January 2020:

      Ashley pulled into his driveway, easing the Charger in next to his most recent acquisition, a fully-restored jet-black 1956 Oldsmobile that he had dubbed "Evil-Lyn", after a favorite cartoon character from his childhood. He made sure to leave as much space between the two vehicles as possible, since the thought of damaging either one by banging it with the door of the other was almost physically painful to him. 

      He made his way to the front door, and as he stepped into the entryway, an appetizing smell drifted through from the kitchen, and he realized that Aerin had apparently had one of her infrequent "domestic impulses" and decided to cook dinner. She claimed to not really enjoy that particular chore, so he did the majority of the household cooking, but she would occasionally surprise him. He paused to hang up his coat and car keys, then hurried through to the kitchen to see what she had come up with.

      As he entered the kitchen, he saw his roommate standing by the stove, carefully peeling a sheet of foil off of a baking pan, which was emitting clouds of steam. "Hey there, sugar!" he called out. "What smells so good?"

      "Well, it's called 'Forgotten Chicken', according to the recipe," she responded. "I found it on Pinterest, and we had all of the ingredients, so I figured I could whip some up, since you've been working your ass off for the last couple of weeks. It comes with a built-in side dish, so we just need a salad, and we're all set."

      "I think I can handle that," Ashley stated, so he went to the refrigerator to gather the components for a salad while Aerin placed the pan back into the oven to broil for a bit. In fairly short order, they had everything ready, and decided to just eat at the kitchen island, instead of taking the time to set the table. After drizzling a bit of dressing over his salad, he removed a chicken breast from the pan and placed it on his plate, then scooped out some of the creamy-looking rice it rested on. "Looks pretty good," he observed. "What's in this, exactly?"

      "I mixed up a can of cream of mushroom soup, a can of cream of chicken, some water, and Minute Rice, then laid the chicken on top, and sprinkled French onion soup mix over the meat to make a coating," she informed him. "Quick and simple, just how I like it."

      "Well, I appreciate the thought, sugar," Ashley declared as he lifted a piece of the chicken to his mouth. His eyebrows raised as he chewed, and once he had swallowed, he said, "Yeah, this one's a keeper. That French onion coating kind of works its way through the chicken, and gives it a really good flavor."

      "The rice isn't too shabby, either," Aerin replied. "Try some of it before it has a chance to get cold."

      He did so, and agreed that it was quite tasty, even though it was a bit richer than his usual fare, since he generally followed a fairly strict health-oriented diet, with minimal fat, sugar, or carbs, and a near-complete absence of red meat, allowing only a scattering of bacon over his salad on rare occasions. But since he watched what he ate the majority of the time, he reasoned that there was nothing wrong with the occasional indulgent meal or dessert. After they had eaten their fill, Aerin scooped the leftovers into containers and put them into the refrigerator, while Ashley loaded the dishwasher, after which they retired to the living room to relax, and possibly watch a movie. 

      But, before Ash even had a chance to sit down, his phone started to ring, and Aerin curled up on the couch with the remote, waiting to select a movie as he took a call from someone who seemed to be in Las Vegas, judging by some of his responses. Then, when he finished that call, he had to respond to a series of texts from his friend Jeremiah, with whom he was involved in a home-renovation project, and then to reply to a voicemail from another friend, Chisa. Finally, when it seemed that no one else was going to attempt to contact him, he placed the phone on the end table and said, "Sorry about that, Aerin. I don't know why it is that everyone seems to wind up trying to contact me simultaneously, and usually right around this time of day."

      "Because they know you well enough by now to figure out that if they try to call you any earlier, they'll either be interrupting something, or you won't answer because you don't want to be interrupted," his roommate observed. "Lately, you're either in the recording studio trying to get the new song ready for release, or trying to pull the video together. And if you're not there, you're at APFI, or poking around old houses with your biker-looking friend."

      "Hey, Jeremiah is a good guy!"

      "Never said he wasn't," Aerin retorted. "He seemed pretty cool when you brought him by last month, although I kind of get the feeling that I prolly shouldn't get into any sort of... 'theological discussions' with him, all things considered. But, you cannot sit here with your bare face hanging out and tell me that the dude doesn't look for all the world like he should be on a soundstage somewhere wearing a 'SAMCRO' jacket."

      "Well, when you put it that way..." Ashley chuckled. "Yeah, he could probably pull that off. But we can talk about that later, right now, let's figure out what looks good on Netflix."

      They finally settled on a movie, but as they watched, Ashley was slightly distracted by a thought that crossed his mind, most likely prompted by the earlier conversation. So, once the movie credits were rolling on the TV screen, he turned to his friend and said, "Hey, Aerin, would you mind if I ask you something?"

