Friday’s at the office that I worked at were usually pretty quiet in comparison to most other days of the week, where everyone was running around like headless chickens.People were afforded the luxury of wearing “smart, casual business attire” (jeans) and there was usually some kind of meet up after work at a bar for a drink or two….or three or…or ten.

We’d often spend the first hour or so bitching about management and then once everyone had had a couple of drinks in them and had loosened up a little, then it was usually no holds barred confession time.

At least that’s why I went.

The best part of the evening was hearing about who had a crush on whom and who was sleeping with whom and what some other person had done to be fired.This time however I was going for a different reason.

Adrian had been working with us now for about four weeks and this was going to be the first time that he was going to be at the Friday night drinks.

Adrian was, in a word “dreamy”.Just the kind of guy I always fell for.

Tall, muscular, a mop of shaggy, brown hair just long enough to be sexy, but not so long it was messy, that perfectly framed two of the most beautiful, brown eyes I had ever had the pleasure of encountering.Not only was he beyond gorgeous, but he was also lively, chatty, personable and friendly.

Having both looks and personality seemed the rarest of combinations in men these days, so even though I was totally intimidated by his perfection, I wasn’t about to let an opportunity to flirt with him go by,

I had managed to have two completely lucid conversations with him in the lunchroom on a couple of occasions and both times we’d managed to come across some common ground fairly quickly.

The day before when we’d spoken, he’d even mentioned that he would be seeing Weezer in concert that weekend who I loved.We got to talking about their music and how I hadn’t heard their latest offering yet.

Adrian’s eyes lit up and told me that he had a spare ticket he was trying to get rid of and that he first had to check with his roommate, but it was mine if I wanted to go.

I couldn’t believe it.

He took my number, hence the waiting around for a text message the night before.He was so stunning that I often had to be nudged by my friend and co-worker Estelle whenever she would catch me unabashedly staring, unblinkingly at him for long periods of time and it would cross the threshold from mesmerized to downright creepy.

He was mesmerizing though, and I couldn’t understand the general female consensus in the office that he didn’t appear to be anyone else’s type.What was everyone’s type then? Short, ugly and introverted?

Still, at least I wouldn’t be fighting anyone for him except maybe my gay work colleague and friend David, but I was pretty sure from the obvious chemistry between us that Adrian was not gay.

Anyway, not having to jostle for his attention was definitely a plus since there were many other girls in my office way more capable of stealing a man’s attention than I was, at least by my measure.

Not that I was ugly. I just felt that I was average and didn’t make as big an effort each morning as some other girls did.

Although having said that, I will admit to stepping up the effort in the hair and make up department since Adrian had started at the office.

So where was I?

Oh yes! Friday night drinks.

I hadn’t seen Adrian all afternoon, but I knew he was at work.I saw him briefly in the morning trying to navigate back to his desk from the lunch room with a cup of coffee he had filled up that little but too much and thought it best not to disturb him.

I caught glances of him every now and then as he passed my desk throughout the day, but he looked too busy to stop for conversation and besides, there would be plenty of time for that later on tonight at the bar.

I thought five o’clock might never come and I am sure it didn’t help that I was clock watching for last hour and a half of the day.

Then with just five minutes to go, I got an email. 

I am going to subject myself to Clash of the Titans, and I am not doing it alone.

I have snacks.

And terrible local beer. 

Justin. 

I snorted.“Not for the wide world,” I muttered under my breath as I hit the reply button and began typing up my response. 

Sorry, work drinks tonight.Enjoy your imported beer that tastes of juicy old gym boots.

 “You ready to go?” Estelle stood from behind her desk, slinging her bag over her shoulder and I began gathering my things.

“Yep just a sec.”

Another email popped up just as I was about to shut down my computer and I sighed. 

Is he going to be there?

I only ask because I know that if he is, you might actually stay out past 8pm. In which case I won’t wait for you to come home, I’ll just go ahead and watch the movie without you. 

God he was so smug.

Enjoy your movie. Alone, I responded and quickly shut down my computer before he could keep me there with more chatter.

“You ladies headed over to bar?”I looked up and almost gasped.

There Adrian was right in front of me.

“Yes we are, let’s do it!” Estelle chimed enthusiastically seeing that I was barely able to maintain motor function let alone speak.

