Page 1 of Never Say Yes To Your Best Friend (I said Yes)

Chapter one

Evilla

Evilla (Pronounced Eve-ay-lah because my parents had no notion that a name could cause meSOmany problems throughout my entire freaking life.)

“I didn’t know meringues have eggs in them! How was I supposed to know that?” Gen, my best friend, screeches.

“Sweetheart, I think everyone knows that,” I say to her.

Gen’s face turns murderous and thunderous. A very large red welt stands out on her forehead, and there are two that look horribly itchy on her neck. She jams a finger up at the welt on her forehead but doesn’t scratch it. “I didn’t do this on purpose. I could have freaking died!”

“I’m glad you had your pen with you.”

“I didn’t need the pen. I just took some allergy pills fast, and they worked. I would have extra died if I had to stab myself in the leg in front of everyone.”

“I’m glad you’re okay. Or that you’re going to be. But you could just cancel the date and reschedule.”

Genevieve storms across her expansive living room. A person could probably run a marathon in here and still not reach the other side. As far as grad gifts go, this was a good one. We might be in Tampa and not New York, but rent and real estate are still expensive. I’m never going to own a house, and I’ve made my peace with that. Home ownership sucks anyway. Who wants to constantly be sinking all their hard-earned savings into fixing a leaky roof, spending all their free time unclogging gutters, or worrying about the central air crapping out or the fridge going on the fritz?

Gen doesn’t have to worry about those things. She has so much money because her parents have so much money, and when anything stops working, they’re either replaced or fixed by people who know what they’re doing.

Gen is a hot blonde. Naturally. She’s gorgeous. Her parents might be super rich, but she’s actually pretty down to earth. She might like her car and condo, but she goes for natural in every other way. She has a killer body—she always did—even before she had a personal trainer. Not only that, but she makes all her own meals because she loves cooking. She’s also kind and smart, and she’s a great best friend—she has been ever since we met in kindergarten. Her parents getting rich and mine not getting so rich never changed the fundamental core of our friendship.

“It’s just a bad idea. I didn’t want to go in the first place.” Gen flops down on the couch. It’s strangely super hairy, and it kind of resembles a mossy boulder. It swallows her up. She grinds her face into it, then pops back up and scratches the giant hive on her forehead. “Argh! My parents. I can’t believe they did this to me.”

I love Gen to death, but she does have a penchant for bright green that I find to be a little too much. Everything in this place is a shade of neon or chartreuse except the floors. You should see the bathroom, though. It turns out you can get any color of tile,sink, and toilet on the planet if you have the money to pay for it. They’re not even vintage finds as a throwback to when green and pink tubs were hot stuff.

My bare feet make tracks through the fuzzy shag lime green rug as I make my way over to the couch. I sit down beside her on the thing that looks like it came right out of some forest. Then, I stroke her hair. God, it’s so soft. Expensive shampoo and conditioner and trips to a good salon do wonders, though I wouldn’t know about that. My strawberry hair—and I use that term with a grain of salt because it’s more of a coppery red on my best day—wouldn’t know anything about splurging since I don’t treat my hair to spa days. I can’t afford them.

“I hate to ask this, but are you sure you didn’t know about the eggs thing?”

“I didn’t! I didn’t eat them just so I wouldn’t have to go on this horrible blind date my parents set up with his parents.” She scratches at the hives on her arm. “I would never do this to myself. I’m going to be itching for the rest of the night, and I look like a monster.”

“You don’t look like a monster.” I smooth her hair but quickly make adjustments when I realize I’m actually stroking the hairy couch by mistake. “And I’m sure he’ll understand that you have to reschedule.”

“I don’t want to reschedule. I can’t believe my parents did this. They’ve never acted all rich people spoiled and stuff, but this is a rich person thing to do. This guy is just looking for a wife who doesn’t annoy him to death, someone to carry on his rich ass bloodline. That’s it. He doesn’t give two donkey arses about connection or romance.”

“I don’t think that’s a rich person thing. I think rich people care about loving and being loved as well.”

“Okay, maybe, but he doesn’t,” Gen replies with a sigh.

“You do. And that’s all that’s important.”

“So how could my parents do this to me? This is all because my mom started doing the country club thing last year. She meets all these other rich women, and nice or not, things get out of hand. Like this. Dates get set up, and weddings get planned. They’ve probably already picked out names for their grandkids.” She slams her hands over her eyes.

“I was kind of surprised when you told me she’d set you up on a blind date,” I admit. “I don’t think it’s right, but it’s just a few hours. You just have to go and get it over with. Just act positively unlikable. Then he won’t want a second date, and there won’t be any babies, bloodlines, marriage of the season weddings, or trophy wife status.”

Gen starts to sniffle—she always did like a good oxymoron—but then her bright blue eyes sweep up to me. “Can you go on the date for me?”

“What?!” The mossy boulder couch is just barely deep enough to keep me from flying off the end.

Not the deep end, thankfully, although I’ve had enough of that in my life over the past few years. Just the armless end.

“You could just pretend you’re me for a few hours.” Oh no. Gen’s using the sad, puppy dog, wheedling tone. “You could be terrible and make him not like you. It would be funny.”

“Babe! Just reschedule. You said he’s gone through like thirty dates already. It wouldn’t take much to make him not like you. He sounds fussy as fussy gets.”

“No! I can’t risk it! I’ll clam up, and then I won’t say anything at all, which will be just what he wants. Then he’ll be calling me for date two, and my mom will go out and buy baby name books, and my fate will be sealed. You know me. I can’t be awful to anyone, and I’m a terrible actress. He’ll like me. I just know it. And that will be the end of me.”

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