Page 35 of The Problem with Dating

“Yes, actually, it does.” I downed my shot and poured another round. “So you either can help me clean this place up or—”

He sniffed the air. “Did you burn something?”

I grumbled, remembering the empanadas. “I don’t want to talk about it.”

“You never burn anything.”

“I was distracted.”

Noah frowned and patted me on the shoulder. “By your sadness?”

“What? No. By Yara.”

He raised a curious brow. “Oh, you’ve got a thing for the girl next door, huh? Or, more so across the street. I can’t blame you. She’s beautiful. Nice, too.”

There was that word again—nice. Good ole nice Yara.

Why did that bother me so much? Why did she irritate me to my core? People were my least favorite thing in the world. I’d made it a life mission not to care about them, but Yara kept crossing my mind for some reason. It was almost as if she’d unpacked her bags in my head and pitched a tent to live there.

“I don’t have a thing for that woman,” I grumbled like an old man. “She’s a pain and a stereotypical small-town person with a small-town mind.”

“What’s wrong with that? I like small-town girls. I’m engaged to one, remember?”

“Chicago is not a small town.”

“It is when you compare it to New York City,” he explained. “It’s all about perspective.”

“Can we talk about something else?” I said, wanting to move the conversation from Mandy because it always circled back to Catie, and I was beyond done speaking about her.

The best thing about the past was leaving it there.

“Sure. Maybe we can discuss that the last thing you texted me was that you weren’t attending the funeral this afternoon.”

“I’m not.”

“Yes, you are.”

“No. I’m not.”

“Alex…”

“I’m too busy opening the restaurant. I can’t take time off.”

“Buddy…”

I sighed. “I don’t have time for this, Noah. She died, and it sucked, and I’m dealing with it the best way I can think to, all right?”

“And how exactly are you dealing with it?”

By not dealing with it at all.

He sighed and pinched the bridge of his nose. “It will be a beautiful service. Teresa will like it.”

“No, she wouldn’t.”

He arched an eyebrow. “What do you mean?”

“Teresa hated funerals. She thought they were ridiculous. Besides, a few years ago, we’d walked past a church holding a funeral service, and she told me exactly what she thought of them.”

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