I gathered up my coat and purse with some fluidity and the three of us set out of the office.

In the lift it was quiet.Estelle had already nudged me twice for staring and it was one of those elevator rides where we seemed to stop at every floor.

Adrian then turned to me on the fifth.

“Sorry I didn’t get a chance to text you last night.”He was speaking quietly and leaning in and out of the corner of my eye I could see Estelle watching us, her eyes widening a little wondering what he was suppose to have texted me about.

“Oh that’s okay…my phone ran out of battery so I probably wouldn’t have got it until today anyway,” I lied.

I don’t know why I said that.Probably to appear like I wasn’t sitting around waiting for him to message me, which in reality was exactly what I had been doing.

“Oh well, my roommate is more than happy for you to take the ticket…you don’t mind if he tags along too do you?”

I would have tagged along with his mother, if it meant I got to hang out with Adrian.

“Oh yeah, of course. If you’re sure it’s okay that I tag along.”

Adrian shrugged and did this amazingly cheeky little smile.

“Trust me, he’ll be the third wheel, I’d rather hang with you than him. I have to see him everyday.”

“Oh…okay,” was about as much as I could manage and Estelle was being far from subtle as she smiled to herself in the corner of the lift.

It was suddenly awkward in the tiny space of the lift cabin and the silence needed to be filled with things like throat clearing and fake sniffling.When the doors of the elevator finally opened and we all spilled out into the Lobby, Adrian walked ahead to meet with some other male workmates.

“Was he flirting? I can’t tell, I don’t think anyone has ever flirted with me before,” I asked Estelle staring unblinkingly ahead, and shuffling feet which didn’t feel like they were on the ground.

“He was flirting alright,” Estelle confirmed, “Looks like you have yourself a date.”

“It’s not a date.”

“Call it what you want, but I bet his roommate will conveniently go “missing” before the opener had even finished playing.”

“You think so?” I asked so naïvely, having never really been privy to the whole male wing-man scenario.

“Mmm Hmm,” she nodded so very sure of herself and then we had to stop talking about it as we caught up with everyone leaving me to consider all the possibilities as we headed over to the bar. 

Michael Murphy’s or “Murph’s” as it was affectionately known to me and my work colleagues was a long standing Irish bar not more than a block away form our office building.

There wasn’t anything particularly noteworthy about Murph’s and because of this it did well enough, but never really got packed out like most New York City bars on a Friday night, but that’s what we loved about it and why we kept going back. Not that the room wasn’t always full, but at least you never had to wait to get in.

Watching Adrian while I tried to maintain my own separate conversations, I bought a round of beers and tried to loosen up.

It was Friday after all and I didn’t have anywhere to be the following day, so I drank just a little bit faster than usual, until I started to get a pleasant airiness in between my ears, and a warm glow in cheeks.

The boys from the office kept the drinks coming because for some reason which I couldn’t seem to fathom, men tended to have endless funds when it came to alcohol whereas my wallet was almost empty after just one round.

Still they didn’t seem to mind buying and David, my gay friend kept the table entertained with explicit details of the weekend just passed and what was likely to transpire on the weekend ahead.

Milo, Jonathan and Adrian talked sport while Estelle, Carmen and Sarah stuck close by me in a huddle observing the men and ribbing me about Adrian as Estelle recounted to the girls our flirty encounter in the elevator and the fact that I would be attending a concert with him, the following night.

I played it down of course, but inside I was both nervous and excited and just when my imagination began running away with me, I got a text message. 

The movie was terrible, but I just had the greatest sex of my life. How about you? 

I couldn’t help but laugh.

And I knew unless Justin knew I was laughing, he would never leave me alone until I did.

That was just him.He’d wind me up and watch me explode, but wouldn’t leave me alone until we were friends again, never dreaming of saying he was sorry. 

Good for you! I am glad. Now give those hands of yours a rest! You make a living off of those things you know? –Still working on it. 

“I wish Justin Timberlake would send me text messages,” Sarah sighed and I laughed as I put my phone away thinking if only she knew how utterly disgusting and filter less he was.

“Yeah it’s a real treat,” I said ironically, taking a long sip of beer and casting my eye in Adrian’s general direction.

