“Well—it’s one o’clock. I would have thought you’d be dressed. Since you knew I was coming over.”
“Aw, Shira.” He stretched out his legs, crossing his ankles on an ottoman. “I would have dressed up for you if I knew you cared.”
“I don’t.”
He held his thumb and forefinger an inch apart. “Maybe the teeniest bit?”
Tyler reminded me of a cat playing with a mouse, not for food but for entertainment. “Why do you keep teasing me?”
He grinned, those perfectly orthodontically straightened teeth blinding. “I just want to win your affections.”
This boy. He could get under my skin like no one, and it mademe want to do the same. “I think you tease and you flirt because you think it makes people like you. And I think you hate the idea of anyone not liking you.”
His mouth parted slightly and he leaned back. “Shots fired.”
“Am I wrong? You didn’t like me not liking you.”
“We’re here to psychoanalyze you, not me.” He took a long sip of his coffee. “All right, let’s cut to the chase, then. What are we working with?”
“Um. Excuse me?”
He gestured at me broadly. “If we’re going to do this, I want to know how much work we have cut out for us. You wouldn’t teach someone calculus without figuring out how good they are at math, right?”
“Not at all the same.” I sat down in an armchair kitty-corner from his couch. “But fine. What do you want to know?”
He sipped his coffee as he appraised me. “You said you hadn’t kissed anyone. So... no past relationships? No hookups?” He waited as I shook my head for both. “How comfortable are you flirting?”
I tried to smile, but it felt tight and brittle on my lips. “I’m not. I can’t flirt.”
“Huh.” He leaned back.
I was uncomfortably aware of the way his shirt rose slightly and the ripple of skin over his stomach. “What does ‘huh’ mean?”
“Nothing. I’m taking everything into consideration. Makinga game plan.” He tilted his head. “Why do you think you can’t flirt?”
I tried not to sound curt. “Obviously I’ve failed every time I’ve tried. And like I said, I’ve never had a boyfriend.”
“That’s the outcome. It doesn’t help us figure out what’s happening with your flirting. How do you usually flirt?”
Embarrassment tightened all my muscles, like I was trying to compress myself into nothingness. “I’m not sure I do. It seems so... obvious.”
He tilted his head. “What seems obvious?”
“I don’t know.” Heat crawled through me, and I tugged off my sweater. “I don’t want to seem—I don’t want—”
I didn’t want people to know if I had a crush on them. Which hadn’t seemed so weird until right now, as I articulated the feeling. “I don’t want anyone to realize I like them.”
Tyler looked genuinely confused. “Why not? If you want to date someone, don’t theyhaveto learn you like them for anything to happen?”
True. I realized, in a blinding, obvious epiphany, that I wanted the person I liked to pursue me without me, personally, having to bear any vulnerability. Shamefaced, I said, “I guess I just want them to realize they like me and ask me out.”
“You don’t want to make the first move,” he said easily. “Classic fear of rejection. You have to get over that hump.”
Easier said than done. “How?”
“Hmm.” He tapped his fingers against his thigh. “You need to flip a switch in your brain. Get yourself to see most people areflatteredwhen others express an interest in them. No one’s going to laugh at you for putting yourself out there.”
I let out an actual laugh, sharp and high and bright. My voice came out as pointed as the icicles glittering outside the windows. “Are you serious?”
