Page 39 of Best Friends for Never

“You’re going?”

“You kidding me? Of course I’m going. Your grandson only gets a theater named after him once.”

“Unless you’re a Rafferty. I’m pretty sure Jude and Jasper have, like, four between them.”

“Well, yeah. Have youseenthat family? Hollywood royalty, I tell ya.” She huffs likeI’mthe one out of line here. “Eat, relax, and work on your speech. I’ll be ready in ten minutes, and we can mosey our way to the theater.”

I halt, my fork halfway to my mouth. “Speech? What speech?”

She doesn’t answer.

“Gran!” I call to her back. “Nobody mentioned a speech! What speech?!”

I swear I see her shoulders shake with laughter.

I love my grandmother, but sometimes ... sometimes, I want to shake the old bird.

I pluck my phone from my pocket and scroll to a name I haven’t touched in years. She has to have the same number, right? There’s no reason for her to change it.

Me:Am I supposed to give a speech?

Dots dance along the screen almost instantly.

Parker:Who is this?

Fuck. Either she’s deleted my number, or she did change hers, and I’m bothering a total stranger.

I don’t know which option I hate more, but on the off chance it is her, I type back.

Me:Noel.

Parker:Noel who?

Me:Carter.

Parker:Hm. That doesn’t ring a bell.

Parker:No. Wait.

Parker:Are you that guy who was in that movie where he showed his naked butt to the whole world? Not that I’ve ever seen it—I just heard about it.

Parker:Because if so, I’m shocked. I never expectedTheNoel Carter to text little old me, a boring small-town gal from the middle of nowhere Washington, even though she did keep his secret that he did have a highly inappropriate crush on Tinker Bell and used to look her up on adult websites.

Oh, it’s definitely Parker.

Is it strange to say I’ve missed her?

It’s been two days since I last saw her. I left shortly after my fourth wine cooler for the night. Not because I was drunk—far from it, with those Kool-Aid knockoffs—but because if I had to hear about how amazing Axel was one more time, I would lose it.

I believe Parker is being 100 percent honest when she says she and Axel are just friends. I’ve heard enough about him and his wife around town to believe it.

No. It’s the whole “best friend” label that grates on me. I am fully aware of how ridiculous, unfair, and even childish it is for me to be upset by it, but dammit, I still fucking hate it.

She may be friends with Axel, and he may have taken up the space in her life I left behind, but the one thing that will never change is that she belonged to me first.

I want to remind her of that, but I can’t. That’s too heavy a topic for one measly sip of bad coffee. Instead, I shove those thoughts and feelings back into the box I’ve kept them in over the last decade and let my fingers fly over my phone screen.

Me:First, I have it on good authority that you’ve watched my movies. Your mother claims you fast-forwarded through those parts, but just like you know things about me, I know things about you, and you’re a butt girl. You might have acted innocent when she was around, but you watched those parts. I know it. You know it. We both know it.

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