Frenemies with Benefits
by Lydia Sharp

Copyright © 2023 by Lydia Sharp. All rights reserved, including the right to reproduce, distribute, or transmit in any form or by any means. For information regarding subsidiary rights, please contact the Publisher.

Nine months ago…

Rayna: what the hell was that all about???!!!??!!

Me: Benjamin Oliver is an asshole. End of story.

Rayna: he’s usually a super nice guy! everyone i know likes him!!!!

Me: Except me. You know me and I don’t like him.

Me: In fact I hate him.

Rayna: what am i supposed to do!! he’s jeremy’s best friend!

Me: And I’m your best friend.

Rayna: but i can’t just ask ben to sit at another table because you had a fight with him!! he’s not there for you he’s there for jeremy!! and jeremy is there for me! and i’m not asking my boyfriend to leave because of this!!!!!

Me: That was not just a fight. Are you asking ME to leave?

Rayna: NO ONE is leaving!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Me: Your exclamation points are drilling holes into my brain.

Rayna: your drama is drilling holes into my LIFE!!!!

Rayna: !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Chapter One

On the last day of school for the year, it’s every person for themselves. The teachers have given up at this point. They’ve done all they can do—we will either graduate or we won’t. There is no such thing as detention anymore or failing an assignment that’s worth half your grade.

It’s all behind us now. We just have to sit through the boredom of a nothing school day. Funny how the only day of the year we’re not expected to use our brains is when people get the most creative.

Some guy in the room across the hall starts belching in Latin—amo, amare, amavi, amatum—and even my boomer English teacher is laughing along with everyone else here. I’d be laughing, too, if I wasn’t so hungry. This is my last class before lunch.

Fourteen minutes.

I just have to get through fourteen more minutes, and then I can eat. Who knew being this bored out of your goddamn mind would give you such a raging appetite?

For the next fourteen minutes, I focus on playing solitaire on my phone instead of on my gurgling gut, and I only lose every time, so my pristine record still stands.

Finally, the fifth-period bell buzzes overhead, but I’ve officially ventured into hangry territory now, and I practically run to the cafeteria. As fast as I can, anyway, with so many bodies crowding the halls. It’s the last day of school—more people should be skipping out early. But I have to weave my way around people and accidentally bump into some girl with a “teacher’s aide” badge hanging from a lanyard.

“Hey!” she squeals and grabs me by the elbow. “No running in the halls!”

“I wasn’t running.” My voice comes out breathy, which is not helping. I read the name on her badge. “Tiffany…hi. Can you please let go of me?”

She doesn’t. This has to be in violation of at least seven different student codes of conduct. She’s a walking hypocrisy.

“Promise you won’t run again,” she says. “You’re a danger to yourself and others.”

“This is the last day of school—” I start, but she cuts me off.

“The rules still apply!”

For fuck’s sake. I’m getting lightheaded now. I’m a senior. I should be able to stand up to this freshman goody-goody with something to prove. But all I get out is a weak, “I promise I won’t run again.”

She gives me a smug little smile and removes her iron grip from my arm.

And I immediately take off in a jog. Technically not running! Tiffany’s shrieks from behind me apparently disagree. I grin.

I really don’t want anyone to get hurt, but if I don’t get something to eat soon, I will either pass out or eviscerate someone. Or, more likely, pass out while I’m eviscerating someone. And if I don’t get to the cafeteria before the rush, the line for the vending machines will have a wait time that could result in me going Godzilla on the entire population of our fifth-period lunch. Just before I die.

Thankfully, when I get to the cafeteria, my favorite vending machine has no line yet. I jog over to it and punch in the same thing I get every day—half a turkey sandwich, a tiny carton of chocolate milk, and a bag of Doritos, Cool Ranch flavor.

Within half a minute, I’ve got my sandwich. I’ve got my chocolate milk. I’ve almost got my Doritos, but when I search my pocket for another dime, I come up empty.

No…what? I’m short by ten cents?

There’s a line behind me now as I frantically try to hold my sandwich and milk in one hand while digging through pockets with the other. All of them are empty.

Besides feeding myself—which is pretty damn vital—I also need to not press the change return in front of all these people and make it abundantly clear that I can’t even afford my whole skimpy lunch.

