Page 41 of Best I Never Had

“There was something I wanted to…throw out there,” José says, interrupting the unintentional humming sound I’m making in the midst of my heavy slurping.

I stop, curious but a little apprehensive. The last time he looked at me the way he’s looking at me right now, suggestive and insistent, I sat through a blind coffee date with a man who thought diva cups were a special type of chalice meant for “boss ladies.”

“I feel like I should be nervous, but go on.” I gesture toward him to continue.

“I want to set you up,” he finally says.

“That’s what I thought.” I sigh. “No.”

“Nah-taliaa,” he whines, elongating the vowels as his almost nonexistent accent becomes thicker.

I hold up my hand. “Did you not learn from the last time?”

“That was a mistake,” he confesses. “I should have known the moment he compared himself to Dwayne ‘The Rock’ Johnson.”

I focus my attention on cleaning up our trash, hurriedly standing from our table while collecting various wax wrappings and paper boxes. José gathers his own trash and follows.

“My cousin Shawn just moved to Manhattan,” he explains as his urgent steps catch up with mine. “He’s in desperate need of a woman. A companion.”

“Then get him a dog,” I say briskly.

“I showed him your picture.”

I side-eye him.

“He’s interested.”

I roll my eyes.

“And he’s a good person, Natalia.”

“Then why is he so desperate?”

“Well, he’s not really ‘desperate,’” he says, using air quotes. “He’s just lonely.”

My face softens.Boy, do I know whatthatfeels like.Just as the inconvenience of being set up draws up an imaginative shield, I lower it, feeling sorry for this lonely cousin.

Breaking under José’s over exaggerated pout, I throw my hands up in surrender. “Fine. I’ll think about it.”

He squeals and wraps his arms around me. “And I promise he isn’t some creep or serial killer.”

“If he is, then you’re buying lunch every single day until I retire.IfI’m not chopped into tiny human chunks and fed to the seagulls.” I finally smile before playfully shrugging him off my shoulders as we continue our walk back to theoffice.

I guess misery really does love company. Who would have thought the one thing to convince me to go on a blind date would be my loneliness? Sympathizing for another lonely soul in New York City. And then I realize I haven’t felt as lonely as of late. As much as those bouts of loneliness waver in and out, the last time I felt truly lonely was before Hayden came along. Ever since we came to the decision, much to Hayden’s persistence, to call each other when we were lonely, it’s as if I’ve been filling that void with him. With memories of him, memories ofus. That empty hole Matteo left behind is now being filled with my past.

The smirk that creeps up on my face as I think about my long-stretched phone call with Hayden while we talked about everything and nothing comes out of nowhere. While I reminded him of his aversion to dead animal carcasses, he reminded me of my obsession with pastel gel pens and color-coordinated highlighters. As I teased him about his teeny-tiny fixation on Emma Stone and her stunning red hair, he reminded me of my own addiction to Swedish Fish, voicing his disgust for the snack I used to sneak in small bites when Mr. Khan had his back turned to us.

José and I are walking on the semi-crowded sidewalk bustling with other nine-to-fivers on their lunch break when we walk past a small bookstore. I peek inside through the glass display window, peering at the shelves lining the walls and small tables full of best sellers and sales.

“Can we go in for a second?” I ask José, who’s busy with his nose buried in his phone.

He looks up as his gaze lifts toward the storefront. “Sure,” he answers.

When we enter the shop, the copper bell chimes, welcoming us, as well as the scent of old, dusty books. I can practically feel the coarse pages rubbing between my fingers and the spines splitting as they’re cracked open for the first time. My fingers trace over the shelves as I leisurely walk the aisles, recognizing titles from John Green and Danielle Steel before I land on a copy ofThe Perks of Being a Wallflower. The smile that spreads across myface transitions into a full giggle. I’m still laughing to myself when I remove it off the shelf. And before I know it, I’m clutching it against my chest, spreading my warmth through it. As if transferring my memories into the tightly bound pages so I can physically hold it in my hands.

“What’s so funny?” José asks from behind me.

I shake my head, tucking my chin toward my chest as if sharing a silent inside joke with myself and the book.

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