I loved his listening face.

“There’s another one practically throwing himself at you and you’re too off in your little Adrian dream world to recognize it,” Estelle sighed shaking her head “and that one is RICH!”

“Justin is soooooo not anywhere near in the neighborhood of being attractive to me or being attracted to me, we don’t have that kind of chemistry, we’re just friends…and we can barely manage to be that,” I replied, tired of having to explain this to them every time the subject came up and a predictable groan filtered through the music in the bar and I could just tell Estelle was about to start preaching.

“Sophie, honey let me explain something to you okay?”

“Here we go,” I grinned sipping my beer and quickly deciding I would need a lot more.

I hated people who had never seen Justin and I interact, make judgments on our relationship purely based on the fact that he was a desirable celebrity out there in tabloid world.

“Men do not have…girls that are just friends. Honey there is always more to it than that whether y’all know it or you don’t.”

“Oh Estelle please stop talking now okay? If you had any idea about what we are like when we’re in the same room together, you would so change your mind about how male and female relationships can work.”

“Jesus Sophie, put me in a room with that boy and I’ll be more than happy to show you how male and female relationships can work,” Carmen added and I found it so odd to hear people talk about Justin that way.

It was like hearing people talk about how hot your brother was and it made me kind of uncomfortable.

“All I am saying to you is, you have thought of him that way at one point or another and he has done the same of you, whether you admit it to us or not. It’s just human nature,” Estelle shrugged like it wasn’t a big deal and I just so didn’t get her point and it was making me feel gross.

The focus was being taken off how much I really wanted Adrian, so I decided a reminder was in order.

“Ladies, I appreciate your opinions, but that one over there,” I said pointing over at Adrian, “is the only one I am interested in right now.”

I proceeded to polish off the rest of my beer and with some Dutch courage, I left my lady friends to think what they wanted about Justin, while I walked over to the other side of the bench and burrowed my way in between Adrian and David.

“Hi,” I greeted staring up at him with a pleasantly buzzed smile.

“Well look who decided to break up the tea party and join the boys,” Adrian said teasingly.

Yep. Estelle was at least right about that. He was definitely flirting.

“Yeah, I decided to come in search of more stimulating conversation.”

“Oh yeah?” He asked and “hot” was the only word you could use to describe what was going on between us, especially since I was too buzzed to be subtle.

“Yeah…what are you drinking?” I asked. The room was getting louder so I got as close to his ear as possible to me heard and couldn’t help but notice his smell.

“I’ll get it-“ he started to say, but I wanted to buy him a drink. It wasn’t so much that it was polite, but what buying a guy a drink implied that I wanted to get across.

“Adrian please, tell me what you’re drinking,” I insisted.

He smiled and took the hint.

“Corona.”

I disappeared over to the bar and ordered two shots of tequila and two Coronas with the last of my allotted drinking money, but considered it an investment.

As I weaved my way through the moderately packed bodies, he managed to find me halfway between the bar and our workmates.

“Here,” I said handing him a shot.

“What’s this,” he asked taking it, from me with a smirk.

“You said you wanted tequila,” I played dumb.

“I said I wanted Corona,” he corrected smiling knowing, that I bought the shot on purpose and I continued to play dumb.

“Oh Corona” I exclaimed tapping my forehead, “I thought you said Tequila!”

He didn’t believe for a second that I thought he has requested Tequila instead of beer, but we laughed.

“You trying to get me drunk,” he asked and my expression turned innocent.

“No! I wouldn’t dream of it, but here, have a Corona, just for good measure,” I said handing him a bottle of beer and watched his fantastic smile broaden as he laughed and accepted the drink.

“Cheers,” he declared as we clinked our shot glasses together and watched each other as we somewhat slowly knocked back what was in truth a foul tasting creation made sought after only for the affects it had on ones body and mind and certainly not for it’s taste.

I recalled in the movies when a poker face would be maintained to demonstrate that one wasn’t phased by such a grotesque flavor. I didn’t know exactly what being able to not pull the gross face would do for me, but I managed it.

The awkwardness of staring at each other while we both took beer chasers was interrupted by my phone again and I was tempted to ignore it, but it wasn’t in my nature, because my imagination was way too hard wired to imagine all sorts of emergencies that I might knowingly be ignoring.