“Move!” some guy shouts from far behind me. “Quit holding up the line, bitch.”

I pound on the vending machine and then kick it, hoping it might rattle something out of place enough to drop.

“Is it stuck?” the girl directly behind me says. She sounds like she wants to help, like she feels sorry for me, and that’s just the worst thing for me to hear right now.

I turn to face her. Swear to god, she could pass for twelve. And yet, according to my brain, speaking to her—a total stranger—is scarier than going hungry. I swallow hard and awkwardly force out the words. “Hi. Uh. You got a dime I could borrow?”

“I…” She looks up at me, an apology written all over her face. “All I have is a card.”

The twelve-year-old has a credit card. I try not to let my frustration show. It isn’t her fault her parents are probably filthy rich and she lives in a—mostly—filthy rich town. It isn’t her fault that I’m part of the zero-point-five percent of students at Trinity High who use cash at lunch. She was only trying to help.

I turn back around with a “thanks anyway.”

“What’s the problem, Jess?” a new voice says. A voice that’s warm and deep and makes me want to—

“Fuck off, Benjamin,” I say without looking at him.

“It’s Ben.”

“It’s ‘I don’t fucking care.’ Benjamin.”

He tsks, and in my side vision I catch him shaking his head. “Such language,” he says. “You’re gonna eat your lunch with that mouth?”

My heart does a thump-thump so hard I feel it in my throat. I still can’t look at him—especially now, when he’s using that fake-scolding tone that’s somehow both annoying and sexy as hell.

I thrust my middle finger up in the general direction of his voice.

There’s a moment of silence around me, just a quick beat, before the whispers start. Things like “wait for it,” and “what’s it gonna be this time,” and “ten bucks says she kicks him in the nuts.”

I’ll take that bet. I need the money—getting to kick him in the nuts is just a bonus.

“Half a turkey sandwich,” Ben mutters, “elementary school chocolate milk… What’s missing here?”

I cast a sideways glance at him. He’s got his hand to his chin, eyes squinted, like he’s thinking. Asshole.

Then he snaps his fingers. “I got it. Doritos. Cool Ranch, right?” He wedges himself between the machine and me, and not a single person behind us is complaining now. Of course not. He’s Benjamin Oliver. The mayor’s son. Star quarterback. King of Trinity High.

This whole Pittsburgh suburb’s pride and joy.

Ben pushes the coin return, then scoops up all my change. Is there a hidden portal somewhere that I can crawl into? This is even more embarrassing than if I’d done it myself.

His warm fingers graze my palm as he hands me the money, and my breath hitches. Then he swipes his card and punches a few buttons. A blue bag of Doritos drops, and I purposely keep my eyes trained on the vending machine, rather than his ass in those jeans as he bends over to get the chips. The scowl on my face doesn’t move, either, even though my heart is racing now.

What’s worse than ogling the person you hate most? Letting anyone know you enjoy the view—especially him.

Ben pops back up, rising to his full height, which puts him several inches above me, looking down. With that annoying, sexy smirk. “Special delivery for Jessica Webster,” he says, locking his rich brown gaze on mine. “Is there a Jessica Webster here?”

I refuse to look away, and remind myself people are watching. Remind myself he just bought me food out of pity. “Maybe I don’t want your charity. Maybe I’d rather starve.”

Someone calls me a bitch again, a girl this time. She probably has a crush on Ben—so many of them do. I’ve never denied the boy is hot, but the difference between me and the other girls is that all they want is the privilege of being called his girlfriend. I’d rather snort Pop Rocks than be his girlfriend. I can barely get through lunch every day without murdering him.

Something flickers across his face, and the “cocky jerk” expression falters. He leans closer to me and whispers, “Just take the chips and go eat. You look pallid.”

What eighteen-year-old boy uses the word “pallid” in everyday conversation? And why does he get to be jock-hot and nerd-hot? People should only be allowed one hot.

“Gee, thanks,” I say, snatching the Doritos from him. “You sure know how to charm a girl.” I turn on my heels and make a bee line for the table where my best friend, Rayna, and her boyfriend, Jeremy, are sitting with the rest of our…clique.

I hate that word, but it is what it is.

