There are times in a person’s life where they need to choose a path at a fork in the road. So they sit down at a table or flop on the couch and grab a notepad and the last chewed-up Bic in the house with no lid on it. They make two columns on their little yellow pad: one for pros and one for cons. And on one side they write down all the good things that could come of cranking up some AC/DC and riding that Highway to Hell, and on the other side: all the unpleasant fallout that would warn against it.

Line by line, point by point they’d see the score adding up, and sooner or later it would become clear. Right there in front of them would be the reasonable, rational answer and, regardless of what they wanted in their greedy little hearts, they could put their finger square on the best choice. Knowing they’d examined all possibilities, they could take the path that wouldn’t bite them in the ass later.

For Taylor Sharpe, sitting at the entrance of an abandoned mine in the middle of nowhere with her best friend Ian, right now was not one of those times.

“You ever heard the term ‘bro-job’?” She punctuated the question with another swig from her water bottle to avoid having to make eye contact.

“Uhm, no.” He laughed. “Do I even want to?”

“Well, I’d tell you to look it up, but it’s not like there’s Wi-Fi out here.”

“OK? So?”

What the fuck are you doing, Sharpe?

“It’s when two straight dudes who’re friends help each other out in the blow job department.” He was already snorting. “One of them’s going through a dry spell and the other one scratches his back. Or well … you know.”

“Um, I am not asking Nick for a bro-job, Sharpie,” he said, making a double-handed gesture of negation beneath climbing eyebrows that spoke of confused amusement. “Thought you’d know me better than that by now.”

Just stop. Laugh it off.

“I’m not talking about Nick, dumbass. I mean, Me.”

The first traces of nerves showed when he sat up a little straighter on his rock. “I don’t think it counts if a girl does it.” The humor was still in his voice, but things had just jumped off the ledge into Weird. Some mature, responsible part of her sighed somewhere, turned off the lights, and shut the door, knowing the whole thing was beyond saving.

“Oh stop,” she said. “I’ve been one of the boys since the day we met. Probably why I keep going through boyfriends. They think they’re getting a girl and then, BAM! Wrong again!”

“Yeah well, except for that one time at New Year’s,” he said, looking at the dirt with a wry grin.

“Eh. There was alcohol. That doesn’t count.” She waved him off with a hand.

Ian looked up at her then, forehead wrinkled in incredulity. “Hey, uhh … if you’re fuckin’ serious—I mean … I appreciate the offer and all that but …”

“But what?” Taylor said, standing. “I am serious. Free bro-job. Right now.” She took two steps in his direction and his eyebrows shot back up.