“Sorry,” I apologized unlocking my phone to see what he wanted this time. 

Building is being evacuated. I can’t get in to get Barney and Bowser. 

I stopped and my heart sunk as I started down at my phone.

My face must have given away that something was up because Adrian immediately leaned in.

“You okay?”

In truth I wasn’t sure what was happening. I didn’t know if Justin was serious or of the extent of the severity of this evacuation, but I began to panic, thinking nobody could get into my apartment except me and the super and I doubted he would risk his life for a dog and cat.

“I think something is up at my apartment building, I have to go,” I told him hastily.

“Do you want me to go with you?”

I was frazzled otherwise I would have been touched by his sweet gesture, but I just shook my head and starting looking around for an escape route.

“No, thank you just…call me tomorrow and tell me where to meet you?” I asked and though he looked concerned he agreed.

“Sure. I hope everyth-“ the rest was drowned out by the crowd as I backed my way out of the bar and as I tried in my panic to find a cab, I was shoulder barged by someone walking in the opposite direction, sending my phone flying from my hands right out into the middle of the street where it proceeded to be flattened by a speeding fire truck speeding in the direction of my apartment building.

It was like everything was suddenly happening in slow motion including my reaction time and my alcohol addled brain was grasping to focus on what I needed to do.

I stood on the sidewalk, staring with my mouth agape at the shards in the middle of the road which used to be my precious iPhone.

I heard my name behind me and turned to find Adrian standing with a waiting cab, holding the door open.

Grateful, I ran toward him and leapt in with Adrian right behind me.

“Thank you,” I said sincerely.

“I just hope everything is okay.”

I was like a bobble head in the back seat trying to see past the traffic and buildings for signs of a fire in Soho but I couldn’t see any.

Up ahead and just a couple of blocks from my building, the driver turned to me.

“Streets blocked off, what do you wanna do?”

“Here’s fine,” I said and threw some money at him, tearing the car door open and running down the street to my building with Adrian close behind but to be honest I wasn’t too concerned about whether or not he was keeping up.

I could see fire engines, and a whole crowd of evacuated residents, but there didn’t appear to be any smoke or fire anywhere.

As I neared closer I looked around for neighbors or Justin to find out what was happening.

Instead, I stopped a fireman on his way by me.

“Excuse me, I have pets up there-“

“It’s nothing to worry about, just a burnt pot roast,” he assured me and I sighed and nodded feeling Adrian’s hands around my shoulder as I fell against him with relief.

“Okay…thanks.”

A burnt pot roast.

As people were told it was safe to go back inside, and slowly began filtering back into the lobby, I suddenly realized I was pressed against a man I knew very little about and quickly righted the situation by turning to face him.

“You so didn’t have to come with me, I am really grateful though,” I said and he shrugged coolly.

“That’s okay, I am just glad it turned out to be a false alarm…so much for getting me drunk though,” he joked and I stared up at him and laughed a little.

“Oh that’s okay there’s always tomorrow night. You...me…Weezer!”

“Right, yeah! So should I come by and pick you up or-“

“Oh no that’s okay I can make my own way there.”

“Sure, that’s cool. Okay well why don’t we meet up for a drink at around seven?”

“Okay, only…my phone…” I stumbled remembering now I didn’t have a phone where he could reach me.

“Oh right, right well in that case, I’ll just come by and pick you up and we can head over together,” he suggested.

I sighed inside. He was all about the problem solving wasn’t he?

I knew my good sense wanted me to get to know him better and wait for the rose colored spectacles to fade before making any real moves on him but-

“Do you want to come upstairs?”

It spilled from my mouth before I couldn’t even hold back and he didn’t seem at all surprised, but rather relieved.

“Yes. Yes definitely,” he agreed and I smiled up at him fixing my gaze on those amazing brown eyes when suddenly…

“How cool is it that no pets were incinerated tonight!? The building is in tact! A burned pot roast, how about that huh?”

I cringed at the sound of that voice behind me.My heart sunk in my chest at the thought of Justin spending any amount of time with Adrian, especially after stupidly telling him how obsessed with him I was.

I stood between them and Adrian smiled politely waiting to be introduced, while Justin as usual made a spectacle of himself.

