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“Yeah.”
“Fuck.”
“Yeah.”
“I’m sorry, man.”
Jared just shrugged, but Rick saw his eyes flit over to where Adam and Justin were standing on the sideline. They were cheering on Liam, who was now using what looked like some kind of pro-wrestling move on Chris. Tossing him to the ground where Chris made his body shake like he was having some kind of seizure–just like the pro-wrestlers in the 80s did. Patrick pretended to be throwing down the People’s elbow onto Chris’ chest, a move made famous by the Rock back when they’d all actually watched that stuff.
Suddenly he understood why Jared had opened up specifically to him, why he’d felt comfortable enough to do so.
Adam, Liam, Justin, and Chris were all in happy relationships. Even Patrick and Lexie had some kind of weird thing going on between them that, while it wasn’t a relationship, might be one day if Patrick ever let it. If Andrew had been there, maybe Jared would have talked to him, but he wasn’t, and Rick was.
For the first time, in a long time, Rick was glad he was single. Because that meant Jared hadn’t had to hold everything inside while looking around at all his happy friends.
He looked at Jared, whose expression had settled into morose. Elbowing the big guy in the side, Rick started to push himself up out of his sitting position.
“Come on, let’s jump these asshats and make this a Battle Royale.”
It took a moment, but then a smile spread across Jared’s face. “Fuck yeah man.”
Rick reached out his hand and yanked Jared to his feet. They both let out war cries as they dove into the fray, Rick going for Liam while Jared aimed for Patrick, knocking them off Chris. It took Adam and Justin less than two seconds to figure out what was going on, and then Rick grunted as one–possibly both–of them landed on his back.
“Austin 3:16 says—you’re going down!” Chris yelled as he bounced up to his feet, pumping his fist in the air.
Chaos reigned.
“Maybe he has a foot fetish. In which case, you should definitely stop by to say hi to him after this.”
Maria giggled as her sister Jackie wiggled her toes at her lasciviously. The pedicurist clucked a scolding sound at her and Jackie contritely put her foot back on the rest, even though it wasn’t the one the pedicurist had been attending to. Jackie was generally considered the prettiest of the Arias sisters, with her long black hair and striking green eyes. She had the same thick hair as Maria, but without the frizz and curl, and her naturally tanned skin only made her wide eyes all the more stunning.
Growing up, all of the sisters had been envious of Jackie, especially once they’d realized their boyfriends were easily distracted by her. Not that it was her fault, but it had happened. It would have been easy to hate Jackie if she wasn’t so damned nice on top of everything else. Maria sometimes wondered if Jackie felt almost apologetic for her looks. She knew her sister had often felt guilty whenever someone’s boyfriend would become fascinated with her. Especially since she definitely never encouraged them.
Jackie had been happily married for the past two years to a wonderful man named Daniel, who was well aware his wife had attributes that went far beyond her physical beauty and appreciated every bit of her. He wasn’t bad looking, but a lot of people tended to be surprised when they saw him because he didn’t have Jackie’s movie star good looks either.
Maria thought her sister was wonderfully lucky to have found him.
“Is that why you have a standing appointment for a pedicure every two weeks?” she teased back. “Because of Daniel’s foot fetish?” To her surprise, Jackie blushed. Maria gaped. “What?! No way!”
“Shhhhh,” said Jackie, her cheeks turning even darker pink as she waved her hand at Maria gesturing her to speak more softly. The pedicurists would still be able to hear, of course, but it always seemed like there was some kind of code of silence between clients and pedicurists. Maria was sure they heard the weirdest things. “I wouldn’t call it a fetish exactly but, yes... he does love it when I get a new pedicure. And he likes to kiss and suck on my toes sometimes, but that’s as far as it goes.”
“I had no idea.” Maria tried to keep from giggling, knowing this was a serious subject to her sister, but it was just so hard not to picture it in a comical way. “Do Ava and Lara know?”
“No, and I wouldn’t be telling you this if you hadn’t brought it up, so don’t tell them.”
“I won’t if you won’t,” Maria said, referencing the fact that Jackie had somehow managed to coax her into talking about Rick. She’d managed to avoid her good-looking neighbor for several days now. It wasn’t too hard as long as she stayed away from the pool in the early mornings.
She hadn’t been avoiding him because she didn’t want to see him again. She’d been avoiding a chance run-in, while she thought about how best to approach him next. And she’d been wondering what it was, exactly, he wanted to do to her that he didn’t want her to know about.
“I’ve already promised not to,” Jackie reminded her, making a face.
Secrets were sacred among the sisters, mostly because it was so hard to keep one for any length of time. Maria had needed someone to spill to, Jackie had been the next sister to see her, she’d noticed how distracted Maria had been and well... one thing led to another and Maria had found herself spilling about the entire incident.
“I could live with a foot fetish,” Maria announced, nodding her head thoughtfully. Laughing, Jackie shushed her again. Maria grinned, amused at how easily embarrassed Jackie was by the revelation. “No seriously, I mean, that doesn’t sound so bad. A man who wants to worship my feet? That’s close enough to ‘at my feet,’ right?”
“I can recommend it,” Jackie said with a little smirk, wiggling her glossy dark red toenails on the foot the pedicurist wasn’t working on. Her face became a little bit more serious. “What if it’s not though? What if he’s into something like swinging or having sex in front of people?”
Maria contemplated the idea, watching as her own pedicurist put the finishing touches on her bright pink nails. Swinging didn’t sound like fun, she wasn’t a sharing person. She also didn’t really know how she felt about exhibitionism. There was something exciting about that, but it was also sharing in a different way. People would be watching an intimate moment. Still. She didn’t like the idea of giving up on a hot guy just because he might be into something different than she’d ever done before. “I mean... you should never say no until you’ve tried something, right?”
