Page 29 of Choosing Her
“You stepped away while she tried to kiss you,” Mako interrupted. “That’s a rejection.”
I looked to Tino for help but he just nodded in agreement. I didn’t look to see what Bear thought.
“All of these girls signed up for a date via an application,” I said. “Shouldn’t they assume I’m going out with multiple people?”
“Sure,” Tino said, “but you don’t want to flaunt it in front of them. There’s a fine science to dating multiple people at once.”
“Says the guy who has been pining after the same girl for two years.”
He gave me a dirty look. “Yeah, like you’re one to talk.”
Okay, he wasn’t exactly wrong about that but I still glared at him anyway, because I was doing everything I could to get over my love for Saylor. I was doing better at it than he was withhis adoration of Lilah—at least I was dating other people. Sure, I was being forced into it by my friends, but any progress was good.
We were early for the date when we got to the cafe, so I went to sit at a table while the other three split off to find their own spot to watch. This time, they didn’t try to stay out of my view, which I preferred, since I wouldn’t be on edge, constantly looking for where they were. Then again, maybe it wasn’t ideal, because they were all acting completely ridiculous.
Bear had his face buried in a newspaper. Tino was pointing at random spots on the wall, acting as if he was seeing invisible objects flying around. And Mako was trying to lounge on his chair, sitting sideways with his head resting against the wall and his long legs sticking out into the aisle. It might have worked, except that he looked pretty much as uncomfortable as a person could be.
Group Name:The Penalty Box
Members:Bear, Tino, Crossy, Mako
Crossy
Stop acting so weird
She’s gonna notice you
I saw all three of them pull out their phones, but none of them responded. And then they went back to their ridiculous actions from before. I just hoped my date didn’t get weirded out by them. Crap, had I forgotten her name already? It started a K, I thought. It was like Katie, but not Katie because I had just seen her. And it wasn't Caitlyn, either, because I'd gone on a date with her three days ago. And she didn’t have the same name as eitherof them. When Mako said it, I hadn’t thought it was one I’d gone out with before.
Crossy
HELP
WHAT’S HER NAME??
I saw Mako grabbing his phone and breathed a sigh of relief. But just as he started typing, somebody behind me said, “Caleb, right?”
I quickly shoved my phone in my pocket before she could accidentally see the message on my screen, the jumped to my feet so quickly that the chair clattered loudly as it was pushed backward. The perky blonde who was now standing next to me took a step back in surprise.
“Sorry,” I choked out. I cleared my throat. “You took me by surprise.”
I stuck a hand out for her to shake, realizing a second too late that it was the most awkward way to start a date. The girl thought so too, if the look of disgust on her face as she slipped her hand into mine was anything to go off. Should I have hugged her? No, that seemed really forward. I tried to remember how I’d started out all the other dates I’d gone on recently. I guess with most of them, we hadn’t touched at all—no handshake, no hug, no anything. I guess the panic of not knowing her name had thrown me off a little.
“Should we get drinks?” I asked the girl. Cassandra? Catalina? Katherine? She nodded with a small smile and I gestured for her to go first to go into the line behind a middle-aged couple. They seemed like they’d never been to a coffee shop before, based on how the husband kept asking the wife basic questions about the drink, like what espresso was and if amatcha latte had coffee in it. I had a feeling we'd be standing in line forever behind them.
I turned to the blonde girl. Her hair was pulled back into a braid, similar to the one Saylor had been wearing in the stable the other day. It was neater than Saylor’s braid, with no pieces hanging out like hers had been, that I thought came from Saylor’s workout. Strangely, I found myself missing that.
“So, how are you?” I asked, trying to push thoughts of Saylor from my mind. Thinking about the girl I was trying to get over while on a first date probably wasn’t a good idea, right?
The girl shrugged. “Fine.”
Okay, maybe that wasn’t the best question for me to start off with, but with being on my third date of the day, I was running out of good conversation starters. I didn’t want to just have the same conversation over and over again. I thought of New Year’s Eve and of the way that the conversation had flowed so easily between us. Why hadn’t I been able to recreate that on any of these dates? Maybe it was because going on a first date from an ad was too planned. We hadn’t stumbled upon each other, we agreed to meet and we had to stay here for a certain amount of time to not be rude. It was completely different than stumbling upon a girl in a party and knowing that anything could come of it—a thirty second interlude or an all-night, never-ending conversation.
“Why don’t you tell me about yourself?” I suggested. I hated using that as a first question since it was the way everyone started set-up dats like this and it was awkward to answer, because you had to just randomly list stuff you thought the other person would find it interesting. But my mind was blank on any other questions right now.
“Uh…” The girl said, squinting her eyes. “Why don’t you go first?”
Okay, fair enough. I couldn’t ask her to answer if I wasn’t able to answer myself.
