Cash Is Money

Zoe shoots the breeze with a good friend while discussing the state of her relationship.

"Sorry, I have a boyfriend," Zoe smiled politely before getting back to thumbing through the clearance rack. Gwen had been spying on the brief interaction and finally walked over.

"Man, he was so cute. It would be awesome for a guy like that to ask for my number," she said.

"Then go ask for his," Zoe replied without looking away from the clothes she continued to paw through.

"What? No way! That's not how it's supposed to work," Gwen scoffed.

"Says who? Gwendolyn, you watch too many eighties movies. Just catch up to him and ask. It'll be hard for him to use the 'I have a girlfriend' excuse, considering he just asked for my number," Zoe offered.

Gwen sighed, shook her head, and looked down at the ground before looking back back up to ask, "How are you and Cash doing, anyway?"

Without a moment's hesitation Zoe gushed, "Nothing short of amazing. I feel a tad bit bad for it. There's so many unhappy couples just going through the motions. Not sure why they do it to themselves," she finished, shrugging off a slight look of concern.

"I know!" Gwen agreed, "So, why do you guys work so well?"

Zoe thought for a moment before admitting, "And I've thought about this a lot, but I couldn't pinpoint it to one thing. Maybe that's telling of a good relationship," Zoe suggested, "having several strong points." Gwen tilted her head while Zoe continued, "One thing is for sure, I was the one that approached Cash. Not the other way around," she said slyly while looking around to see if the guy Gwen liked was still in the vicinity. "It's super cliche, but we're just ourselves with one another and it helps a lot. It also doesn't hurt that he and I are just a couple of perverts," Zoe fidgeted. "I forgot to tell you! You know how we play music off of his phone? Well, we set it up to connect to my car's Bluetooth automatically. I go to pick up this animal from our place, he hops in the car and before he even pulls his phone out of his pocket, it syncs and starts playing a porn that he was in the middle of watching while he was waiting for me get there," Zoe laughed. "I don't know what I'm going to do with him," she joked.

Gwen pursed her lips to muffle a giggle.

"Oh my god! You pervs deserve one another.”

"Uh huh… you’re the most sexually repressed person I know and even you would get a kick out of that," Zoe replied. “I remember the first time he caught me complimenting myself."

"Zoe! You compliment yourself?" asked Gwen, bug-eyed..

"Of course," she replied.

"Out loud?!" Gwen asked in disbelief.

"Yeah," Zoe shrugged. "A habit I got into when I lived alone.”

Gwendolyn smiled big, "What were you saying?"

Zoe flushed,"I was walking past a mirror in my favorite bra, stopped, and said, 'Nice rack.' I winked even winked. He saw the whole thing."

Gwen laughed while her palms were cupped up to her face. "Zoe! Noo!"

"I’ve been feeling really secure with myself since I’ve been with him. You know more than anyone that I’m a bit of a nut case when it comes to jealousy-induced episodes," Zoe started. “But maybe it’s what I need. Someone who doesn’t bring out the worst in me, but makes me forget the worst in me. And yeah, it doesn’t hurt that he looks like he’s from the planet “Hottie” and a drummer in our town’s most popular band,” Zoe playfully beamed.

“Yeah. I always have fun at his band’s shows.” Gwen recalled and added, “But I think it would drive me nuts to see all the attention he gets from other girls. Does he know why you and Jack broke up?”

“Nope,” Zoe replied, “Cash and I have an unspoken ‘Don’t ask, don’t tell’ policy in regards to past relationships, which works wonderfully. Not sure why I didn’t think of it before.”

Gwen nodded, “Hmm that makes sense.”

"Anyway, my favorite Cash story was from our first date, before the date even started. Apparently, he was frantically cleaning up around his place, on the off chance I would end up back there with him, but he's texting me the entire time. While he was cleaning the toilet, plop, he dropped his phone in. This was before our first date, so that was his only way of getting ahold of me. Without missing a beat, he rushed to the store, used the last of his money to change phones, and wasn't even late picking me up.”

“The last of his money? What about the date?” Gwen interrupted.

“Well, I asked him out, so before the date I told him I’d pay and then we alternated paying from then on.”

Gwen nodded and asked through an amused smile, “He told you he dropped his phone in the toilet?”

“He told me the story after we'd been dating for a few months. Yeah...He's not a goalie, but he's definitely a keeper."