Monique, a Personal Trainer and YouTube personality, walked in on her fiancΓ© of three years in bed with another woman.
She took Trey's betrayal hard and went on an unplanned hiatus from men.
Eight months later, she met an Uber driver named Alexander after a night out with her best friend.
Monique was still recovering from heartbreak but felt a strange connection to this man who made her smile.
Nothing romantic, just an appreciation for him.
Their second encounter wasn't as pleasant.
He showed up at the gym she worked at, looking for a personal trainer.
Because his original trainer quit, she was the replacement.
But he didn't want to work out with a woman.
He requested a man for a reason.
She was offended by what she perceived as sexism, and the two had a falling out.
He left the gym in a huff, with her dismissing him from her life as another loser.
Yet, after talking with her big brother, she realized that she was presumptuous.
After finding his phone number, she disguised herself as a random representative of the gym to find out why he was quitting.
She found out the real reason he wanted a male trainer, and it had nothing to do with sexism.
He was just insecure about his body.
She apologized, and the two of them talked it out.
She even convinced him to give her a chance as his trainer.
That was the beginning of their friendship.
Monique looked forward to their workout sessions together.
They made each other laugh, and their personalities complemented one another.
Monique eventually got over her ex.
She even had a random one-night stand with a guy she met at a club.
His name was Craig.
It felt great to be liberated from Trey's grasp on her heart.
It was a celebration of that liberty.
The next day, however, reality set in.
She had a massive hangover and was drained of energy to do anything with her day.
After realizing there was nothing to do, she called Alex.
The two hung out outside the gym for the first time while watching Star Wars.
That became a thing for them over the course of the next few months.
They watched everything Star Wars related.
In that time, they got to know each other a little more.
As much as Alex wanted to deny the growing attraction he had for Monique, he couldn't.
His best friend Greg had a feeling that she was attracted to Alex too, but he was too jilted over a past experience to take the leap.
Summer Fitzgerald was that experience; the ghost that kept haunting him from high school.
She repeatedly broke his heart by keeping him in the background while she pursued "the bad boys".
She even used him as a bait and switch to trick her mom into letting her stay out late.
That was the last straw for Alex, and he hadn't tried to pursue another woman since.
But now, his heart -- and Greg -- was telling him to carpe diem.
So, he leaned in for kiss.
Unfortunately, he was rejected yet again.
Monique wasn't ready for that, at least not with him.
Right now, she just wanted his friendship.
Nothing more.
Alex took that pretty hard.
He renewed his vow to stay clear of romantic relationships and to keep Monique at a distance.
This hurt Monique, and the two had a long discussion about it.
Fortunately, they were able to re-emerge from that discussion as friends.
However, things took a turn the day before Monique's birthday.
The two celebrated it with an incredibly thoughtful gift from Alex, but there was an even bigger surprise waiting for her.
Alex had met someone new; a girl.
He was going out on a date with Cameron, a girl from his high school days.
Monique had to come to grips with this.
It was then that she realized that her feelings for Alex weren't just about friendship.
She wanted to date him.
So, she told him how she felt.
His reaction wasn't what she'd hoped for.
You see, Alex took everything into account.
His question was, why now?
What changed?
He wasn't willing to take that risk.
He'd become comfortable with the idea that MoLex was nothing more than a strong friendship.
They had a fight about that, and eventually fell out.
But the two of them found their way back to each other.
Monique offered Alex a surprising choice; one she would never offer anyone else.
"Date both of us."
She said to him.
She was willing to share him.
Alex, being who he was, couldn't do that.
It wouldn't be fair to either woman.
Unlike Trey, he wasn't a guy who could date multiple women.
And so, they were back where they started:
just friends.
But were they really, or were they just deluding themselves?
******************************************************
Monique and Alex sat on her couch, each on either end. In front of them, credits were rolling on the final episode of
Game of Thrones.
"Well, that sucked." Monique said, not hiding her disappointment.
With a chuckle, Alex said, "I warned you."
"I mean...really?" she ranted. "It's like they got bored with their own show and said
fuck it
. After such a great build up, why would they just drive it off a cliff like that?"
"I think they were...uh...s-supposed to...umm..."
Alex's sentence trailed off into nothingness as his train of thought drove off the same cliff GOT season 8 did. The reason he was so distracted was because during his response Monique stood up and began cleaning up the coffee table, which was littered with bits of potato chips, cookie crumbs, and errant popcorn. In order to do this, she had to bend down to brush messy remnants of their movie time snacks with her hand.
In front of him, not even a couple of feet away from his face, was her ass. Those teeny, tiny shorts she always wore when she was just lounging around the house were severely inadequate in covering such a deliciously copious surface area; an area which only widened when she bent over. The roundness of her brown buttocks was peeking out from the bottom hem of either side.
She might as well have been wearing underwear. Ironically, judging by the lucky wedgie that was disappearing between her cheeks, it would appear she wasn't.
As she absentmindedly gave Alex the view of a lifetime, something came over him. It could best be described as a sense of bravery that had never existed in him before now, and probably would never exist again. It was completely isolated to this moment in time. A voice inside of him gave him permission to -- for once -- do what he'd been wanting to do all along.
It whispered to him, "
Do it."
Without realizing it, his hand had reached out and swatted her ass.
The loud
SMACK
as his hand made contact seemed to vibrate across the silent room. All other sound just ceased. Neither of them moved, as if they were both frozen in time as they tried to figure out what just happened.
"Did he just..."
Slowly, without even standing up, she turned her head and looked back at him. Her eyes were narrowed into a glare; her forehead furrowed.
"Did you just...smack my ass?"
He sat there, looking just as stunned as she was. She wondered what his response would be. Would he lie, apologize, or say it was an accident?