I can’t help that my best friend is captain of Trinity High’s champion gymnastics team, and ever since she joined the varsity cheer squad junior year, she’s created a gravitational pull around her that sent certain people into her orbit. Jocks—that’s how she and Jeremy got together. Cheerleaders—like our mutual friend, Kamy, along with her boyfriend, Todd, who is also—shocker—on the football team. They’re all people who stand above the masses.

Then there’s me, the anomaly. I’m not into sports. I’m not in any clubs or school politics. I don’t even write for the paper or play in the band. The only thing attaching me to the most popular of the popular crowd is the fact that Rayna and me are a package deal.

And that’s how Benjamin Oliver came into my life. Because Ben and Rayna’s boyfriend, Jeremy, are also best friends, a package deal.

As soon as I sit, I shake up the milk and down the whole thing in one go, then tear open the bag of Doritos.

“Hey,” Rayna says, “you okay?”

“She’s fine,” Ben says as he sits across from me with his own bag of Doritos—red bag, cheese flavor. Plus, a couple of whole sandwiches, a super XL protein bar, a six-pack of mini chocolate donuts, a banana, and a giant bottle of purple Gatorade. He’s going to eat all of that in the next ten minutes and still have the flattest abs this side of Hollywood.

Athletes. They’re the real anomalies here.

He cracks the lid off his Gatorade and guzzles, and for a few seconds I’m hypnotized by the rhythm of his throat bobbing up and down as he swallows.

It really isn’t fair. His reputation as a sex god is one thousand percent valid. He can’t even drink Gatorade without sending out pheromones.

“She doesn’t look fine,” Rayna says, then turns to me, her voluminous, fresh-from-the-salon-red hair swishing as she moves. “You don’t look fine.”

Ben lowers the Gatorade bottle from his mouth to the table and says to Rayna, “You’re just not used to seeing her without her big pointy witch hat. Without it, the green tint to her skin is more noticeable.”

“Try to burn me at the stake, scarecrow, and see if you survive it,” I snipe.

He raises a brow. “Are you asking me to tie you up?”

“Are you asking me to castrate you with a rusty fork?”

“Guys, come on,” Rayna says, even though the others sitting with us are laughing, including her boyfriend. “We’re trying to eat here.” She sends Ben and me a behave yourself look, then kicks Jeremy under the table and hisses, “Stop encouraging them.”

Ben blows me a kiss, and I roll my eyes. I go back to eating my lunch, and for about seven seconds, we all sit in blissful silence, with only the sounds of chewing and slurping and a hundred other people making noise around us.

But then Jeremy and Todd start talking to Ben about a baseball game that went into extra innings last night and how the Bucs could make the playoffs this year, their voices so loud and enthusiastic and male that any other conversation at this table has become impossible.

It doesn’t prevent me from feeling my phone vibrate in my back pocket, though. I pull it out and wake up the screen. It’s a text from my older brother.

Chris: hey bad news

My stomach sinks. The milk-and-Doritos combination in there goes sour.

Chris: going to miss your graduation

Me: Are you serious?

Chris: won’t be home for another month

Dammit. Chris is my only brother, my only sibling, and I hardly ever see him anymore. Now I just lost a whole month of summer break with him? And he’s going to miss one of the biggest days of my life? He’d better be stranded on a deserted island somewhere…that still somehow has cell service…

Me: Why??

Chris: got accepted into the volunteer program

Chris: leaving for Cambodia soon

I sit up straighter, my fingers flying over the screen.

Me: OH MY GOD

Me: WHAT!!!!!!

Me: AAAHHHH CONGRATS!

Chris: thank you

Chris: there’s more

Me: More bad news that’s actually good?

Chris: that depends

Chris: remember my friend Andrew from Brazil

Do I remember Andrew? Come on. I haven’t stopped thinking about him since we met last summer, after Chris’s second year at Florida International University. Florida is a long way from Pennsylvania, and me and my parents all went down there to surprise Chris, who also had a surprise for us—his hot new roommate. I hated the trip, but the destination made it all worth it.

Me: Yeah I remember Andrew

Chris: he got into the program too so we’re going out there together then he’s coming back home with me until next semester starts

Chris: he needed a place to stay so he’s staying at our house

Chris: hope that’s okay

“Oh my god!”

