Page 30 of Choosing Her
“Well, my name’s Caleb Cross, as you know.” I was hoping that might prompt her to say her own name, but she stayed silent and stared at me, clearly waiting for me to continue. “And I’m on the Hartwell hockey team. I’m a senior, so lately I’ve been thinking of what college I want to go to. And…” I tried to think of one last fact to add on since I thought I hadn’t shared enough, and came back to the one I always said: “And I’m the eldest of five siblings.”
“Oh,” the girl said, not looking remotely interested. She chewed on the inside of her cheek and looked around, her gaze not staying on any one place long enough for me to think she was actually distracted by anything. She just didn’t want to be looking at me, apparently.
“Do you have any siblings?” I asked.
“No.”
“Only child, huh? What’s that like?” I couldn’t imagine what it was like to be an only child. The only time I came close to it was when I was staying with my mom in the summer, while Aspen and Alivia were with their dad, but even then, I was always in contact with all my siblings. I couldn’t imagine not having them to talk to all the time.
“I don’t know,” she mumbled. “It’s fine, I guess.”
I waited for her to continue or to start a new topic of conversation, but she just fell silent, still looking anywhere but me. I looked at the counter, where the middle-aged couple was now asking the barista questions instead of each other, and wondered if there was any way I could get them to hurry up.
“Boarding school must be a big change for you, then,” I said, turning back to the girl. Surely, there was something I could say that would get her to start talking.
She shrugged. “Yeah. More people around.”
I cracked my knuckles just for the sake of something to do and looked around. I could see the boys in the corner, still acting as unnatural as they could possibly be, and wondered whether they could tell how terrible this date was going. I wished that we’d made some sort of signal for them to get me out of here, like Aspen had done for me last week. My hand itched to grab my phone and just text them SOS or something, but I was sure with the girl standing right next to me, she would notice. Maybe I could excuse myself to the bathroom after we ordered and text them there. Or maybe we could just go our separate ways after getting our drinks, since we’d been in this line for so long that it felt like we’d already had the entire date.
“So, what are you going to get to drink?” I asked.
“Just coffee.”
My answer was probably the same, although somehow the word coffee had never seemed so boring. But this was the first crumb of information she had really given me, and I tried to jump on it.
“Like iced coffee?” I asked, thinking of Saylor again. “You know, they have tons of flavor shots you can get. My favorite?—”
“Hot coffee,” she interrupted. “With one cream and one sugar.”
“Oh. Right.” I cleared my throat and stuck my hands in my pockets. “Well, that’s fun too. A classic.”
“Mh-hm.”
I looked around again, hoping for anything to start up a conversation about, but there was truly nothing. Finally, I just tipped my head back towards the ceiling and started counting the seconds until we got to go.
If you were wondering, it was one-hundred-and-eighty-one seconds before the barista called us up. That was three whole minutes of total and utter silence. And then more silence while we waited for our drinks to be made. And, you guessed it, thesilence continued once we sat down—because I hadn’t found a way of suggesting that we could just walk home now that didn’t sound ridiculously insulting. It was so much silence that I was genuinely considering faking a heart attack right here, because at least the emergency room would have something going on.
Please, universe, I am begging you to make this date even mildly more interesting.
The door chimed as somebody walked in, and I was bored enough that I actually turned around to look. Then I immediately spun back around to the table and told the universenever mind, I didn’t mean it. If I could fit under this table, would that be enough to hide me from their view?
“Caleb!”
I sighed. So much for that plan.
“I thought that was you,” Naomi continued in a sickly sweet tone, as she came up beside the table. My date glanced at her, then at me, then just stared down at her coffee without saying anything. I wondered what was going on in her head. Was she mad that another girl was interrupting our date? Or did she just not care about anything at all?
Saylor came up beside her sister a second later, leaving a small gap between them. It had been a while since I’d been with the two of them together. The last time had to be when Naomi and I were still dating, but it hadn’t happened much even during the relationship, when I thought back on it. After I’d tried to break ties with Saylor by telling her that we should forget everything that happened between us, she’d kept her distance, even when I was over at her house. But could I blame her for it? All I’d been trying to do was follow my mom’s advice that if I got to know Saylor again, I would realize she wasn’t as magical as I remembered her being from that one night, so it was best to leave it in the past. I thought it was best if I told her outright that nothing would be happening between us, so I didn’t leadher on at all. But then, when I saw her face fall, I wondered if I’d been too harsh about it. Especially when she said she didn’t understand how her sister could ever love me, then pushed me in the pool.
When I saw the Saylor sisters up close like this, I could see the resemblance I’d somehow missed when I first met Naomi. The silky dark brown hair, soft jawlines, and rare but bright smiles. But their mannerisms were all wrong. Where Saylor stood with perfect posture, Naomi always seemed to be on a lean, popping a hip out one direction or the other. Where Saylor was usually pretty reserved, Naomi was always flirting—even with guys who weren’t her boyfriend when she was in a relationship.
“Naomi,” I said flatly. “Saylor. Nice to see you.”
I tried to turn my attention back to my date, but as I looked away from Naomi, I accidentally made eye contact with Saylor, who almost seemed to be catching my attention, though I had no idea why.
“Hi,” I said to her, unable to help myself. I cringed afterward, realizing that I’d just said hello to her twice for no reason. Her mouth quirked like she was thinking the same. I cleared my throat and looked back at my date. “Do you know Naomi and Saylor?”
She shook her head and glanced at them, not quite smiling, but not really frowning either. She was completely indifferent, the way she'd been since the moment she walked into this coffee shop.
