Me:Does Lee know he’s supposed to be on a date with me? Or wasthis your sneaky secret and you hoped we’d just hit it off?
Her phone beeps butthe guys don’t pay it any attention.
Livi:He knows. He’s just shy.
Me:He’s not even talking to me.
Livi:He’s shy!
She turns aroundand winks at me from the front seat. I roll my eyes.
“It’s a nice dayoutside,” I say during a lull in the conversation.
“Yeah, it is,” Leesays back. He actually turns to look at me. Hallelujah! He knows I exist. Hisblue eyes meet mine and I smile and he smiles, and suddenly it feels like maybethisisa date.
When we get to therestaurant, Lee walks around to my side of the truck and closes the door afterI get out. Livi and Mason hold hands, as always, and Lee and I trail alongbeside them. He keeps close to me, so that any passing stranger might thinkwe’re both couples. When we get to the restaurant, he holds open the door forme.
Well, that’s nice.
We’re seated at anoutdoor table again, and the conversation flows nicely between the four of us.But Lee isn’t much of a one-on-one talker. Livi brings up my restaurant and Leenods politely but doesn’t ask anything else. Gabe was fascinated by my bakery.He thought it was cool and we spent at least an hour lying in bed talking aboutit. Oh well, I tell myself. Gabe is a business owner so maybe that’s why hefound my job interesting.
“What do you do fora living?” I ask Lee.
He sits a littlestraighter and plays with the empty straw wrapper on the table. “I, uh, docarpet installation.”
“Oh that’s cool,” Isay. Even though it’s not really that cool at all. “Do you like it?”
“Nah, it blows.”
And then ourconversation is over. I glance at Livi who gives me this frustrated look. She’salso wishing he would talk a little more. How am I supposed to get to know aguy if he doesn’t ever talk?
Halfway throughdinner, I just give up on getting to know him and I talk with Livi while theguys talk about motorcycle stuff. I’d tried to be openminded about this and notcompare Lee to Gabe, but I can’t help it. I can practically visualize this samesituation but with Gabe sitting in Lee’s spot, and the outcome would be totallydifferent. Gabe would love talking to Mason about the motorcycle shop, andabout my bakery, and I’m sure he’d get along with Livi, too. He’d be funny andsweet, and when I accidentally dropped my fork, he’d probably have bent overand picked it up for me. Instead, Lee just snorted out a laugh and said, “Thatsucks” while I waited for the waitress to bring me a new one.
This isn’t really abig deal. As soon as Livi brought up the idea, I thought it was kind of stupid,so I shouldn’t be disappointed that the entire night is a total waste. But I’mstill recovering from the ache of meeting Gabe, so everything feels shittierthan it should in the moment.
Finally, the dinneris over, and finally, Mason gets back to his house, and I tell Lee a politegoodbye and then follow Livi into the house while the guys stay outside to talkabout the bike. You’d think that bike was solid gold the way they talk aboutit.
“Sorry that datesucked,” Livi says.
I shake my head. “Idon’t even think we can call it a date.”
“Lee seems so nice,but I had no idea he’d be so boring.” Livi reaches into the fridge and grabs apitcher of iced tea and pours us each a glass.
“I’m guessing hejust didn’t like what he saw.” I glance down at my body to punctuate my point.
“No way,” Livisays. “He’s just boring. You’re hot.”
“Doubtful.”
She sets her glassdown so hard on the granite countertop that I fear it’ll break. “Alexa, hetotally thinks you’re hot. He even said it at the shop the other day, which iswhy I got the idea.”
My brows furrow.“Oh. Well, then I feel even worse now.”
Livi laughs. “Why?”
“If he doesn’tthink I’m ugly then why was he so boring?”
“He’s aguy, Alexa. Guys can’t be explained.”
