two and a half years, we’d been friends-slash-roommates, nothing more. I’d listened to countless encounters that had involved Gavin and some woman he’d met at a bar or wherever he’d been for the night. And to this day, I tried not to think about them. The same way I tried not to think about the chicks Gil banged on a nightly basis. It turned my stomach and not because I was jealous.
In fact, it had never bothered me that Gavin or Gil had a healthy sex life—hearing about it, on the other hand, I didn’t particularly like. But I had never had an issue with who they hooked up with. Still didn’t.
However, at one point, I had almost moved out and not because they were man whores. I’d considered moving out because I’d needed to in order to keep from damaging my relationship with Gavin. Thanks to … well, thanks to what I’d come to think of as The Incident. The incident with Adrian that would’ve caused major friction between Gavin and me, and likely would’ve ruined our friendship had I not handled things the way that I had. So, in order to salvage the most important relationship in my life, I had manipulated the truth about what had actually happened with the man whose name I would not be mentioning.
The fact was, Gavin was always taking care of me. He was my closest friend, the one person I shared everything with. Since we were kids, we’d been close. Never once had we ever crossed that friendship line, nor had we ever had the desire to. Clean, wholesome friends was what we were.
“You get any inspiration yet?”
I shook my head, then picked at the label on my beer. “It’s been a year, G. You think I should be worried?” I could pinpoint right down to the day when all my inspiration had disappeared. The same day I’d witnessed the guy I was dating screwing some chick in the ass. My mind had been blank ever since.
Gavin placed his arm across my chair and thumped me on the shoulder. “Nope. I think you should go with it.”
“Go with it? Are you fucking crazy?” I couldn’t simply go with it. If I did, my career would be over. I couldn’t spend the rest of my days tattooing flowers and fucking butterflies on people. That wasn’t what I’d set out to do in the beginning.
“Relax, Presley. It’s all good.”
I didn’t bother to tell him that I couldn’t relax. In fact, I was getting myself worked up more and more these days. With every passing minute, I was freaking out a little more. And quite frankly, it scared the shit out of me.
While I continued to peel the corner of the label from my bottle, I said, “Have you heard about that art contest? The big one that’s coming up?”
“You mean the one from that shop in California? With the grand prize of five grand?”
I nodded. Although I’d entered numerous contests over the years, rarely did they have a grand prize amount that came remotely close to that. This would be huge for me.
“You gonna enter?”
“I thought about it.” Right up until I’d realized I couldn’t draw shit anymore. At that point, it would’ve been stupid and naïve to think I could win. Although, the money they were offering… It was worth the attempt no matter what, especially since I’d drained a significant portion of my savings with the down payment on the condo.
Only I didn’t have a design idea.
“You up for that?”
I shook my head. In the mindset I’d been in, I wasn’t up for much of anything.
“When’s the deadline?” Gavin asked.
“February twenty-second.” Not nearly enough time to come up with a design and perfect it.
I was so screwed.
I peered over at Gavin, noticing that he was eyeing some girl in the corner. I followed his gaze, giving the woman a quick once-over. She was pretty, if very young. Twenty-one, at most. Not surprising—Gavin liked the younger ones, but thankfully he insisted they were legal drinking age. This girl’s café au lait skin glowed beneath the spotlight above her, and her dark eyes were sparkling with interest. And that … the interested part … was definitely Gavin’s type.
I sighed, knowing that I’d lost Gavin for the night. When he set his sights on a woman, he would be of no use to me anymore. Not that he would blow me off for a hookup. He wasn’t like that. But I knew he would