I knew this would not be pretty and poor Adrian had no idea what he was in for.

“Justin this is Adrian, Adrian, Justin” I flickered my hands lazily between them both as they shook hands doing the whole manly-sizing-each-other-up-without-looking-like-they-were-sizing-each-other-up thing.

“Elevators will be jammed in the main entrance, let’s go this way,” Justin declared turning and heading down a side street near our building as we followed.

“Justin is my annoying building co-dweller, who is way too important to use the front door with everyone else, so he gets a “special entrance,” around the back,” I explained with a wry grin although I stupidly forgot who I was dealing with and quickly regretted any level of ribbing Justin while Adrian was around.

“Are we still talking about the building,” Justin asked not skipping a beat.

“Fuck you”

“I didn’t think we were,” Justin quipped as I scoffed and looked up at Adrian to make sure that he seemed aware that he was kidding. Luckily he appeared amused.

“Nice to meet you Justin.”

“Likewise, good to finally put a face to the name, all I hear about is Adrian this and Adrian that,” Justin replied like I did nothing but talk about Adrian.

This was becoming mortifying and worse still, I knew that telling Justin to “shut up” would only make it worse.

I turned to Adrian sheepish, but trying to remain cool.

“You’ll have to excuse him, he was never properly socialized.”

I prayed for a quick elevator ride.

Justin used his exclusive access key in the elevator to allow him access to the 18th and Penthouse floors, the three of us standing in a harshly lit elevator.

There was no way Justin would allow for a silent ride and the freight elevator was a slow and sometimes bumpy ride.

I tried to turn the conversation to something benign.

“So the movie sucked huh?”

Justin nodded unmoved from his corner of the elevator.

“Yeah. Kind of movie you watch alone so you can masturbate to distract from the terrible dialogue and watery plot.”

“It’s Friday, why aren’t you out on the town, snorting cocaine off a hookers ass,” I asked facetiously.

“Because evidently, I need to stay home and work on perfecting my pot roasting skills,” he replied with a half sheepish smile and my mouth dropped open before both Adrian and I burst into laughter.

“It was you? You burned the pot roast?”

“The underside is still perfectly okay it was just the top that got a little…crispy,” he explained as I fell about laughing for a moment but then it hit me.

I suddenly wondered why he would have texted me, interrupting my night out, and make me come racing home like that if he knew there was nothing to worry about.

As the elevator door dinged open I slid my fingers between Adrian’s and took his hand, leading him out of the elevator and noticed Justin’s eyes flicker down on them for the quickest moment.

“Good night Justin,” I said trying not act any differently, but I started to wonder in maybe Estelle was in fact right.

“Goodnight Soph. Nice to meet you Adrian,” he replied politely as the elevator doors slowly glided shut.

“Yeah you too, take care,” Adrian replied just as the doors fully shut, and the last thing I saw was subtle wink and smile form Justin before the doors fully shut.

I tried to push the ridiculous notion from my mind that Estelle might have had a point about Justin and I.

To distract myself, I pulled on Adrian’s hand and headed towards my apartment, fishing in my purse for my keys.

As I unlocked my door, I looked up behind me at those eyes, and I was suddenly every bit as distracted as I had intended to be.

The door glided open and he followed me inside as a beagle that had been indoors all day came bounding towards the entrance.

“Hey Barney,” I greeted as he jumped up a couple of times and then turned his attention to the pair of shoes whose scent he hadn’t had the pleasure of acquainting himself with yet.

Adrian immediately knelt down and greeted Barney, showing he was a dog person by holding out his hand for Barney to sniff before gently scratching him behind the ears and petting him head.

“Aw man I love dogs, I wish I was allowed to have one in my apartment,” he told me lifting Barney up into his lap.

“Yeah that’s kind of a deal breaker for me, if the building owners don’t allow pets,” I told him, lifting my scarf off from my shoulder and hanging it on the coat stand by the door along with my purse and jacket.

“You hungry Barney,” I asked the beagle and upon hearing the word “hungry” he immediately began trying to wriggle his way out of Adrian’s grasp and Adrian laughed, placing him on the carpet as he raced me to the kitchen.

“Make yourself at home,” I shouted out into the living room where Adrian stood orienting himself within the surroundings of my small yet, modern apartment.