I don’t realize that was me who just squealed like a twelve-year-old at a Taylor Swift concert until I notice everyone at our table looking at me.

“What is it, what is it!” Rayna is so excited she’s wiggling in her seat. “Who texted you?”

“Chris,” I say, still staring at my phone. He’s typing another message. There’s more?

“Your brother Chris?” Rayna says, her enthusiasm dying fast.

“Yeah, but that’s not—”

His next text comes through.

Chris: did I lose you

Me: Still here. Sorry. Yes that’s okay. I’m so happy for both of you!

Chris: yay!

Chris: gotta go now so much to do before we leave

Chris: see you in a month!

“Hey.” Rayna shakes my shoulder. “Tell me what’s going on right now. I haven’t seen you smile this much since…never. I have never seen you smile this much. Spill it.”

“Andrew,” I say. My hands are shaking. “Chris is bringing Andrew back with him this summer. To stay at our house. I can’t—” I swallow, my mouth suddenly dry. “Oh my god.”

It takes Rayna a minute to remember why this is a big deal. “The Andrew? As in, your brother’s hot friend from Brazil? With the sexy accent? And the sexy bod? And the”—she gestures around her head—“sexy hair?”

“Yes, yes, and yes.” Hair is not usually a thing for me, but Andrew’s hair? It’s perfect, long spirals springing from his head, messy but not messy, with streaks of natural blond through the darker shades of brown. I swear, he could be a model. He probably is a model.

But how would I know? He’s never really talked to me—actually, reverse that. I’ve never really talked to him. I can’t. I’ve had opportunities, and just like with anyone I don’t know, I get all tongue-tied and fumble so badly I need a translator. The last time Andrew saw me, I was blushing so hard, he asked if I had a sunburn and recommended his favorite aloe vera gel.

But now…now, I’ll have half a summer with him in my house. It’s a chance to get to know him better, be more comfortable around him, have a real conversation, and maybe then he won’t see me as just his best friend’s shy little sister anymore.

“Rayna,” I say, trying to tone down the desperation in my voice, “what do I do? He’ll be right there in my house—what if he still doesn’t notice me? How do I get him to notice me?”

She shrugs. “Just be you.”

Across the table, Ben starts laughing. “Bad idea. Very bad idea.”

Well, shit. I thought he wasn’t paying attention. “Something funny, Benjamin?”

“Just imagining how this will go down—you, in all your frumpy glory, trying to seduce a ‘sexy’ dude in college.”

If he’s trying to rile me up, it’s a weak attempt. I’ve told him seventeen hundred and twelve times that I take “frumpy” as a compliment, no matter how much he thinks it’s an insult.

“He’s what?” Ben asks. “Twenty-one? Twenty-two?”

“Twenty,” I say. “So what? I’m eighteen. We’re both adults.”

“Jess, you just turned eighteen last month.” He gives me a look.

I shoot that same look right back at him. “The age of consent is sixteen in Pennsylvania, so stuff it, Benjamin.”

“Okay.” He smirks. “Exactly where would you like me to—”

“Shut up.”

Of course, he just keeps talking.

“You’re right, though. Age isn’t what really matters here. You have worse things to worry about, like the fact that you’re more innocent than a Teletubby.”

My face heats. “That has nothing to do with—”

“That has everything to do with it,” he says. “You want this Andrew guy to notice you, you have to give him something to notice.”

“What does that even mean?” I snap back.

He hesitates. But only for a second. “It means it’s obvious you’re a virgin just by looking at you.”

I roll my eyes. “No it isn’t—”

“What’s wrong with being a virgin?” Rayna jumps in.

Sigh. I love her for trying. But everyone here knows she and Jeremy have been boinking since last Christmas. She can scream “V is for Victory” all she wants and no one will take it seriously.

“Nothing,” I answer Rayna’s question, keeping my eyes on Ben. “I’m not trying to hide it, either. Sex isn’t everything in a relationship—unless it’s a relationship with you.”

He doesn’t even flinch.