      "Couldn't tell ya if I mind until I hear it, but give it a shot. If I don't wanna answer, I'll tell you straight up."

      "It just suddenly occurred to me that I hardly ever see you actually using your phone for anything but games and your reading sites," he explained. "So do you just talk or text with your friends when I'm at work or something?"

      She offered him a lopsided grin and replied, "No, because other than you, the only friend I actually have is Aidan, and we chat on either the reading site or Facebook."

      "Is this somebody you know from back home?"

      "Nope, we got acquainted through comments we left on each other's stories," Aerin said. "I guess you'd say that she's a friend I haven't met yet, but she's been nicer to me than basically anybody except you. She hasn't judged me because of my religious views, or my... 'other interests', if you take my meaning."

      A slight flush rose in Ashley's cheeks at this statement, as he considered some of the new "interests" that he himself had developed since the two of them had become roommates, some of which Aerin had introduced him to. He chuckled again, and replied, "Yeah, I'm pretty sure I do."

      "I'm not sure she totally understands all of it, but her basic philosophy is, 'As long as nobody's getting hurt, you do you, and I'll do me, and we can all be cool.' When I messaged her to let her know that I was gettin' the fuck outta North Carolina, the first thing she sent back was a message that I was welcome to crash on her couch for a bit if I made it as far as Missouri."

      This roused Ashley's curiosity, and he queried, "If you've never actually met this Aidan person, what do you really know about her, then? Do you have any pictures or anything?"

      "No, she doesn't put her pics online," Aerin informed him. "She uses her pen name on all of her social media, because she says that there are people that she'd rather not know she's on social media. Not sure if that's personal, or work-related, cuz she's mentioned that her job has government contracts, and I know some of those assholes can get a little weird about stuff you put on the internet."

      "I take it that she's a fanfic writer, too, then?"

      "Yep, and she can be as much of an evil bitch with her stories as I can, if not more so," Aerin said. "She's actually had me screaming at my laptop with some of the cliffhangers she's pulled out. You should give her stuff a shot sometime, since you didn't totally hate mine, and she doesn't do any of those stories. You know, the ones that creep you out? I'd suggest trying out her murder mystery, you might be surprised at what your fictional self is capable of doing."

      "Maybe I'll do that. But fictions aside, what do you really know about this chick if she's so secretive? I mean, I totally get keeping some of your shit private, but you have to be careful about people you meet online, y'know. She could be catfishing you or something."

      "I can't imagine how, or even why," Aerin retorted. "She's never asked me for anything, or tried to talk me into doing anything, either. Basically, we talk about stories, or music, and she didn't have a problem letting me bitch to her about my mom. That's more than anybody except for you was willing to do."

      Ashley opened his mouth to reply, but at that moment, another idea struck him. "Well, there's a way to figure out if you're right or not," he informed his roommate. "I'm kind of surprised that you haven't thought of it yourself."

      "And that would be...?"

      "Message this chick and see if she'd be interested in doing a Skype session," he stated. "That way, she doesn't have to put her face out publicly if she doesn't want to, but you could both finally know for sure that you're dealing with the person you think you are. Because if you think about it, she doesn't have a clue if you're for real, either. Which means that she's either for real and too nice for her own good, or she had something up her sleeve when she made that offer. So if she agrees to Skype, you'll know she's the real deal, and if not, you can cut her off before she can try to scam you or anything."

      She stared at him in silence for several seconds before flinging her arms around him and planting a kiss on his cheek. "Y'know what? I'm surprised I didn't think of that, too. I think I'll go do that right now, before she heads off to bed, since she says that she has to get up at the ass-crack of dawn for work. I hope she goes for it, cuz it would be nice to know what my other best friend actually looks like."

      As she rose from the couch, Ashley said, "Before you do that, why don't you give me the name of that story you wanted me to read? I might go ahead and check out a few chapters before I turn in."

      She grabbed the notepad that he kept on the end table and jotted down the book title and Aidan's username, then fairly skipped down the hall to her room. Ashley watched her go, then retrieved his own laptop and logged into the writing site. As he typed the username into the searchbar, he mumbled, "Shit, I hope this chick is for real, cause Aerin's gonna be pretty much crushed if she's not. Because I sure as hell know how much it sucks to have someone you think is your friend turn out to be anything but."

      He pulled up the profile, and clicked on the book that Aerin had named. And as he began to read the summary, he raised an eyebrow and murmured to himself, "What the hell do we have here? Okay, let's see what sort of trouble this girl has gotten 'me' into."