“Do you want a drink?” I asked scooping out some food I had cooked up for Barney and kept in containers in the fridge. No commercial dog food for my little man!

“Sure, you having one,” he asked as I set the timer on the microwave for a minute.

“Yeah, what do you feel like?”

“I don’t know what do you have?”

“Good question,” I muttered to myself crossing the kitchen to the pantry where I kept what little liquor I had only to find that I didn’t have anything I could really offer him. No beer, no wine…just port and a Mickey of brandy I used for French cooking.

I didn’t know what to do. I couldn’t very well leave him there and run to the liquor store.

I made my way out of the kitchen and into the lounge room towards the hallway.

“Can you do me a huge favor,” I asked and Adrian nodded.

“Sure.”

“When the microwave dings, can you put the food in Barney’s bowl, I just have to run downstairs for one second,” I told him and he nodded.

“Okay yeah sure.”

“Great thanks. Make yourself at home!” I reminded him before grabbing my keys and rushing out the door, I caught the elevator all the way downstairs and exited the building and once out I pressed Justin’s apartment number into the intercom.

“Yeah?”

“It’s me!” I responded and the door buzzed to let me back into the apartment.

I caught the elevator up to his floor and raced to his door knocking continuously until he opened it.

When he opened the door, something happened.

It was so quick I almost missed it, but for a moment I thought my heart skipped a beat looking up at Justin standing in the hallway. Until that is when he opened his mouth.

“Out of rubbers” he enquired flatly, “I only have Magnum size, they’ll be no good for him.”

I was mistaken.

It was nothing.

“I need to borrow some alcohol.”

Justin stood aside to let me in as I rushed past him towards his kitchen.

“Geez, times are tough when you have to get a prospect drunk before you can lay them.”

“Shut up, just stop talking and help me out here.”

“What do you want? Wine?”

“Yes wine is fine.”

“Red or white?”

“I don’t care as long as it’s not Japanese, Just give me something I can easily replace, actually red…red is sexy right?”

“Yeah especially the whole stained teeth thing, gets my motor going every time,” he said reaching to the back of his liquor cupboard and pulling out a bottle that as best I could tell was white.

“Try this one, it’s very sexy” he said simply, handing me the bottle and I didn’t even look at it.

“Thank you, Thank you” I said and grabbed him by the front of his pristine $80 tee shirt and kissed his cheek before rushing out of his apartment.

Once I was back at my apartment, I stood for a moment outside my door to collect myself before letting myself back in.

Barney was greedily guzzling food from his bowl that slid all about the kitchen floor and Bowser was delicately devouring her tuna from her porcelain plate on the window sill where Barney the greedy dog couldn’t get to it.

He even knew to put the cat’s dinner up where the dog couldn’t get to it.

I turned and smiled at him where he sat on my couch and walked over to him, fighting my urge to be very brazen and not only make the first move, but completely take control. The only thing holding me back was the thought that a guy who didn’t make the first move, might be put off by a girl who did.

But this guy was definitely a find.

I didn’t feel any reservations about him whatsoever, and he didn’t put a foot wrong from the very first day that I met him.

He rose from the couch and took the wine from my hands, resting it down on the coffee table, not breaking his gaze from me as he did it and my heart started to race because I knew what was coming.

Pulling me to him with an arm around my waist and a hand on my face he lowered his face and lingered for moment.

I responded by resting my hands on his chest and reaching up to close the gap between us and catching his mouth with mine.

Slowly our kiss began. Slow and gentle and promising a lot more to come.

It had been sometime since I had last been with a man and it wasn’t until this very heated, passionate kiss that I realized just how ripe I was.

As the kiss deepened and became more torrid, we collapsed onto the couch together the weight of him on me like an inescapable blanket of lust, grinding into me.

His hands touched all over and his mouth was doing to mine, what was nothing short of assault, robbing me of air so that when he finally burrowed his face into my neck, I gasped for air.

Eyes closed, racking at the shirt on his back it was so completely primal and devoid of thought and consideration. 

“Oh Justin,” I whispered into his neck so overcome that I didn’t even realize what I said until Adrian completely seized on top of me, like he had an off switch and lifted his head breathlessly staring down at me confusion etched in his brow.