“I never said virginity is wrong or something to be ashamed of,” Ben clarifies, as if he’s an expert on the subject. Pfft. “But you’re talking about a twenty-year-old male surrounded by horny college girls every day. Why would he leave the fun and excitement of the high dive to go sit in the kiddie pool?”

I want to tell him to shut up again. To stop being an asshole. To stop…making sense.

“Fuck you, Benjamin.”

His grin spreads wide. He knows I know he’s right.

Seriously, though. Fuck him. No one asked for his opinion.

“I also never said this was hopeless, Jess. He’ll be here in a month? That’s plenty of time.”

“For what?” I ask, realizing too late that I took his bait. Hook, line, and sinker.

“Sex is like any other skill,” he says. “You get better with practice. All you need to do is practice with someone willing to teach you, then show Andrew what you can do.”

Rayna’s jaw drops. Even Jeremy gives Ben a look like what the hell are you on.

But I think that’s exactly what Ben wants—a reaction.

“You’re just teasing me,” I tell him. Like he’s been doing since the day we met.

He spreads his arms out, palms up. “Maybe I am, maybe I’m not.”

That’s all I can take of him. Of this. He’s making a joke out of my feelings for someone perfectly decent, someone Ben could never measure up to except maybe in looks. Nothing about this is serious—nothing about him is ever serious. And I may have trouble talking to Andrew or anyone else I don’t know, but I’ve been sitting with Ben at lunch for the last nine months. I know him well enough—I know him too well. I have no hesitance when it comes to calling him out on his own bullshit.

“Let me get this straight,” I say. “You want me to ask someone to have sex with me—not just once, but so many times it would be considered practice—and then say ‘thanks, that was fun, bye,’ and this will somehow magically make Andrew want me?”

“Yes.”

“Okay.” I practically snort. “What kind of sex-crazed Neanderthal would be willing to do all that? Wait, let me guess—you?”

His face goes hard for a second, and he swallows, but just when I think I’ve caught him, that cocky smirk reappears. He leans forward on his elbows, folding his hands together. Interlocking those long, nimble, skillful fingers. “Only if you admit that I’m the best choice.”

Whatever retort I might have said gets stuck in my throat.

He would be the best choice, if he was actually offering. And if I was considering such a thing. But I’m not. Hell no freaking way. Also? We both know he isn’t actually offering.

This isn’t about the offer at all, really. This is about the same thing it’s been about with me and Ben since the very first day we sat at this table. We go back and forth until one of us “wins” and one of us “loses.”

I’m not going to let him win. Every day for nine months, I’ve had to sit across from him and his stupid-hot face. It’s the last day of school in our last year of high school, the last time I’ll ever have one of these nonsense arguments with him at lunch. As if I would let him get the last word now.

He’s still got those gorgeous brown eyes on mine, his perfect, pillowy lips set in a bring-it-on smirk. I refuse to get distracted by what he is on the outside. I have to remind myself of who he is on the inside—an asshole through and through. A player. Both on and off the football field. This is all just a game to him.

“Benjamin,” I say.

“It’s Ben—”

“How can I admit you’re the best at anything, when all you’ve ever shown me is your worst?”

He laughs, but it sounds cold. “That sounds like you want me to show you my best.”

Come on.

Is he high?

I mean…seriously. Is he?

It wouldn’t be the first time he had “special” snacks in his lunch. In fact, those mini chocolate donuts look highly suspect.

“The answer is no,” I say.

“The answer to what?” he counters. “I didn’t ask you anything, Jessie.”

True. He didn’t, just heavily implied it. All he really did was tell me about a dumb fucking idea that he knew I would disagree with. No matter how badly I want Andrew to notice me.

“Ask me, then,” I say in challenge.

The bell rings through the speakers above us, loud and obnoxious, followed by the sea of sound created by a hundred students making a mass exodus from the cafeteria. Ben stands up, then leans over the table toward me, his face closer to mine than it’s ever been. I can see every shade of brown sparkling in his eyes, every little curve in his pillowy lips, the tautness of his smooth light-brown skin over sharp cheekbones…

Suddenly there isn’t enough air. I’m having a hard time finding my next breath.

“I would never disrespect a girl by asking her to do that,” he says. “But if she was the one doing the asking?”

Then he just turns and walks off, leaving me staring after him.

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