of sweet in a way…?”

Chad put his arm around my shoulder and squeezed me closer to his side. “I’m glad you see it like that. Because for a second there, I thought you might slap me.”

“I almost did.” I leaned my head against his shoulder for a moment, hoping being close to him and syncing our breaths would calm me down again.

On the screen there were several sad-face and angry-face emojis fluttering over the screen. And comments talking about how Chad needs to be cancelled. But there were others saying things like:Chad’s right. I tried Arianna’s mint brownie recipe two years ago and it was so bad I had to throw the whole pan away.

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